JK News Today Commentary
The Election Commission of India will be on a three-day visit of Jammu and Kashmir from Thursday apparently to assess the situation and the preparedness of parties and administration for holding the legislative Assembly polls in the Union Territory which has not seen an elected government ever since it was born on October 31, 2019 as a result of the announcement of bifurcation of the state on August 5 that year. Now it is almost certain that the polls will be held by September-end . PM has delivered on his promise .
It is clear that the Election Commission will undertake an exercise of interacting with the political parties and the administration before announcing the polls to J&K UT assembly. The whole thing is already in place .
It has become possible due to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s commitment to democracy and democratic rights of the people of Jammu and Kashmir. Within days after the abrogation of Article 370 on August 5, Prime Minister , in his address to the nation , had promised that the J&K will have its own elected MLAs, ministers and Chief Minister . Each and every word of Prime Minister translated the democratic intentions and commitment to the people of J&K . Now it is going to become a reality in letter and spirit .
On June 20 , 2024 , soon after he assumed office for a third time in a row, Prime Minister told an audience in Srinagar, the capital city of Srinagar, that “ preparations for Assembly polls in J&K have begun “ as he expressed his gratitude to high turnout of the people in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections in the Union Territory, especially in the Kashmir Valley which had broken all the previous records of the past 40 years. This was an unprecedented success of the policies that the Modi Government had planned and implemented in the erstwhile state ever since May 2014 when it came to power first .
There has been a detailed commentary on the transformation of J&K , with a special focus on the Kashmir Valley, after the abrogation of Article 370 in August 2019 , The fact is that Prime Minister had been working on bringing in changes in Jammu and Kashmir , not just getting the state rid of menace of terrorism but creating an ethos in which the state flourished in peace . He heaped all praise in the youth of J&K , cricketers and all others who made their mark , to define role models for the youth in Kashmir.
His first speech in Srinagar on December 8, 2014 , if read carefully and understood in the real spirit of its intentions was a clear vision of peace, progress for the people of Kashmir and their rightful place in the country and the world. He had spoken of making Kashmir as a world class tourist destination . That time, there was not much of talk of abrogation of Article 370 , though Modi had advised the parties and people in J&K to mull and debate among themselves on the merits and demerits of this constitutional provision at a rally in MAM stadium in Jammu in December 2013 , months before he was elected as Prime Minister with BJP getting a clear majority in the general elections .
After the abrogation of Article 370 , the democratic exercise gained momentum . The elections , which before that were seen as the only democratic exercise in Jammu and Kashmir, were given a new meaning with the elections undertaken to the panchayat bodies . For the first time, J&K had access to the grassroots democracy . More than 30,000 public representatives dotted the landscape. It changed the whole scenario.
Union Home Minister Amit Shah , who had piloted the abrogation of Article 370 in the Parliament on August 5 and 6 , 2019 , worked day in and day out to make the things possible . That the revocation of the constitutional provision that had stood as a wall between the state of Jammu and Kashmir and the rest of the country was demolished was a big success story in itself, but there was much more- to deliver on the promises of not only physically integrating the state into the Indian Union , though as two separate Union territories, but also through emotional connect .
Today, the efforts have fructified – J&K is at the cusp of having Assembly elections .
