Jammu: Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Home Minister Amit Shah and other senior ministers will campaign for the BJP candidates in J&K. PM Modi, Amit Shah, Rajnath Singh, Nitin Gadkari and BJP President, J.P. Nadda in addition to other senior leaders of the party will campaign for the party candidates from September 8 onwards.
Party sources said that the PM is expected to arrive in J&K after September 10, but given the pre-occupation of the PM, there might be some change in his programme. “The participation of Amit Shah, Rajnath Singh, Nitin Gadkari, J.P.Nadda and other senior BJP leaders is already confirmed. The PM may campaign for the party candidates during the second phase,” the sources added.
The sources said that the PM will address two rallies, one in Jammu and the other in Srinagar, but the dates for these rallies are yet to be finalised. BJP is fighting the J&K Assembly polls without any alliance partners, although the party may support some Independent candidates depending upon the ground situation. The main opponents of the BJP in this election are the NC-Congress allies.
These two parties have entered into a pre-poll alliance. This alliance is basically aimed at keeping the BJP out of power in J&K. Senior leaders of both the NC and the Congress have admitted that the formation of the alliance between the two parties has been a political compulsion to keep the BJP from coming to power in the union territory. While the BJP is well entrenched in the Jammu division that has 43 Assembly seats, the party’s presence in Kashmir, where there are 47 seats, is not of predominant political significance.
During the Lok Sabha elections, the BJP did not field any candidate of its own party in the three seats of Srinagar, Baramulla and Anantnag-Rajouri in Kashmir. BJP supported the candidates of J&K Apni Party headed by Syed Altaf Bukhari in Srinagar and Anantnag-Rajouri Lok Sabha seats and the Peoples Conference (PC) led by Sajad Gani Lone in the Baramulla seat. BJP-supported Apni Party and PC candidates did not win any of these three seats including Srinagar, Baramulla and Anantnag-Rajouri.
IANS
