While
free election in a climate of fear, that prevails in Jammu and Kashmir, is
a far cry even the fairness of the current polls has come under cloud with
two of the four phases of polling yet to be held. The allegations of
coercion to bring the unwilling voters to the polling booths, tampering
with the electoral rolls, bogus polling with the ruling party carrying
hordes of non-voters on wheels to several polling booths, booth capturing
and the use of administration to help the National Conference have already
been made not only by the opposition parties but even by various credible
independent observers teams. What makes the electoral exercise doubtful
are the allegations made by the leader of the People’s Democratic Party,
Muzaffar Beig regarding the role of the police and the attempts to replace
the Electronic Voting Machines of the first two phases of the polls, now
under custody of the security forces. A renowned Supreme Court lawyer
known for his balanced views, who is not used to make wild and
unsubstantiated charges, Beig has accused the State police chief AK Suri
of acting as a card holder of the ruling party alleging that the police in
South Kashmir, which is going to polls in the third phase and where PDP is
posing a serious threat to the NC, has been directed to forget the
Election Commission directives and help the NC. He went to the extent of
saying that “I can prove it and if I fail they have every right to sue
me”. Even more serious was Beig’s allegation that the ruling party was
hell bent on replacing the EVMs by bribing the central forces guarding
them. According to him a leading businessman and friend of Farooq.
Abdullah had landed in Srinagar with a truck load of cash and has been
moving in the government-owned chopper and the vehicle of the chief
minister’s personal security officer for this purpose.
The PDP leader has warned that if nothing was done
by the EC to prevent such malpractices his party would be forced to walk
out of the poll contest. The allegations made by such a responsible
political leader are too serious to be ignored. These cast a shadow of
cloud over the CEC’s claims of the present elections in the state as
“fairest ever” held in the country. Serious doubts have been expressed
about the possibility of fair election in the State under the Farooq
government, which has a dubious past record in rigging and which has
already been using the administrative machinery and resources for
improving its electoral prospects. The allegations regarding the
replacement or misuse of EVMs are further substantiated with the reports
that one EVM has been seized from the residence of the Agriculture and
Rural Development Minister Chowdhary Ramzan. An employee of the RDD in
Lolab Mohammed Yusuf Bhat has been detained for possessing an EVM given to
him for depositing with the District Returning Officer and the has been
detained. What adds to the suspicion about tampering with the EVMs is the
veil of secrecy that is being maintained regarding the official statistics
on the polling in the first two phases of the elections. The figures about
the actual percentage of polling are changing after every day casting
further suspicions about the fairness of the polls. The delay in releasing
the segmentwise poll tallies in the first two phases, which should have
been done after the conclusion of polling, also cast doubts with many
considering it as deliberate to manipulate the figures. The EC will have
to dispel doubts about the fairness of elections. At least it should fully
inquire into all allegations with open mind instead of outrightly
rejecting them as the State’s chief electoral officer Pramod Jain has
been doing.
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