Violence fails to dampen voting in Kashmir

Ten people were killed in an explosion and gunfights in Kashmir yesterday but voting in two parliamentary constituencies in the restive region passed off relatively unscathed, police said.

Earlier election rounds in four other Kashmir constituencies were marred by separatist violence and boycotts.

Police said yesterday's election-related violence occurred when suspected militants attacked a polling booth in Doda, part of the sensitive Udhampur-Doda constituency, which left a civilian injured.

The main violence occurred elsewhere in the state. A police spokesman said one person was killed and 12 injured in a grenade explosion triggered by suspected militants in a busy market in the northern town of Sopore. He said two of the injured were Indian border guards and the others were civilians.

"The dead was a retired government official," the spokesman said, adding that he had been a functionary of the party ruling the region, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

Police said suspected rebels yesterday shot dead three people as part of their anti-election campaign. Among the dead in separate incidents in the districts of Anantnag, Srinagar and Poonch was a policeman.

An Indian trooper was killed and another injured during a gunfight with rebels in the northern district of Baramulla overnight, police said, adding a also died in the crossfire between the two sides.

In another incident, Indian troops shot dead four rebels in three separate gunfights overnight and Monday in the districts of Kupwara, Pulwama and Udhampur.

Polling passed off by and large peacefully yesterday in the Kargil area, the flashpoint of the Indo-Pakistan battles that put the subcontinent sharply in global focus just five years ago.

The Doda-Kishtwar area is part of Udhampur constituency on the Jammu side of the Pir Panjal range. Kargil is part of the Ladakh constituency. Both constituencies went to the polls yesterday.

There was a bomb blast near a polling station in Bhaderwah in the morning and security forces defused another bomb near a different station.

There had been a blast in Doda town on Sunday, but no series of blasts followed outside polling booths – as was the pattern in the Kashmir valley.

On Sunday, militants killed a government officer and wounded 15 people by tossing a grenade at a passing motorcade of a campaigning candidate in Doda. The device exploded at the gate of a hospital.

The Doda-Kishtwar area is large, though far less densely populated than the valley. It has been claimed along with the valley by Pakistani negotiators in track two talks with Indian representatives.

Some independent initiatives for a solution – such as the Kathwari plan, which is backed by several US legislators – also club this large swathe of land along with the valley.

That plan bases its proposals on communal demography and highlights the fact that the Muslim population of this part of the state is just above half.

The Kathwari plan and Pakistani track two representatives also claim the Kargil area, where the population is almost entirely Muslim.

However, as was evident again yesterday, militancy has never found a base in Kargil, although it has in the Doda-Kishtwar as well as the Rajouri-Poonch parts of the state. Militant activity has in fact been concentrated in the densely wooded areas of Doda over the past five years.

Kargil's predominantly Shiite population has traditionally steered clear of secessionist movements. The region's ethnic ties with both Gilgit and Tibet no doubt influence that pattern.

The Muslims of the Doda-Kishtwar belt on the other hand are Sunnis, half of them of ethnic Kashmiri stock and the other half of Pathwari- and Punjabi-speaking stock.