Ishtiyaq Ahmad
Srinagar April 23 (KINS): The Anantnag Parliamentary seat is likely to witness a two-way contest between National Conference and PDP.
There are many candidates in the election fray which goes for polls on May 07. However, the main contest seems to be between NC’s Mian Altaf and PDP’s Mehbooba Mufti.
At present, the South Kashmir Lok Sabha seat is held by National Conference leader Justice Hasnian Masoodi.
Political parties have intensified their election campaigns and are competing against each other.
Historically, no political party has retained the seat since 1989.
In the 1989 parliamentary polls, PL Handoo of the National Conference emerged as the winner from the Anantnag Lok Sabha seat.
Although parliamentary polls were again held in 1991 across India, they could not take place in Kashmir due to the volatile situation in the valley. This prompted the Centre to promulgate an ordinance to defer elections for these seats.
In the 1996 polls, the Janta Dal candidate Muhammad Maqbool Dar emerged as the winner from this Lok Sabha constituency. Mufti Muhammad Sayeed won the South Kashmir Parliamentary seat in 1998 on the Congress ticket, and the polls recorded around a 28 percent voter turnout.
In 1999, the Lok Sabha seat of South Kashmir was won by the National Conference candidate Ali Muhammad Naik. The voter turnout stood at less than 20 percent. The elections were conducted against the backdrop of then National Conference leader Saifuddin Soz, who voted in defiance of the party whip against the BJP-led coalition government during the confidence motion in Lok Sabha. He later joined the Congress party.
Mehbooba Mufti made her maiden entry into Parliament in 2004 by defeating her rival National Conference candidate, Mehboob Beg, by more than 38,000 votes from the Anantnag constituency.
In 2009, the National Conference candidate Mehboob Beg was declared the winner. He defeated PDP candidate Peer Mohammad Hussain with a mere margin of 5,200 votes. Mehbooba won the Lok Sabha seat in 2014 by 65,417 votes. She defeated the then NC candidate Mehboob Beg, who later joined the PDP. In 2019, NC’s Masoodi won the Parliamentary seat. (KINS)
