Srinagar: The Ladakh Parliamentary segment is likely to witness an interesting contest because of rebellion in both the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Congress, along with a united decision of Kargil to support Congress rebel as independent candidate in these elections. Ladakh is slated to go for polls on 6 May.
Both the National Conference and the PDP, after a series of meetings with Islamia School Kargil, decided to support Sajjad Hussain Kargili as the consensus candidate from Kargil.
However, another influential Shia Trust known as Imam Khomeni Memorial Trust has decided to support Congress rebel and former MLA Asgar Ali Karbalaie as independent candidate. With Karbalaie as rebel candidate in the fray, political observers here say that it would be a huge setback to the Congress in this Parliamentary segment as they were hoping that after the rebellion in BJP, their chance of winning the seat was up.
Congress official candidate from Leh seat is Rigzin Spalbar, two-time Chief Executive Council (CEC) of Leh Council, and has a lot of influence over Buddhists in Leh.
There would be a clear division in the votes between Leh and Kargil over the Congress candidate as Spalbar may not get much support in Kargil as all the religious and political organisations along with civil society members have decided to vote for Congress rebel candidate Asgar Ali Karbalaie.
Already there is lot of galvanisation of support for Karbalaie as people of Kargil together had fought for the rotational divisional headquarters.
Meanwhile, the BJP doesn’t have the support it had in the 2014 Parliamentary elections. This time, the BJP has fielded Jamyang Tsering Namgyal, the present CEC of Leh Council, after Thupstan Chhewang refused to rejoin the party. Chhewang resigned not only as MP of Ladakh, but also BJP, claiming that the Centre did not keep promise to grant Union Territory status to the region. The BJP is hoping that they may retain the seat as they recently, through state Governor Satya Pal Malik, accorded separate divisional status to the Ladakh region.