The Lok Sabha election in Jammu and Kashmir will be held in five phases beginning April 11 but the simultaneous assembly and parliamentary elections are “not possible” in the state “due to security concerns,” the state’s chief electoral officer Shailendra Kumar said on Sunday.
Addressing a press conference here, he said the entire pollingprocess in the state would end on May 6. The restive Anantnag parliamentaryconstituency, comprising Anantnag, Shopian and Kulgam districts, will go to thepolls “in parts” in the third, fourth and fifth phase.
The CEO said the notification for twoconstituencies—Baramulla and Jammu—which are going to polls in the first phasewill be issued on March 16.
In the second phase, Srinagar and Udhampur constituencieswill go to the polls on April 18 and in the third and fourth phases, some areasof Anantnag are going to polls on April 23 and April 29 respectively.
In the fifth and last phase, the remaining areas of Anantnagconstituency and Ladakh constituency will go to the polls on May 6.
The CEO that that multi-phase polling in a particularconstituency “is possible according to the law”.
All the poll-related preparations have been finalised and wetrying to provide best facilities to voters at all polling booths, he said.
He also said that with the announcement of schedule for thegeneral elections, the model code of conduct (MCC) has come into effect and theadministration has constituted committees to check its violations, if any.
The CEO said that simultaneous assembly and parliamentaryelections are “not possible” in the state “due to security concerns.”
“Unlike the parliament elections, the assembly electionsrequire more security set up and the present situation does not favour holdingof simultaneous polls,” he told reporters here, soon after the electioncommission of India announced the dates for the LokSabha elections.
Justifying the decision of the Commission and the governmenton deferring the assembly polls in J&K, Kumar said: “J&K has sixparliamentary constituencies and if we have 10 candidates for each seat, wehave a total of 60 candidates whom we have to provide security. But in theassembly polls, we have candidates in thousands and it’s impossible to providesecurity to every candidate.”
“If we go for simultaneous elections, we need more securitypersonnel. We have 87 assembly segments and going by rough calculations, wehave over 900 candidates who require security, especially in the Valley. Theyrequire security at both, their residences and places of campaigning. So thereis additional requirement (of security personnel),” he added.
“The campaign areas in assembly polls are very large ascandidates try to reach out to the most far-flung areas in theirconstituencies, thus putting pressure on the police to go for large areadomination,” he said.”Therefore if we go for simultaneous elections,the requirement of security personnel goes up manifold. Roughly, we have 10candidates in every parliamentary constituency, so for six constituencies wehave a total of 60 candidates. But if the assembly elections are held alongsideLS polls, then we have around 1000 candidates, and one can understand thedifference. In Jammu division also, we have certain areas where some subversiveactivities have been noticed,” he said.