Jammu, Sep 07 (KNO): The Brahmin-Rajput battle on Padder-Nagseni Assembly constituency of Kishtwar district will be the most watched battles for Assembly elections in Jammu and Kashmir.
This is because one of the most influential and trusted leader of Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP) Sunil Sharma is up against National Conference’s (NC) Poonja Thakur.
As per the news agency—Kashmir News Observer (KNO), Pooja Thakur, the chairperson of District Development Council (DDC) Kishtwar, has been chosen by NC to fight against BJP Sunil Sharma on a seat which is mostly dominated by Hindu population.
Padder-Nagseni seat was carved out of Kishtwar Assembly constituency and as per the data given by chief electoral officer Jammu and Kashmir, only 40732 electorates including 20866 male, 19865 female and one transgender voters are eligible to vote on September 18 in the first phase.
This constituency is also abode to one of the revered Hindu shrines of Jammu and Kashmir Machail Mata and Sunil has got the mandate from BJP for this seat on demand. This will be a litmus test for him to win this seat whereas NC is putting all its efforts to make Thakur win.
While Sunil Sharma hails from Kishtwar town, Thakur is from Dachan and this area is part of Padder-Nagseni constituency whereas Kishtwar town is part of Kishtwar constituency. A total of six candidates are in the fray for this seat which include candidates from BJP, NC and PDP, and three are independents and all belong to Hindu community. PDP has fielded Sandesh Kumar whereas the independent candidates are Rakesh Goswami, Shri Kant and Anil Kumar.
After winning the 2014 Assembly elections from Kishtwar by defeating NC’s Sajad Kichloo, Sunil Sharma remained in council of ministers during PDP-BJP coalition government whereas Pooja Thakur was awarded with DDC chairperson by NC. With this investment on Thakur, NC came in a position to field her against one of the top BJP leaders of J&K—(KNO)