National Conference: Electoral Revival or Political Renaissance?
The massive mandate which the National Conference got, reflects the premium that Kashmiris place on their identity; politics of Kashmir has been and will have to be about its preservation. National Conference, which has historically contributed to the identity formation of Kashmiris, shaping it in a way that helped its political cause, has been seen as being best placed to play this type of politics. At least for now. Whether they are able to do it or not, time will tell. History doesn’t give hope, though. But truth be told, there aren’t any better options at this point in time.
The electoral triumph of the National Conference is also a telling rebuttal of the Bhartiya Janata Party’s “dynasts who destroyed Kashmir” narrative. Omar Abdullah’s loss in the Parliamentary elections, which it saw as a vindication of its strategy, was more of a tactical loss, than a political defeat. That the electoral loss of their leader didn’t demoralise the rank and file of the party speaks about National Conference’s organisational strength.
Indeed, whatever the reason – vote against BJP or vote fragmentation – for its stunning electoral victory, the political strength of the organisation is more than evident. In fact, more than the consistency of its actions, coherence of its politics and conviction of its ideology. It goes to the credit of the National Conference as an organisation that it did not lose a single leader to any other party. Certainly, not for the lack of trying. To hold the party together during such political turmoil and relentless assault is remarkable organisational resilience.
That is not to suggest that it is a monolithic entity with no cracks. The choice of a dissident and a disgruntled leader for the parliamentary elections was an obvious giveaway. An elected MP of National Conference puts out on social media a letter to the Chief Minister, seemingly to distance himself from “your government”. The pot may not be on the boil just yet but isn’t on the back burner either.
While the fortunes of National Conference clearly changed in 2024, does it indicate an electoral revival? Has the National Conference managed to stem the rot in its vote share, declining as it has been for the last three decades. Facts suggest the contrary. Despite winning 42 seats, up almost three times from the last election in 2014, the vote share of National Conference has increased only marginally from 21 per cent in 2014 to 23 per cent in 2024. In 1996, National Conference secured 57 assembly seats with 35 per cent vote share. It dropped to 28 per cent in 2002 and further to 23 per cent in 2008, with number of seats dropping to 28 from 57. In 2014, its vote share touched an all-time low of 21 per cent. Overtime, NC’s share of votes has been halved; from more than 47 per cent in 1977 to 21 per cent in 2014. In the last parliamentary elections, NC got 23 per cent votes up from 19 per cent in 2014 but massively down from a high of 68 per cent in 1977.
However, besides this electoral arithmetic, there is a larger political reality of being the single largest party, with a majority on its own. It also has a more broad-based representation in the legislative assembly that cuts across geographies, communities and interests. Its representativeness is far greater than the second largest party, BJP with 29 seats, which incidentally has the highest vote share. But it is restricted to one community and two and half districts of Jammu and pockets of a gerrymandered Chenab valley.
The current political sentiment has put National Conference on the road to political renaissance. In fact, it goes beyond that. The relevance and revival of valley-centric mainstream politics and political parties will depend on success of the National Conference government, not its failure. It is in their enlightened self-interest not to be obsessed with scoring brownie points as they have been doing after their electoral debacle.
All the ingredients for the resurgence of popular politics have coalesced, as if by serendipity. The sensibilities that have been violated need to be assuaged, aspirations have to be articulated, and the ideology of liberal democratic politics restored and practiced. There is a cause to be rallied around. For that to happen, the local leadership has to evolve a broad-based political understanding, if not consensus, on the end goals. At a time when the country is in a state of discriminatory equilibrium, the nature of understanding has to be farsighted.
Is going back to the past the best way of envisaging a future for the Kashmiri society? Or should the possibility of a new compact, terms of engagement be explored which are more meaningful and relevant to the needs and requirements of the Kashmiri society as it is today. A zeitgeist engagement that can make Kashmir consequential to the success of the counter narrative to majoritarianism across India. An empowered J&K is possible in a republican democracy, not a majoritarian one. The former provides for safeguards for minorities while the latter erodes these.
Besides the legislative muscle, which it now has, National Conference will require administrative craft to not normalise the status quo in the process of asserting governance authority. To be sure it has the sympathy and support of the grassroots administrative ecosystems, be it the patwaris or the policemen. Time to leverage these operational layers rather than warn the top bureaucracy. They are all careerists who will fall in line the moment the power equation tilts. To restore the status quo ante, is going to be much longer and harder.
Given the highly constrained administrative writ of the elected government and equally curtailed powers of the legislature, the best that the elected representatives can do for now is to act as touch points not of government but of afflictive governance; exercising state authority to address loss of community control and personal hope. This requires realpolitik acumen and engagement.
In the last decade or so, the spaces of political confrontation have been extended into personal spheres thereby eroding the social capital – collective values, belief systems, relationships, attitudes and behaviours -- of Kashmiris. The only solution to the existing schizophrenia between the state and the civil society is to rebuild the social capital of Kashmir. The route to an empowered statehood doesn’t lie in passing resolutions, which is more of optics and less of substance, but lies in recalibrating and redefining the mass politics of Kashmir.
Tailpiece:
It is an interesting factoid that the decline in National Conference’s vote share starts post the election of 1996 i.e., a couple of years after it shifted its political headquarters from Mujahid Manzil to Nawa i Subah. There has to be more to it than a mere coincidence. The steeped in history, Mujahid Manzil, in downtown Srinagar, was the nerve centre of Kashmir politics for seven decades and more. Known to the masses, not just NC cadres, as the “castle of Kashmiri identity”, it is the structure that for decades symbolically housed the aspirations of Kashmiris. Even as the Nawa i Subah, a sanitised structure in uptown, bereft of history and heritage, continues to be its headquarters, the party’s salvation lies in its heart and pulse moving back to Mujahid Manzil; a short physical distance, but a long ideological tread.
