New Delhi

Attributed to use of EVMs and judicious use of paramilitary and police forces.

The curtain has come down on the 2009 Lok Sabha elections which is considered the least violent in recent times. While over 20 people were killed in election-related violence this time, the figure was 48 in the 2004 general elections, and nearly 100 in 1999.

Provisional figures available with the Election Commission (EC) suggest that levels of repolling — directly related to election violence — have also reduced with 648 polling stations across the country had repolls/adjourned polls of which 117 booths were in Manipur alone.

EC officials attribute low levels of violence to two factors: the use of electronic voting machines (EVMs); and the judicious use of paramilitary and police forces to enable the conduct of the elections.

Officials conceded that when they planned the elections, spread over five phases during India’s hottest months, they asked themselves if security was more important or turnout. It is acknowledged that the heat kept people indoors and kept the turnout percentage low.

But they were clear that no voter’s right to franchise should be abridged in any way by compromising on security. “Election-related violence has almost always been connected to attempts to rig the election. With EVMs, this is virtually impossible. So not only is rigging down, so is violence,” an EC official said.

“The process of carrying the ballot boxes from the site of voting to the counting centre, booth capturing, impersonation, fudging voting… all this could happen so long as voting was done manually. Now it is impossible to capture a booth or impersonate,” he said. In fact, 2004 was the first election conducted entirely through EVMs.

How much the EVMs have changed the way elections are conducted in India can be judged by what used to happen during elections earlier. The 1989 elections saw riots among Hindus and Muslims taking place in Jaipur for the first time. This happened because voting was manually conducted and ballot papers were not brought from the polling centres and mixed. When the 1989 Lok Sabha results were out, it became clear from the pattern of voting that the Muslim areas had voted against the BJP MP from Jaipur, Girdhari Lal Bhargava. An angry mob set fire to Muslim-dominated areas during a victory rally taken out by Bhargava’s supporters. Following this incident, ballot papers were always mixed before they were counted, so that polling agents would not know in which booth who voted how.

A former Congressman, now on the periphery of active power politics, told Business Standard how elections used to be rigged prior to the EVM era. “Trucks full of ballot papers would take boxes to the counting stations. En route, all an enterprising candidate had to do was keep a few trucks with stamped ballot papers ready — and just switch the trucks,” he explained.

“Today, this cannot happen. Yes, there have been reports of EVMs malfunctioning. That is because the wires might not have been connected correctly or because of some other technical error. But you cannot stuff EVMs with preprogrammed votes,” said an EC official.

Significantly, this time no constituency saw the election being countermanded — which happens if a candidate dies or there is unacceptable levels of violence during the poll. A candidate from the Indian Justice Party did die in Uttar Pradesh but as the party is not recognised by the EC, the election went on as scheduled.

The BBC's India election train has stopped off in the state of Haryana where locals have given their opinions on what they hope the elections will bring.
The train, which is carrying BBC journalists covering the election, will stop at eight key locations during its 18-day, 8,000km journey.

BBC correspondent Karishma Vaswani has been speaking to people on the way.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/8018978.stm

By Ben Arnoldy

New Delhi - All politics may be local, but India is taking the notion to an extreme: Voters this week head into national elections with no national issues dominating campaigns. In the world's largest democracy, many will choose members of parliament more for their attention to potholes down the street than to Pakistan.

That's surprising given recent events here. A major terrorist attack on Mumbai exposed police and intelligence failures less than half a year ago. Neighboring Pakistan is caught in an Islamist insurgency. And a global recession is clipping India's economic growth.

Yet none of this appears to have galvanized voters. Even the jailing of a scion of the prominent Nehru-Gandhi political dynasty for a Muslim-baiting speech has failed to generate much Hindu-nationalist energy. Pollsters say voters seem more concerned with local development, such as the condition of a school, the expansion of a nearby road, or more continuous electricity.

What does it mean for the world's largest democracy that voters care more about local than national issues? For starters, the election, which ends on May 13, could result in a weak – and perhaps short-lived – coalition government.

"It's like a ship without a rudder. There is no one guiding the country as a whole in its relations with other countries, or with problems that transcend national boundaries of India, or come from outside," says Prem Shankar Jha, a senior political analyst senior political analyst and a columnist for the Deccan Herald.

What matters? New bridges, buses


Yet he and others also see a positive move by voters toward holding politicians accountable and away from appeals to jingoism or communal politics – even if that muddies any national mandate for the central government.

"What's changed in the last five years is we've had it up to our noses with [politicians] demanding loyalty for who they are – we want them to perform," says Mr. Jha.

"Performance" means being accessible and taking action on local affairs, according to polling done by the Hindustan Times, a leading English-language daily. Nearly half of voters polled listed development and area-specific issues as top issues, with only 21 percent citing the economic downturn and 14 percent saying terrorism.

In a country so immense and diverse, and with so many people struggling for basic needs, local concerns can be very narrow indeed. Yashwant Deshmukh, a pollster with the CVoter Foundation, puts it this way: A voter in New Delhi may notice some new bridges and mass transit around the city and decide to reward the party in local power – or, if the new metro causes his dwelling to shake, punish that party.

These local-issue votes – pouring in from a 714 million person electorate spanning seven major religions and 20 official languages – are not expected to add up to an outright majority for one party. Though the ruling Congress Party may win a plurality of votes, it's not guaranteed to keep its top spot. The fractured electorate means many small parties and politicians could secure enough votes to become coalition kingmakers.
One possible kingmaker is Kumari Mayawati, who's added spice to the election in her outsider's bid to become the nation's first Dalit – or bottom-rung caste – prime minister.

Otherwise, the campaigns have failed to generate much excitement. Manmohan Singh and LK Advani – the elderly prime ministerial candidates from the ruling Congress party and the BJP, respectively – have spent decades on the Indian political scene.

"Other than that, what's happening? Nothing. Two very old people are battling it out," says Mr. Deshmukh.
He's not alone in his lack of enthusiasm. More Indians are expected to tune into an upcoming cricket championship than the election coverage, including the night that votes are counted on May 16, according to studies by two media buying companies.

Voters have even given low priority to terrorism and national security despite suffering an attack in Mumbai that some have called "India's 9/11."

Analysts point out that India has borne terrorist attacks for decades and tends not to see one party as more competent in responding. Fatigue with communal religious struggles also seems to be high, dampening the domestic aftershocks from Mumbai. Deshmukh suggests this had to do with the response of the Muslim community in Mumbai – it clearly denounced the attacks and refused to bury the terrorists in local Muslim cemeteries.


Attempts by the major parties to reach outside politics to galvanize voters haven't garnered much mileage, either. Congress have latched on to the child actors in the Oscar-winning movie Slumdog Millionaire, while the BJP churned out pen-holders in the shape of the Nano – the new $2,000 car that's the pride of India.
The weakness of top-down, imposed notions of what should bind the nation together doesn't bother Rajeev Bhargava, director of the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies in New Delhi.

The fact that no single party can take charge and different coalitions must come together does reflect how India is becoming a "fractured society," he says. But that doesn't mean secession, just a more bottom-up approach to national participation.

"What we are witnessing is a change in the way that the whole nation is conceived," says Mr. Bhargava. "In the past it's something that's been largely imagined by a small group of people in the hope it will percolate downwards. What is happening now is a nationalism that is developing from multiple regions and multiple centers."

April 16th Thursday
Andhra Pradesh
Arunachal Pradesh
Assam
Bihar
Jammu & Kashmir
Kerala
Maharashtra
Manipur
Meghalaya
Mizoram
Nagaland
Orissa
Uttar Pradesh
Chhattisgarh
Jharkhand
Andaman & Nicobar Islands
Chandigarh
Lakshadweep
April 23rd Thursday
Andhra Pradesh
Assam
Bihar
Goa
Jammu & Kashmir
Karnataka
Madhya Pradesh
Maharashtra
Manipur
Orissa
Tripura
Uttar Pradesh
Jharkhand
April 23rd Thursday
Bihar
Haryana
Jammu & Kashmir
Punjab
Rajasthan
Uttar Pradesh
West Bengal
NCT of Delhi
May 07 Thursday

Himachal Pradesh
Jammu & Kashmir
Punjab
Tamil Nadu
Uttar Pradesh
West Bengal
Uttarakhand
Pondicherry
May 13 Wednesday
Himachal Pradesh
Jammu & Kashmir
Punjab
Tamil Nadu
Uttar Pradesh
West Bengal
Uttarakhand
Pondicherry

Once a Congress Party stronghold, India’s most populous state is now dominated by two caste-based parties, the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) led by Dalit (formerly untouchable) leader Mayawati, and the Samajwadi Party (SP) of Mulayam Singh Yadav, which draws support from lower castes and Muslims. The two parties won 54 seats between them in 2004, while Congress and the BJP won 19 between them.
Acute poverty, rising crime, poor infrastructure and abysmal healthcare are the biggest problems in the state, often referred to as India’s Hindi heartland.
Mayawati’s BSP is looking to repeat its sweeping victory in 2007 state elections. It has assiduously cultivated upper-caste Hindus to refashion itself as a rainbow coalition of high and low castes.
Mayawati has ambitions to become a pan-Indian leader and could be a crucial player in coalition negotiations once the votes are counted. It is even possible she could emerge as prime minister at the head of a Third Front of communist and left-wing parties.

Bihar is renowned as one of India’s poorest and most lawless states.
Two regional parties - the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) and the Janata Dal United (JDU) - dominate the political landscape. Both have links with the country’s main political parties, the RJD with Congress, and the JDU with the BJP.
In 2004, the RJD, led by the flamboyant Laloo Yadav, picked up more than half of the state’s seats, while the JDU managed only six. Mr Yadav went on to become railway minister in the Congress-led government. He has been credited with turning around India’s ailing train network.
But the tables have turned since 2004. The JDU and BJP swept state polls in 2005, with JDU leader Nitish Kumar cashing in on popular disenchantment with the RJD government and the deteriorating law and order situation. Analysts say the JDU-BJP alliance has a good chance of picking up more seats than the RJD-Congress in the forthcoming national election.
Bihar needs to catch up with the rest of India - and jobs, development, infrastructure and security are what its voters demand.

One of India’s most economically developed states - and one of its most politically volatile. Known as India’s Detroit for its car making, it also has a strong services sector and a booming film industry.
The main contest will be between two of India’s most powerful regional parties, the DMK and the AIADMK. Since the 1960s, regional parties have tapped into nascent Tamil nationalism and lower caste aspirations.
M Karunanidhi, an astute scriptwriter, heads the DMK, which governs the state. Pitted against him is a controversial former actress, the feisty J Jayalalitha, who leads the AIADMK. The dominance of these two personality-driven parties is so great that no national party has been able to make substantial political headway in Tamil Nadu in the last three decades.
In 2004 the DMK coalition swept every seat. But Tamil Nadu is considered a swing state. Whoever wins there is likely to play an important role in the forming of India’s new coalition government.

Andhra Pradesh is marked by extreme affluence - there are vast farms and a burgeoning info-tech and services industry - and desperate poverty. The state also faces a separatist movement in the poverty-ridden Telangana region.
State and federal elections are both taking place here, with a keen contest in prospect between the ruling Congress Party and the main opposition alliance, led by the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) with the support of the communists.
Andhra Pradesh was a Congress stronghold until the TDP emerged in the 1980s. In 2004, a Congress-led alliance swept the polls, winning 37 seats. Five years earlier an alliance between the TDP and the BJP had taken 36.
Congress is banking this time on schemes like cheap rice, free electricity for farmers, free health cover for poor families and cheap loans for women.
Meanwhile, Chandrababu Naidu, the TDP leader hailed in the West as a mascot of economic reforms, is promising free electricity and television sets and unemployment benefit.

State and general elections are both likely to be three-sided contests, following a split in March between the Biju Janata Dal (BJD) and the BJP - former allies who governed the state together.
Both will now fight each other as well as Congress, the main opposition in the state.
The BJD hopes to win voter support with recently introduced measures, including cheap rice for the poor, better pay for government employees and better pensions for the elderly.
Congress says it will focus its campaign on calls to eliminate corruption, which it says has escalated over the last nine years. The BJP says the deterioration of law and order will be one of its election priorities.
Analysts says the state could be heading for a hung assembly. Congress should in theory benefit from the BJD-BJP split, but it may not be able to emerge as a clear winner.
Orissa is no stranger to hung assemblies and has had them regularly since the 1950s.
========================================================================
After last November’s attacks in Mumbai, security is a key issue in this state, which is home to India’s financial capital.
The Congress Party’s Vilasrao Deshmukh had to resign as chief minister in Maharashtra - along with deputy RR Patil - for perceived failures over the Mumbai attacks. It has formed a pre-poll alliance and seat-sharing pact with the Nationalist Congress Party of Sharad Pawar.
The head of the right-wing Hindu Shiv Sena party, Bal Thackeray, has been ill and has made few public appearances. His nephew, Raj Thackeray, meanwhile, has formed a new party, the Maharashtra Navnirmaan Sena, along similar right-wing nationalist lines but is unlikely to make a big impact at national level.
The BJP is likely to focus on security, and the suicide rate among farmers suffering financial difficulties.
A critical shortage of electricity - with cuts ranging from four to 16 hours a day in most parts of the state - is also among voters’ major concerns.

A left-wing coalition has governed the state for more than three decades. The left won 35 parliamentary seats in West Bengal in the 2004 elections, with Congress winning six and the Trinamul Congress one.
But the opposition parties are upbeat about how they will perform this time and are expecting to make major gains.
But now it seems the left is in trouble. The once-loyal rural poor have turned against Chief Minister Buddhadev Bhattacharya, as he pushes ahead with his plans to acquire farmland for big industrial projects.
The opposition, especially the Trinamul Congress - a party specific to West Bengal - have joined protests against large-scale land acquisition.
But Mr Bhattacharya insists that West Bengal must rapidly industrialise in order to provide jobs for millions of unemployed men and women.
“The iron discipline of the left is wilting after three decades in power. This election will be a real wake-up call for them,” says political analyst Basu Ray Chaudhuri.

Congress campaigned hard in Gujarat’s state elections in 2007, but still lost to the BJP, allowing the controversial Narendra Modi to become chief minister for the third time in a row.
Mr Modi won the 2002 election on a Hindu nationalist platform shortly after the massacre of some 1,000 Muslims in Gujarat. In 2007, he toned down his nationalist rhetoric and campaigned on his economic record - the state’s economy has been growing roughly 10% per year, above the national average.
Mr Modi appointed a Muslim as the state’s police chief in February, in what analysts see as an attempt to court a secular image. But the arrest and resignation of the state’s education minister on 27 March, in connection with the 2002 riots, is seen as a major embarrassment for the party.
Mr Modi is considered a possible successor to the ageing BJP leader LK Advani and will be hitting the campaign trail in other parts of India.|

16 April: Andhra Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, Jammu and Kashmir, Kerala, Maharashtra, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Orissa, Uttar Pradesh, Chattisgarh, Jharkhand, Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Lakshwadeep
Total constituencies: 124

22 April: Manipur, Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, Goa, Jammu & Kashmir, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Orissa, Tripura, Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand
Total constituencies: 141

30 April: Bihar, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, Jammu & Kashmir, Gujarat, Sikkim, Dadar and Nagar Haveli, Daman and Diu
Total constituencies: 107

7 May: Bihar, Haryana, Jammu & Kashmir, Punjab, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, Delhi
Total constituencies: 85


13 May: Himachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, Punjab, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal, Uttarakhand, Chandigarh, Pondicherry, Uttar Pradesh
Total constituencies: 86

India's problems are complex. And unfortunately these are compounded by vote-bank politics. Instead of uniting the different sections of society, many politicians divide it to keep their vote banks intact. If people are united, politicians won't be able to get votes through divisive politics. In such a situation, the only way for them to win votes would be through good performance.

The above is paragraph from shri shri ravi shankar's write up for cnn ibn. He has precisely stated our politics. Our politics runs on divisive policies. Whether it is dalit,brahman equation or hindu-muslim equation or maharathi-bihari equation and lastly the great rich-poor equation.
Indian politics is based on we v/s they concept.

When right wing parties say safe guard hindu rights , secular parties say muslims are not given justice. Right wing parties play on fear of terrorism , jihad and ashmita of hindus where as secular parties play on muslims getting eradicated by majority hindu. Here fear is primary focus , primary emotion used as tool for exploiting and getting vote bank.

Then comes caste funda. Since centuries lower caste people were exploited by upper caste and now this caste concept is used to exploit both upper caste and lower caste for vote.

Regionalization is another factor which is used for vote bank. Amachi mumbai , kick out bhaiya slogans...

Then come great equation which did use to effect Indians psychic and it still does to some extent. Rich are exploiting poor concept . Now it is not so that rich dont exploit , they do to some extent but its also truth that people like tata , birla , godrej work for 18 hours a day. They work hard , take risk and earn lot of money. It good to be rich and you can be as human as any and be rich at same time.

But rich-poor equation too is used to divide society. So indian politics is based of we v/s they and it needs to be matured now.

Education , Medical , Employment , Economy , National Security , Terrorism should be issues and not dalit , brahmin , maharathi , muslim , hindu.

2009 can be most significant year for all of us. Lets vote against division and lets vote for development.

Arun Nehru

The heroes of the Jammu & Kashmir election have to be the father-son duo of Mr Farooq Abdullah and Mr Omar Abdullah. Several times in these columns I had predicted their victory and surely enough they have delivered. Besides them, there were many winners in this election: The Election Commision for a job well done; the PDP won seats in the Valley as did the BJP in Jammu. But it was Mr Farooq Abdullah who went against the tide of communal populism and spoke of national interest —— a bold and courageous move coming from a Valley politician.

This required a great deal of nerve and the Congress has done the right thing by supporting the National Conference. The PDP has done well in electoral terms but Mufti Mohammed Sayeed is well aware that his political stances that suit the Valley are in conflict with national objectives. Electoral rhetoric and governance are two different things and with General election around the corner this is not the time for experiments.

We all get wiser through experience and hindsight but I think that the people of Jammu & Kashmir have produced something special here. They have created history by turning out in record numbers to exercise their franchise (about 62 per cent to be precise) and for the first time in many years we are close to integrating the people of the State into a single entity. The young Chief Minister Omar Abdullah has a difficult job ahead and I wish him and the new generation of leaders in all the three parties —— Mr Omar Abdullah, Mr Rahul Gandhi and Mehbooba Mufti —— the very best. Hopefully their leadership will wash way the past and make way for a better future.

We also have good news on the Pakistani front with Islamabad and the Pakistani Army adopting a more positive approach to the issue of regional terrorism. Whereas on our eastern border the election result in Bangladesh is definitely welcome with Sheikh Hasina and the Awami League achieving a landslide victory there.

I have revised my 2009 General election prediction chart on the basis of current trends and I think we have to watch developments very closely in Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu. In Uttar Pradesh although the anti-incumbency trends are visible against the BSP but I doubt if this will go in favour of the SP. Points on law and order and good governance may well go more to the BJP and the Congress, although much will depend on the strength of these two organisations in the State whether they can actually benefit from the changed situation. The given chart has been marginally adjusted vis-à-vis my previous one, but like I said one needs to closely watch the fight between the BSP and the SP in Uttar Pradesh, where things could still change as the election is still four months away. In Andhra Pradesh Opposition unity is still very shaky and the TDP, the TRS and the Left are yet to consolidate their positions. Chiranjeevi and his Praja Rajyam are still struggling with political direction and may well align with the BJP.

The Karnataka by-elections were a serious setback for the Congress and therefore appropriate changes in favour of the BJP have been made in the chart. The situation in Tamil Nadu is fluid and the DMK is in damage-control mode within the family and also with its allies. On the other hand, Ms J Jayalalithaa and the AIADMK have made major gains in the northern part of the State and along with the support of the Left and the BSP is in a strong position.

The Left will lose some seats but seems to be improving, both in West Bengal and in Kerala, although to a lesser degree in the latter. Its alliances with the AIADMK and the TDP will give it a presence in Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh respectively and as things stand the Left may end with a tally of close to 50 seats. At present there is little to choose between the UPA and the NDA, and the Left-AIADMK-TDP combine will be a formidable rival to both. And if the BSP were to join this grouping we could be looking at a bloc of 100 seats plus, and without this number neither the NDA nor the UPA can form a Government at the Centre.

Uttar Prdesh with 80 seats will be crucial and it is good to see the BSP attempting to curb the criminal elements within the party. This ailment is not only confined to the BSP alone and even the SP has a great deal to do in this regard. I don’t think that the anti-incumbency trends against the BSP will be very severe in the short term but the SP may well gain in the long run. But both the BJP and the Congress are set to gain ground in the State. Coalition and regional politics have dominated Uttar Pradesh for close to two decades now but this could all change over anither two elections. In politics nothing lasts forever and electoral verdicts are for governance and not for creating personality cults and personal assets.

By Neena Vyas

Post-Assembly elections, the RSS influence over BJP could increase

It is believed that victory in M.P. and Chhattisgarh is due to better coordination

Top BJP leaders are scheduled to meet RSS general secretary

There is some talk of RSS strengthening its direct presence in BJP

NEW DELHI: With the victory of the Bharatiya Janata Party in two out of 6 Assembly elections, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh is set to increase its influence over the party.

The issue is not settled as yet, but an influential section of the party leadership believes that the BJP was able to perform well in Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh, thanks to the synergy between the BJP and the cadre of various RSS front organisations. The Chief Ministers — Shivraj Singh Chouhan of Madhya Pradesh and Raman Singh of Chhattisgarh — who led the party campaign paid far more attention to maintaining the link with RSS volunteers than projecting their own personalities. This, a section of the party believes, was not the case in Rajasthan and Delhi. And in Jammu and Kashmir, the party did extremely well only in comparison with the 2002 election results, but not as well as it expected to do, despite the weeks-long Amarnath land agitation. And in Mizoram, the Congress simply swept the election.

There is another section in the party that believes that given the anti-incumbency and the Gujjar agitation in Rajasthan, the BJP performed not too badly, thanks to the leadership of Vasundhara Raje. And in Delhi, this section would like to believe that the party’s third consecutive defeat in the Assembly election was the result of projecting the wrong man with age not on his side as its chief ministerial candidate. There is, as yet, unwillingness to concede that the BJP failed in its attempt to electorally cash in on the Mumbai terror strike or to make a dent in Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit’s image despite an aggressive campaign.

Against the backdrop of the emergence of these two contradictory views, top party leaders — possibly L.K. Advani, Rajnath Singh, Venkaiah Naidu and a few others — are scheduled to meet RSS general secretary Mohan Bhagwat at the RSS Jhandewalan headquarters on Friday. While there is no fixed agenda — officially the meeting was described as routine — it is expected that this issue would be discussed.

A meeting of the party’s Parliamentary Board is also scheduled on Friday morning. While some issues related to the States where Assembly elections took place will be discussed, the curious case of the missing currency notes from the safes in the party office may also be brought up by some members.

There is some talk in the party of the RSS strengthening its direct presence in the party by “loaning” more full-time RSS volunteers to the BJP. But this has not yet materialised. However, it appears certain that the former Swadeshi Jagaran Manch chief, Muralidhar Rao, is to be inducted as an aide to party president Rajnath Singh to strengthen the direct link with the RSS (the SJM is a front organisation of the RSS and had clashed with the Vajpayee government disagreeing with the continued liberalisation of the economy). Already the key position of general secretary (organisation) in each State and the central party is held by RSS men who are the point men for BJP-RSS coordination at the ground level.
Meetings postponed

A senior leader indicated that the decision to hold the next National Council and National Executive Committee meeting in Nagpur was also a pointer to the strengthening relationship and the increasing RSS influence. That meeting, earlier fixed for January 23 to 25, has been changed to February 6 to 8.

New Delhi, Dec 28 : 

Early trends in Jammu and Kashmir assembly elections indicate that the state is heading for a hung assembly.

Of the 57 trends available :
the National Conference is leading in - 18
BJP - 11
Congress 10
PDP - 10
and
Independents & Others in 10 constituencies.

Former Chief Minister Gulam Nabi Azad is leading by 1,572 votes over his nearest rival Aslam Goni of NationalConference in Bhaderwah constituency. In Anantnag former Chier Minister and PDP leader Mufti Mohammed Sayeed is leading against National Conference candidate Mirza Mehboob Beigh by over 590 votes.

In Ganderbal, Omar Abdullah of the National Conference who was earlier trailing is now leading over his PDP candidate Qazi Mohammad Afzal. Mehbooba Mufti of PDP is leading against Mohammad Khalil Naik of CPM by over 1800 votes in Wachi.

PDP candidate Javed Mustafa Mir is leading in Chadoora seat against Congress candidate Ghulam Nabi Mir by over 900 votes. Abdul Rahim Rather of the National Conference is leading in Chrari Sharief constituency. Jagdish Raj Sapolia of the BJP is ahead in Basohli. Lal Chand of the BJP is leading in Bani.

Independents Charanjit Singh and Shabir Ahmed Mir are leading in Kathua and Kangan constituencies. In Chhamb former assembly speaker Tara Chand of the Congress is trailing behind Chaman Lal of the BJP.

State BJP President Ashok Kumar Khajuria is leading in Jammu East from where the Jammu and Kashmir Panthers Party chief Prof. Bhim Singh is trailing. In Ladakh, Tsetan Namgyal Independent is leading in Nobra while National Conference candidate Feroz Ahmed Khan is leading in Zanaskar.

Counting of votes for the 87 assembly constituencies in Jammu and Kashmir is in progress at 22 centres across the state amidst tight security.