LEH : Low to moderate polling was recorded during the first two hours in the Ladakh Parliamentary constituency, spread over two districts of Leh and Kargil. There was no impact of separatist poll boycott call in the constituency which will witness a four-cornered contest. Officials said that polling began at 0700 hrs in all the polling stations in the constituency. People, mostly women, in traditional dresses, could be seen marching towards their polling stations since early morning. Adequate security arrangements had been made to ensure free, fair and transparent election.
A total number of 1, 59,631 voters will exercise their voting rights at 531 polling stations in the constituency to decide the fate of four candidates namely Thupstan Chhewang of Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) , Tsering Samphel Indian National Congress(INC), and two independent candidates, Ghulam Raza and Sayed Mohd Kazim.
Majority of polling booths are normal since there is no impact of separatist boycott call in the constituency, which did not witness any militant activities when entire Jammu and Kashmir had to pay heavy price due to violence during the past more than two decades.
Though the National Conference (NC) has not put up any candidate and supported the Congress nominee, but on the ground, particularly in the Muslim dominated Kargil district, the situation was entirely different.
There was a clear divide between Congress and NC who have decided to vote two independents, supported by local ulemas and Muslim organisations, including Islamic High School. Koushuk Bakula of Congress was the first to represent the seat in the parliament in 1967 as untill that election, members from the Jammu and Kashmir were being nominated to Lok Sabha. Bakula again represented the constituency in 1971 while Parvati
Devi, also from Congress, won in 1977. In 1980, P Namgyal won from the seat before he again won after he contested on Congress ticket in 1984. However, in 1989 an independent Mohammad Hassan Commander got elected from the constituency but P Namgyal again won on Congress ticket in 1996.
But in 1998 Syed Hussain of National Conference (NC) got elected from the seat while Hassan Khan of (NC) won in 1999. In 2004 Thupstan Chhewang, an independent got elected while Hassan Khan, also an independent won in 2009. (AGENCIES)
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