Will NC regain south Kashmir?

One of the regional parties in Jammu and Kashmir has made their announcement about their candidate from south Kashmir’s Anantnag-Rajouri Lok Sabha constituency. The announcement came at a time when the discussion was going on about the seat-sharing between the allies of the already existing conglomerate—Peoples Alliance for Gupkar Declaration (PAGD) and also the INDIA block partners. However, the announcement has indicated that the allies have no longer been on the same page and are set to contest against each other in the upcoming polls. But, the million dollar question remains whether the National Conference (NC) will regain the constituency where its leader Hasnain Masoodi emerged victorious in 2019 Lok Sabha Polls, defeating its closest rival Ghulam Ahmad Mir. As the delimitation has added some more areas in the constituency this time, it would be interesting to see whether the voters from new areas will have faith in the party? The National Conference has announced its candidate keeping in view the huge voters from Gujjar community. Mian Altaf Ahmad Larvi is a known figure amongst the Gujjar community and thus simultaneously, the party has played a card to attract the Gujjar voters in the next polls. Nonetheless, the incumbent regime in the centre Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has recently taken a long pending demand of Gujjar community, which has attracted the community towards the party. In such a scenario, it would be interesting to see the contest from the constituency as the community will be the major players to decide the fate of the candidates.