Why Boycott Elections

Bedaar hun dil jis ki fugaani-sehri se

Is quom mein mudat se woh darvesh hei nayaab

Ai wadi Lolab

(Allama Iqbal)

Senior “separatist” leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani has appealed the people of Anantnag to boycott the upcoming State Assembly by-election re-scheduled to be held on 22 June 2016. According to him people should boycott elections because India projects participation of people on international foras as a referendum in its favour. This would signify that international opinion really matters. Alright. In that case election participation could be turned to advantage. Imagine if “separatists” contest and win elections, what message would it send to the international community? Yet the “separatists” led by S.A. Geelani shy away from elections on the contention that the Indian establishment will rig the elections like they did in 1987; and that the establishment will not allow them to give voice to self-determination sentiment in the Assembly.

This theory falls flat at least in so far as it concerns the person of Geelani. When he contested elections he won on most occasions. He won even in 1987. And the history of Kashmir Assembly tells us nowhere that he rose up to talk of Kashmir Dispute but the marshal of the Assembly pounced upon him and thrust a wad of cotton into his mouth. No such thing ever happened in the Assembly.

The 1987 elections are notorious for being rigged ones. Yet Geelani did not resign his membership in protest against rigging. On the contrary he joined the Assembly and continued its membership till August 1989 when he finally resigned under pressure from militants.

He contested elections for the first time in 1972. At that time also he did not bother about election rigging although all the previous elections starting from 1951-Constituent Assembly had been rigged. Moreover, he did not contest elections in 1972 to highlight Kashmir Dispute. In fact, he and his organization, the Jamaati-Islami, went over the head of Plebiscite Front and their plebiscite slogan. They walked into the Assembly kicking the plebiscite slogan in the underbelly.

For now the supporters of election boycott contend that since it is an established fact that the Indian establishment would rig the elections if “separatists” field candidates, it would be unwise to even think of participation. This is a weighty argument and cannot be ignored out of hand. But then what is the alternative? Boycott that ensures walkover to their opponents!

Instead why not give election participation a re-try? If the establishment rig the election, India would be once again exposed as a fake democracy. Plus, it may not be possible for Indian State to really rig elections in Kashmir in this electronic age. In the olden days the Indian establishment managed, with the help of corrupt bureaucracy, to manipulate elections in all the three stages, the pre-poll, the during-poll, and the post-poll. They would decide candidates. They would fill polling boxes with as many votes as they wished. Then they would count them manually and declare the candidate of their choice as successful no matter how many votes they actually had received.

Today a good many people have entered the bureaucracy on merit. Every one of them cannot be accused of being a bootlicker of politicians. Should anyone of them indulge in the dirty game of manipulation, their own colleagues may expose them.

Plus they now use electronic voting machines. Rigging, the way it used to be done in the past, may not be so easy now. However, manipulation of election in the pre-poll stage is possible even now just as it was in 1972 when S. A. Geelani first plunged into election politics. Then, Mohiud-Din Qarra intended to visit New Delhi to convince Sheikh Abdullah to take part in the elections from the platform of Plebiscite Front. Chief Minister Mir Qasim, knowing fully well that his Congress Party (National Conference did not exist) stood no chance of winning against Plebiscite Front, warned him at Jammu that he should do no such thing but Qarra stood his ground. On this Mir Qasim got Qarra arrested while he was travelling to Delhi.

Meanwhile Moulana Masoodi announced at Hazratbal that Plebiscite Front would be contesting elections. Mir Qasim arrested him also. Mir Qasim also issued orders prohibiting the entry into Kashmir of Begum Sheikh Abdullah who had gone to Delhi to meet her husband who was already under arrest there.

This way Plebiscite Front became a leaderless lot. Mir Qasim put thousands of PF cadres behind bars.

At this time Geelani and his party, the Jamaati-Islami, sending plebiscite slogan to winds, came out in the open in support of the establishment and contested elections (pp.335-7 Dastani-Hayat Syed Mir Qasim). They gave implied support to Mir Qasim to manipulate elections in the pre-poll stage and thereby lent legitimacy to the election process.

Soon afterwards Plebiscite Front workers and leaders got completely frustrated. Already the dismemberment of Pakistan in 1971 had disheartened them. In a matter of couple of years they bowed down before New Delhi and signed Kashmir Accord. Frustrated on all counts, the Plebiscite Front workers congratulated their leaders for signing the Accord and dumping plebiscite in these words:

“Raishumari barekh dabas, aalweh babas mubarak”.

As of now Geelani seems to be helping the establishment when he issues boycott calls because boycott leaves the field open for “mainstream”.

My point is that neither did Geelani’s and Jamaati-Islami’s participation in elections in 1972 or thereafter change the disputed nature of Kashmir nor did Sheikh Abdullah’s signing Kashmir Accord change the disputed nature of Kashmir. The same way, neither will boycott of elections change the disputed nature of Kashmir nor will participation change the disputed nature of Kashmir. But participation of “separatists” in the elections will at least provide a challenge to the “mainstream”.

“Separatist” election boycott will always give the establishment enough room to decide who should contest from a certain Assembly segment and who should win.

Instead of taking the “mainstreamers” head on, “separatists” help them by staying away from the process. Election boycott excludes all the people, undesirable from the perspective of the establishment, from the election process.

Present boycott call issued by Geelani will result in the exclusion from the election process of all the elements who could give a tough challenge to the sitting Chief Minister. In fact Geelani has paved the way for Mehbooba Mufti’s walkover in Anantnag.

What was more important at present? Issuing boycott calls to humour one’s inflated ego, or to defeat the sitting Chief Minister to upset the establishment’s apple cart and to send the PDP-BJP coalition in jitters.

Already people have started reading Geelani’s boycott fixation as an attempt on his part to cover his pro-establishment politics of 1970s and 1980s and to project an anti-establishment image of himself. But this would be fallacious reasoning given the fact that boycott has helped the establishment instead of irritating it. Given the state of politics in Kashmir it seems people will continue to be fooled by political demagogues.

Nowadays Mehbooba Mufti calls militants as “cats”. She may call them even worse names in future. But the truth is that when she was an unknown quantity, she sought political space in militancy torn Kashmir and succeeded in obtaining it, in the name of identifying herself with militants. She would visit homes of slain militants in 1998-99 and weep and whimper in the company of the women of the house.

If people of Kashmir do not learn to beware of political adventurers, then Kashmir is bound to head towards barbadi (destruction) rather than “azadi”.

(June 2016)