Although they are only 3% of the total 17.4 million voters in the Srinagar Lok Sabha constituency, 38.73% of the total 16,338 ‘mapped’ Kashmiri Pandit migrant voters were on Monday. They voted at special polling stations set up in Jammu. “We exist somewhere, too, and we want the valley to be a better place for the young people who live there.”
Officials say this is three times more than the nearly 2,500 migrant voters who voted in the Srinagar LS constituency in the 2019 polls.
A total of 52,100 migrant voters across the country are eligible to vote in the Srinagar Lok Sabha constituency, but officials have been able to map only 16,338 of them, election officials said. Stated.
“Our votes may not make a direct difference in our lives, but we came here (to vote) because numerically we exist somewhere, “This is to show our support for today’s Kashmir, which is changing for the better.” Harshita Dar, a first-time voter, came all the way from Delhi to cast her vote at a special polling booth set up in Jagti township, near Nagrota, Jammu.
“I know we are electing MPs to serve in constituencies where we do not live, but my parents spent part of their childhood there and then moved to Jammu following violence by militants. “I want to improve the Kashmir that I lived in till 1990,” she said.
“At that time they were only nine or 10 years old and didn’t think very well of Kashmir, but now we young people want Kashmir to change for the better,” she said. He added that it is different from the 1990s when there were no people in Kashmir. They are even willing to accept their history (historical existence) and “today they treat us with respect.”
A 35-year-old civil servant who requested anonymity said that although his vote had no direct impact on his life, he came to vote solely to ensure that his name continued as an Indian citizen. Told. In her official record. Moreover, he hopes that “with his vote, someday someone will listen to our voices.”
Sanjay Bali, 40, who voted at a special polling station for KP migrants in Jagti township, asked what other options were available to them. “There are government welfare schemes for everyone, including Gujjars and Bakarwals, but I can’t think of anything,” he said, adding, however, that he is Indian First and that is his basic principle. He added that he came to vote because it is his right. Exercise your right to vote.
Ritua Raina, whose husband immigrated from Habak Dara in 1989, said she voted because she believed in democracy.
Meanwhile, in Jagti township near Nagrota, where a special polling station had been set up by the Election Commission, a group of migrants staged a demonstration after they noticed their names had disappeared from the voter list.
The Election Commission has abolished the practice of forcing immigrants to fill out a “Form M” to vote in their home parliamentary districts in the Valley, in a bid to increase voter turnout. The EC added that from now on, they will be “mapped” by constituency and a special polling station will be set up in the area where they currently reside, and they will have to bring it with them.
Veena, a resident of Yagti district, came to the polling booth along with three of her family members. All of them carried EPIC (voter ID) cards, but because their names were not on the voter list, they had to leave without voting.
© Indian Express Private Limited
Date first uploaded: May 14, 2024, 07:05 IST
