It is ironic. The Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA), which came into being on the foundations of “secularism” has collapsed in the union territory of Ladakh under the heavy weight of communal polarisation between the Muslim-dominated Kargil and Buddhist-dominated Leh regions.
The entire rank and file of the National Conference in the Kargil district of the union territory of Ladakh have “rebelled” against the party leadership’s decision to concede the Ladakh parliamentary constituency to the Congress for the ongoing General Elections.
Both the National Conference and the Congress are part of the INDIA bloc. Under the agreement, of the six parliamentary seats in the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir, before it was divided into two union territories, the NC and the Congress shared three seats between themselves. While the valley’s three seats of Srinagar, Baramulla and Anantnag went to the NC, Congress got Jammu, Udhampur and Ladakh.
In Kashmir and Jammu regions, the arrangement worked smoothly. But in a polarised Ladakh region, the NC workers did not accept the arrangement. Ladakh is now a union territory with two districts of Leh and Kargil. Leh is predominantly a Buddhist area, while Kargil is a predominantly Muslim region.
The two districts have supported Congress and National Conference respectively. In Leh district, the BJP has also made deep inroads. BJP won the Ladakh parliamentary constituency in 2014 and 2019 due to the division of opposition votes between NC and the Congress.
Despite the alliance between the two parties this time, the Congress does not seem to gain much as the entire NC leadership in Kargil has rebelled and decided to go along with the Kargil Democratic Alliance (KDA). The alliance has put up Haji Haneef Jan as an independent candidate from Ladakh parliamentary constituency.
Interestingly, the Kargil unit of the Congress has also supported Jan’s candidature against the official party candidate Tsering Namgyal. This is because communal considerations have always overridden political affiliations in the highly volatile and communally polarised Ladakh region.
One of the senior-most National Conference leaders from Kargil, Qamar Ali Akhoon, a former minister, is leading the rebellion against the party and has announced that he will be resigning from the primary membership of the party, the National Conference.
The fact that even the Congress leaders from Kargil are supporting the rebel independent candidate leaves hardly any doubts as to how communally polarised the situation is in the Kargil district.
People of the Muslim-dominated Kargil region have a long-held grievance that they have been made subservient to the Buddhist-dominated Ladakh region. They have been seeking Schedule Six status that will allow them autonomous local governance, although there already exists a semi-autonomous Kargil Hill Development Council.
The BJP had won the Ladakh parliamentary seat in 2014 and 2019. This time it replaced its sitting MP Jamyang Tsering Namgyal with Tashi Gyalson. The Congress has fielded Tsering Namgyal (not Jamyang Tsering Namgyal of the BJP) from here.
With the Muslim-dominated Kargil region having unanimously fielded Jan as an independent candidate and the votes in the Buddhist-dominated Ladakh region likely to get divided between the Congress and the BJP, Jan has a definite edge.
However, with deep polarisation in the region, which has hardly any parallels, there is a likelihood of the Leh region voters also uniting and voting in favour of a single candidate, whoever he may be, whether from the Congress or the BJP, to prevent the division of votes.
Ladakh will be one of the most interesting constituencies to watch and a case study has how communal affinities override the political affiliations.
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