National Panthers Party (NPP) chairman Harsh Dev Singh on Tuesday alleged that the new assembly seats proposed by the Jammu and Kashmir Delimitation Commission were decided in the BJP office and the panel acted as a mere rubber stamp. Addressing a public meeting in Udhampur district, Singh said suggestions of opposition parties and civil society groups seemed to have been rejected by the commission and it “surrendered before the present authoritarian regime”.
The Delimitation Commission, set up to redraw the assembly seats of the union territory, is learnt to have proposed six additional seats for Jammu region and one for Kashmir in its ‘Paper 1’ discussed with its five associate members — three MPs of National Conference and two of BJP from J&K — in Delhi on December 20.
The proposals evoked angry reactions from political parties, which said such steps will only “incentivise and facilitate” violent agitations. Singh said, “It was the political expediency of the BJP which was the primordial consideration rather than the convenience of the public in the process of delimiting assembly seats in J&K.”
“The new constituencies have been drawn up in the BJP office with the delimitation commission merely acting as a rubber stamp and assisting the former in achieving its political designs,”
he alleged. He also claimed that the suggestions of opposition parties, social organisations and civil society groups seemed to have been summarily rejected and the commission “surrendered before the present authoritarian regime like many other so-called autonomous bodies”.
Singh claimed the move was an attempt by the BJP to counter the NPP’s growing popularity in Udhampur. “The BJP is scared of the rising graph of the NPP, particularly in Udhampur, and it is using its influence to recreate assembly seats in the district in the manner which suits its political interests,” he said.