The Election Commission of India (ECI) rescheduled the upcoming elections for Jammu and Kashmir’s Anantnag-Rajouri seat late on Tuesday night.
The general elections for next federal government are underway in India. By the earlier schedule, elections in the Anantnag-Rajouri seat were supposed to be held next week on May 7.
Instead, the ECI announced on Tuesday that the election for the Anantnag-Rajouri seat will be held on May 25.
The country’s federal elections body took the decision due to the bad weather conditions prevailing in the region, the ECI said in a statement.
The ECI said it had received representations from several political parties for a postponement of elections “due to various logistic, communication and the natural barrier of connectivity turning out as hindrance in campaigning which in turn tantamount to lack of fair opportunities for the contesting candidates in the said parliamentary constituency which may affect poll process.”
“The commission after considering report from the UT administration as well as analysing the ground situation prevailing in the constituency, has decided under Section 56 of Representation of People Act, 1951, to revise the date of poll in the said Parliamentary Constituency in respect of ongoing General Election to Lok Sabha, 2024,” Sanjeev Kumar Prasad, Secretary of the ECI, said.
The main contest in the Anantnag-Rajouri seat is between regional political parties, as the ruling BJP had decided not to field candidates in any of the three seats of Kashmir — restricting itself to fighting the two seats in Jammu and one in Ladakh.
Prominent National Conference tribal politician Miyan Altaf and former state chief from the People’s Democratic Party Mehbooba Mufti are the chief contenders for the seats.
Candidates from two newly-formed political parties and independents are also fighting the elections.
The new parties were among those seeking the deferment of the elections.