Jehangir Ali 
Srinagar: A political landslide triggered by the surprising victory of the Awami Ittehad Party (AIP) leader Sheikh Rashid Ahmad aka Engineer Rashid from the Baramulla Lok Sabha constituency has thrown a spotlight on how the Bhartiya Janta Party’s devious policy on Jammu and Kashmir has failed to deliver any tangible electoral results for the party.
Incarcerated in New Delhi’s Tihar jail since 2019 when he was arrested by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) on terror funding charges, Rashid has over the years come to represent the face of injustice meted out to many Kashmiris, especially after the saffron party took Jammu and Kashmir under its firm grip in 2018.
The AIP leader, who joined politics after quitting the government service in 2008, was the first mainstream leader from Jammu and Kashmir to be booked under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act. Since 2019, the law has been invoked to incarcerate thousands of Kashmiris, including journalists.
Many UAPA suspects, like Rashid, continue to languish in jails outside J&K.
During the 2024 Lok Sabha election campaign, Abrar Rashid, his son, never missed the opportunity to point towards the “unjust” arrest of his father by the central investigation agency. Without any invitation, promises of freebies or cash, the junior Rashid attracted decent crowds, stunning even the established parties like the National Conference (NC).
Political analysts believe that the victory of Rashid has belied the saffron party’s attempts to engineer the north Kashmir constituency electorally with the help of its allies – the Apni Party led by Altaf Bukhari and Sajad Lone’s Peoples Conference. Ahead of the election, the BJP had convened a secret meeting at the residence of Bukhari in Srinagar to get their act together in support of the PC chairman.
However, the meeting seems to have had little impact on the voters. The ECI data shows that Lone polled 1,71,582 or 16.72% votes, down from 22.65% that his party’s candidate, Raja Aijaz Ali, polled in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls. “Many AIP supporters were first-time voters, who found resonance in the issues of ‘mazloom qoum’ (oppressed community) of Kashmir and their ‘haq’ (rights) raised by Rashid’s son during the election campaign,” said a Srinagar-based political analyst.
Analysts also believe that the message that Rashid could walk out of jail if he won the election, which was the focus of his son’s campaign, resonated with many people of Kashmir whose loved ones have met similar fates since 2019, “The AIP leader also benefited from his image as an ordinary Kashmiri who takes on the powerful and established politicians inside and outside the legislature,” he added.
On the other hand, the AIP leader polled nearly half (4,69,574 votes/45.75% and counting) of all the ballots cast (10,26,457), indicating that the popular sentiment had driven the voters away from the BJP and its allies. The victory of Rashid, a three-time legislator from the Langate constituency in north Kashmir, has also given his party a solid standing in four districts of Kashmir, which will make him a force to reckon with in the coming days.
“The message that has come out is that Rashid is not confined to his assembly constituency alone. He has defeated J&K’s former chief minister from the oldest political party and a powerful ally of the BJP. It is a significant victory which will shape the political contours of Jammu and Kashmir in coming days,” said a former professor at the University of Kashmir, who wished to remain anonymous.
What makes the AIP leader’s victory sweeter for his supporters is that he has felled the giant of Omar Abdullah. The former J&K chief minister and the National Conference (NC) vice-president vacated the Srinagar Lok Sabha constituency, his party’s stronghold, and took the fight to the north of Kashmir against Sajad Lone, whom he described as an ally of the BJP.
According to the ECI data, the former J&K chief minister bagged 25.22% votes, a drop of about 5% from the 29.29% votes that the NC candidate, M Akbar Lone, had polled in the 2019 parliamentary election.
“Engineer Rashid is not a saint,” Mohammad Sidiq, 65, an angry National Conference supporter told The Wire outside the vote counting centre in Srinagar after hearing the result of the Baramulla constituency, “He benefitted emotionally because no one spoke about his incarceration in the last five years. Youngsters were drawn to his campaign.”
Sidiq, a farmer from central Kashmir’s Chadoora, added: “I think this time people didn’t vote for one party or another. They voted against the BJP. They voted because there are hundreds of people in jail who should be released. Their sentiments were echoed by Rashid’s son.”
While Rashid’s victory will keep Omar Abdullah out of the parliament, it also raises a lot of questions about the political trajectory of the former chief minister who has, along with another former J&K chief minister Mehbooba Mufti who also lost the Anantnag-Rajouri constituency to the National Conference’s Mian Altaf, vowed to stay away from the assembly elections until Jammu and Kashmir gets its statehood back.