Kashmir elections neither free nor fair

Kashmir elections neither free nor fair
May 1996

The Statesman

In a poll process that was neither free nor fair, but a successfully completed electoral exercise by the government, the Kashmir Valley underwent the first phase of elections after seven years. People were herded out of villages throughout the Valley to ensure a voter turnout of 43% in Anantnag and 35% in Baramulla.
However, though the Government achieved its goal of holding elections in the Valley, the voters, claiming they had been brought to the polling booths forcibly, remained alienated from the democratic process.
The residents of Awantipora said they were threatened that their houses would be burnt if they did not come out. Most villagers in the Anantnag district too, told a similar tale. Rounds by the security forces, announcements fromloud speakers, in some places from the Masjids, through the local residents and forcible eviction from the houses, were employed to get the voters to the booths. Resentment was high in Bijbehara, where in one locality 40 persons had lost their lives in October 1993, when the security forces opened fire on a demonstration. People said they had refused to come out despite announcements and several rounds by the forces, but had been forced out eventually after continuous pressure. They claimed that men of the counter-insurgency group, the Ikhwan-ul-Muslimoon, had accompanied the Rashtriya Rifles on the third round around the village.
In village Delina the residents came out on the streets on seeing journalists. Despite the presence of the security forces around they raised pro-azadi slogans and gave free vent to their ire against the forces, who, they said, had beaten them to force them out of their houses. There was little secrecy at the polling booths and in several of them, the polling officers were showing voters where to stamp the ballot paper. Most of the polling booths had no polling agents of any of the contesting candidates and there was no method of verification of voters’ identities, with the administration more than happy to allow anyone to vote.