The scramble for votes in Jammu’s Hindu heartland has prompted BJP leaders led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to go the whole hog to pitch for the “first” Jammu-centric BJP majority government in Jammu and Kashmir.

The push is akin to the BJP’s Mission-44 (majority in 87-member Jammu and Kashmir Assembly) slogan raised ahead of the 2014 state elections. The party ended up winning only 25 seats, 19 short of the majority.

The party refrained from raising such outlandish slogans this time, apparently after Muslims, who are two-thirds of Jammu and Kashmir’s population, voted overwhelmingly against it or parties linked to it in this year’s Lok Sabha polls.

Jammu’s 24 seats, which are overwhelmingly Hindu, along with 16 seats in north Kashmir are going to polls on Tuesday.

While the BJP has little stakes in north Kashmir, the party is expecting a clean sweep in 24 seats that fall in Jammu, Udhampur, Kathua and Samba districts. The party had garnered the highest number of votes in 22 out of these 24 seats in the recent parliamentary polls.

The BJP’s pro-Jammu and pro-Hindu rhetoric has got shriller ahead of the third and last phase of the polls on October 1. The 2022 delimitation gave Jammu 43, against 37 earlier, and Valley 47 seats, against 46 earlier, in the Assembly, making things a little easier for the BJP. But getting a majority remains an uphill task.

Senior BJP leader Sham Lal Sharma, who was previously with the Congress, on Friday said the time has come for Jammu and Kashmir to have its first Dogra Hindu chief minister.

The party has lined up the country’s top leadership, including Modi, for the final push.

Modi, who addressed a large election rally in Jammu on Saturday, his third in Jammu and Kashmir, refrained from directly calling for a Hindu chief minister but left nothing to the imagination.

The Prime Minister claimed the results of the first two phases had witnessed excellent voting for the BJP and it was now certain that Jammu and Kashmir will have its first full majority BJP government. In 2014, the party allied with the PDP to form the government.

“Are you listening, there will be a first full majority BJP government. I want to tell the Jammu voters in particular that there has never been such an opportunity in history for the people of the Jammu region. A government, as desired by the Jammu region, is becoming a possibility for the first time,” Modi said.

“This is the city of temples. Don’t miss this opportunity… the BJP government will address the discrimination faced by people of Jammu over decades.”

Political observers in Jammu said the BJP faced a lot of anger in Jammu’s Hindu heartland over issues such as reservation, jobs and economy but has succeeded in building a tempo in the run-up to the polls.

“The Congress appeared to be missing in action. Additionally, the promise of a Hindu chief minister is appealing to Jammu Dogras,” a Jammu politician said.

He said the Centre’s decision to grant ST status to the Pahari population, who are majority Muslims but include upper castes from both Hindu and Muslim communities, has adversely hit Dogras, who are Hindus.

“But many people might forget that on the polling day as they did in Lok Sabha polls,” he said.

Dogras were a ruling class before 1947, but no Dogra has become a chief minister since then.

R.K. Kalsotra, Jammu and Kashmir president of All India Confederation of SCs, STs
and OBCs, said the BJP’s clean sweep mission in Jammu
was unlikely.

“The BJP was trailing in RS Pora and Suchetgarh against the Congress candidate in the Lok Sabha polls. In addition, they have a tough contest in seats such as Akhnoor, Basoli, Jammu West, Khour and Billawar because a lot of Dalits and backwards are likely to vote against the BJP,” Kalsotra said.

But the BJP appears to be determined to break the caste barrier with its fierce Hindutva and nationalist rhetoric, which was on full display at the Prime Minister’s rally on Saturday.

Jammu, Udhampur, Samba and Kathua vote on October 1