Political roadmap for a BJP Government in Jammu & Kashmir

Sunil Sethi

The political landscape of Jammu and Kashmir is undergoing a transformation whose eventual direction is still evolving. The Bharatiya Janata Party has established itself as the principal political force across large parts of the Jammu region, winning 29 seats in the 2024 Assembly elections, but its larger political challenge is to transform this regional strength into a sufficiently broad mandate to become capable of forming a Government in Jammu and Kashmir. This requires a strategy considerably more complex than merely increasing its existing vote share. BJP has to consolidate areas where it is already strong, make further political inroads into areas where it remains weak and, most importantly, ensure that the search for new electoral territory does not result in recession from its core constituencies.

The challenge can perhaps best be described as "Expand Without Dilution." BJP's existing political strength is the foundation upon which any future governmental possibility has to be constructed. Jammu cannot therefore be treated as an assured political reserve whose support can simply be taken for granted while the party concentrates upon Kashmir. Political loyalty creates expectations, and repeated electoral support inevitably increases those expectations. Employment, economic opportunities, infrastructure, industrial development, tourism, education and adequate political representation remain important concerns. The party has to continuously renew its relationship with its existing electorate while simultaneously widening its political footprint.

This becomes a particularly difficult tightrope because Jammu and Kashmir does not necessarily carry identical political aspirations. Their historical experiences, political narratives and perceptions on constitutional and regional questions have often been different and, at times, may even appear to be in antithesis to each other. A political formulation that receives enthusiastic acceptance in one region can encounter resistance in another. BJP therefore faces a peculiar political challenge: it has to broaden its acceptability in Kashmir without creating an impression amongst its traditional supporters that its established positions or their regional interests are being diluted.

The answer cannot be to make Jammu think like Kashmir or Kashmir think like Jammu. A more sustainable political framework would recognise legitimate regional differences while finding common ground around development, employment, infrastructure, tourism, investment, education, transparent administration and opportunities for younger generations. A statewide political party need not insist upon identical political vocabulary everywhere. It can maintain consistency on its fundamental positions while responding differently to legitimate developmental and social priorities in different regions. Political unity does not necessarily require regional uniformity.

Even the convenient description of Jammu and Kashmir as two political regions is inadequate. Jammu plains, the Doda region and Poonch-Rajouri have different demographic, geographical and political characteristics. The Doda region has demonstrated its own patterns of electoral competition, while Poonch-Rajouri has distinctive tribal, border and social dynamics. Kashmir itself is far from politically homogeneous. North, central and south Kashmir have different local equations, and constituencies within them may behave very differently. Any future BJP strategy therefore has to move from broad regional calculations towards constituency-specific political planning.

BJP has undoubtedly developed a greater political presence in Kashmir than it possessed during earlier periods, but political inroads should not be confused with electoral breakthrough. The 2024 Assembly elections demonstrated this distinction clearly. BJP contested 19 constituencies in Kashmir but could not win a seat. Analysis of the results nevertheless showed an increase in its vote share in the constituencies it contested compared with 2014. The message from these apparently contradictory indicators is important: political space may be opening, but translating that space into Assembly seats remains a much more difficult exercise.

The journey in Kashmir has several stages. Political presence has to lead to social acceptability; social acceptability has to produce credible local leadership; leadership has to create constituency-level consolidation; and only then can political expansion be converted into electoral victory. BJP's immediate requirement in Kashmir may therefore be described as "Acceptability Before Electability." Elections cannot be won merely through organisational expansion, high-profile rallies or political slogans. Ultimately, voters have to develop confidence in individuals who represent a political party within their own social environment.

This is where broader social coalition-building and newer leadership become critical. BJP's future expansion in Kashmir may depend upon its ability to provide political space to people possessing independent social credibility. Professionals, lawyers, academics, entrepreneurs, women, younger political workers, grassroots representatives and persons emerging from civil society can potentially enlarge the political conversation. Gujjar-Bakarwals, Paharis and other communities also have their own aspirations, but no community should be mechanically viewed as an electoral bloc. Representation has to grow from genuine political participation rather than numerical calculations alone.

The party's challenge is consequently not merely to find leaders willing to join BJP; it is to identify leaders whom society is willing to follow. Political defections may occasionally provide recognisable faces and short-term organisational advantages, but they cannot substitute for the creation of an indigenous leadership base. Kashmir requires leaders who possess credibility within their communities and can communicate BJP's political position while simultaneously carrying local aspirations back into the party's decision-making structure. Acceptability cannot simply travel from the party to the leader; sometimes the credibility of the leader has to create acceptability for the party.

Grassroots democratic institutions can become an important laboratory for this political transformation. Panchayat, municipal and other local elections provide opportunities to discover leaders whose political strength comes from actual public acceptance rather than organisational designation. A person capable of earning the confidence of a village, ward or local constituency brings a different kind of political capital. Building such leadership patiently can ultimately create Assembly-level possibilities that cannot be manufactured immediately before elections.

Yet the entire Kashmir strategy has to operate simultaneously with consolidation in Jammu, the Doda region and Poonch-Rajouri. This is the central balancing act. Every new vote gained elsewhere has political value only when existing support is substantially retained. Expansion accompanied by contraction merely changes the geographical distribution of votes without necessarily improving the possibility of government formation. BJP therefore needs two political processes operating together-consolidation where it is strong and carefully structured expansion where it remains weak.

The ultimate political roadmap is consequently not based upon one dramatic electoral breakthrough. It requires patient construction of a wider political architecture. BJP has to protect its established foundation, broaden its social coalition, create newer leadership, deepen grassroots organisation and convert political presence in Kashmir into social acceptance before expecting substantial electoral dividends. At the same time, it has to remain responsive to the aspirations of Jammu, the Doda region and Poonch-Rajouri.

The road to a BJP Government in Jammu and Kashmir therefore neither runs through Jammu alone nor can it be built by concentrating exclusively upon Kashmir. It requires a political framework capable of accommodating different regional aspirations without creating the perception that advancement of one region must necessarily come at the expense of another. That is BJP's real tightrope-and also the central challenge in transforming regional political strength into a genuinely Jammu and Kashmir-wide governing mandate.