India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited the main city in Himalayan Kashmir on Thursday to campaign for his party in the local election, the first such vote since New Delhi stripped the disputed region’s semi-autonomy in 2019.

India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi is visiting the main city in Himalayan Kashmir to campaign for his party in the staggered local election in a first such vote since New Delhi stripped the disputed region’s semi-autonomy in 2019.

Three months after his worst election performance to date, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is facing another challenging vote: this time in the fragile region of Jammu and Kashmir, where separatist sentiment is strong and voters are angry with their loss of autonomy.

PM Modi has specially called upon the young & first time voters to use their right of voting.

In Indian-controlled Kashmir, many people boycotted elections for decades in protest against Indian rule. The vote is the first in a decade, and the first since Modi’s Hindu nationalist government in 2019 scrapped the Muslim-majority region’s special status and downgraded the former state to a federally governed territory.

Eight constituencies in the Jammu region and 16 from the Kashmir Valley voted on the first phase of assembly elections. Two more rounds of voting remain.

With fresh faces emerging to challenge the traditional political powerhouses, the region’s political dynamics already appear to be changing.

The union territory of Jammu and Kashmir is set to witness its first assembly election in a decade, following the abrogation of Article 370 in 2019. Over 23 lakh voters from seven districts will decide the fate of 219 candidates.