The 1987 assembly election is considered to be very controversial in the history of Jammu and Kashmir. It is said that this single election changed the fate of Jammu and Kashmir forever. It was only after this that guns entered the valley. Let us tell you that after a decade, the bugle of assembly elections has been blown in the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir. Assembly elections will be held in Jammu and Kashmir in three phases between September 18 and October 1. The Election Commission announced this on Friday. Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar said that the counting of votes will take place on October 4. Assembly elections are going to be held for the first time in Jammu and Kashmir after most of the provisions of Article 370 of the Constitution were abolished in the year 2019. Assembly elections were last held in the state in 2014.
1987 Jammu and Kashmir Assembly elections: Rigging, foundation of discontent and rebellion
The 1987 Jammu and Kashmir Assembly elections are an important and controversial event in the political history of the state. This election not only led to political instability in the state, but also proved to be the catalyst for a wave of militancy and terrorism in the Kashmir Valley. Today we will try to understand the events of the 1987 elections and also try to understand how this election paved the way for the entry of guns into the valley.
Syed Salahuddin contested the election from Muslim United Front
The 1987 elections were fought in alliance between the National Conference and the Congress. The opposition was the Muslim United Front (MUF). The MUF was an alliance of local Muslim parties and groups in Kashmir, inspired by separatist ideology. Syed Mohammad Yusuf Shah, now known as Syed Salahuddin, was a MUF candidate in the 1987 assembly elections. Syed Salahuddin was contesting from the Amira Kadal seat located in the heart of Srinagar as a Muslim United Front (MUF) candidate. This was the last time Syed Salahuddin participated in the electoral process before crossing the Line of Control (LoC) and leading the terrorist organization Hizb-ul-Mujahideen.
Mohammad Yusuf Shah was a religious preacher and used to deliver Friday sermons and lead namaz at a mosque outside Srinagar’s civil secretariat. Elections were finally held on March 23, 1987 and people came out in large numbers to vote. For the first time in Kashmir, the voter turnout touched 80%. It is said that this election was a referendum for the Islamists under the banner of MUF. That is why huge crowds turned out to vote. The huge turnout and the wave of sympathy for the MUF candidates made the Congress government in Delhi and its ally NC in Srinagar restless.
Syed Salahuddin was defeated and ….
Then came the counting of votes. But the results were delayed for several days and when they were finally declared, only four MUF candidates were shown winning. These included Syed Ali Shah Geelani, Syed Ahmad Shah (brother of separatist leader Shabir Shah), Abdul Razak and Gilam Nabi Sumji. The MUF had fielded 44 candidates. The general perception was that the governments in both Delhi and Srinagar had conspired to rig the results to keep the NC-Congress in power.
As the counting progressed, it became clear that the conservative Syed Salahuddin was far ahead of his rival, National Conference’s Ghulam Mohiuddin Shah. As Salahuddin’s lead grew, Mohiuddin Shah left the counting centre in frustration. However, he was soon called back to the polling centre, where he was declared the winner of the Amira Kadal assembly seat.
After trailing by a huge margin, Mohiuddin Shah was declared the winner by 4,289 votes. There was chaos after Muslim United Front (MUF) and Salahuddin supporters clashed with security personnel alleging rigging in the vote counting process. There were reports of large-scale rigging during the election. There were allegations that the government controlled the voting process and misused officials to defeat opposition candidates. In the election results, the National Conference-Congress alliance won a majority, while the MUF did not get the expected number of seats. The electoral rigging caused deep discontent among many MUF supporters and they lost their faith in the democratic process. No inquiry was ever conducted into the allegations of rigging.
After the elections, Syed Salahuddin and Yasin Malik were jailed
There was a virtual curfew in many parts of the Kashmir Valley – Anantnag, Sopore, Handwara and Baramulla – and the victorious Farooq Abdullah government was busy arresting top MUF leaders, giving rise to allegations of rigging and electoral fraud. Syed Salahuddin and his campaign manager Yasin Malik and other supporters were jailed without any charges.
There were reports that Mohammad Yusuf Shah’s rival NC’s Ghulam Mohidin Shah personally beat him up inside the jail. Soon after his release, Malik fled to Pakistan and later emerged as the chief of the terrorist outfit Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF). Aijaz Dar took up arms and targeted and killed the then DIG Ali Mohammad Watali at his residence. Mohammad Yusuf Shah himself fled to Pakistan and adopted the name ‘Syed Salahuddin’. He became the supremo of Hizbul Mujahideen and an internationally declared terrorist.
And guns entered Kashmir
The elections in the spring of 1987 were Syed Salahuddin’s last foray into electoral politics in India. He then took up arms with the aim of merging Jammu and Kashmir with Pakistan. He vowed to unleash terror in the Kashmir Valley and sabotage any peace talks. His election manager Yasin Malik fled to Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) and began leading the Muzaffarabad-based terrorist group Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF).
After the elections, many other Kashmiri youth moved to Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (POK), where they were trained in terrorism. This was the time when guns started entering the valley. Pakistan took advantage of this discontent to supply arms, finance and train terrorists to promote terrorism in the valley. Using these weapons, a new wave of militant activity began in the valley, which kept the region unstable for decades to come.
How many times elections were held in Jammu and Kashmir?
Assembly elections have been held 11 times in the state since 1951, while parliamentary elections have been held 12 times since 1967. The first assembly elections in Jammu and Kashmir were held in 1951, which proved to be a turning point in the political history of the state. In this election, the National Conference won all 75 seats, and Sheikh Abdullah was elected the Prime Minister of the state.