Moderate voting in J&K despite general strike

  This is the highest polling percentage in the state in all the five phases of the Lok Sabha elections.

Chief Electoral Officer B R Sharma said the cold desert Ladakh constituency recorded 65 per cent polling, while Baramulla-Kupwara recorded 40 per cent.

Polling in Baramulla-Kupwara was held amid an election boycott and general strike call by the separatists.

The impact of the call was visible only in Sopore and Baramulla towns, while the people voted in large numbers in the rest of the constituency. However, the voters also boycotted polls at Bomai village in Sopore, where two civilians were allegedly killed in firing by security forces. Sopore is the home town of hardline separatist leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani.

However, in Handwara, the home town of another separatist leader, Sajjad Gani Lone, who is contesting the polls, long queues of voters were seen at the polling stations.
 “Sajjad has promised to raise the Kashmir issue in Parliament, and that is why I am voting for him,” said Abdul Majid, a local resident.

Sixty-five-year-old Hajra said her family had always voted for Sajjad’s father, Abdul Gani Lone, a separatist leader who was killed by unidentified gun men in 2002. “It is good that now his son is contesting elections. We are going to vote for him,” she said while waiting in a queue. Some youths in the apple-rich of town of Sopore said: “We will not vote. Election is a meaningless exercise, and we care for the solution of the Kashmir issue.”

Normal life was paralysed across Kashmir Valley in view of a separatist-sponsored general strike against the polls. Shops and other business establishments, government offices, educational institutions and banks remained closed. Vehicles were also off the roads.

Boycott call finds no takers

The call for boycott of polls by separatists did not have much effect in Ladakh parliamentary constituency as voters thronged the 476 polling booths since morning to exercise their franchise in the fifth and final phase of elections, reports PTI from Leh.
An estimated 61 per cent of the 1.52 lakh electorate cast their votes in the constituency, poll officials told reporters. While voters in Leh said they are voting for development of the district, their counterparts in Kargil said they wanted the reopening of the Kargil-Skardu road and friendship between India and Pakistan. “We have suffered a lot due to hostilities between India and Pakistan. Since the ceasefire reached between the two countries in 2003, we are doing our farming and business unmindful of any danger,” Mohammad Ayub said.