For ‘larger goal’ of beating BJP, Congress leaves J-K’s Nagrota Assembly seat to National Conference

Days earlier, the NC had decided to contest all the four vacant Rajya Sabha seats from Jammu and Kashmir after failing to reach an agreement with the Congress on which seat the latter should contest. The Rajya Sabha election will be held on October 24.

Both the National Conference and the Congress had contested the 2024 Assembly elections together in Jammu and Kashmir, but now differences have surfaced in the alliance following the NC’s refusal to give it one of the first two “safe” Rajya Sabha seats, and instead, offering it the fourth seat that the Congress considered “not safe”. However, both the NC and the Congress have downplayed these differences.

While the by-election in the Nagrota Assembly constituency was necessitated following the death of sitting BJP MLA Devender Rana on October 31 last year, the Budgam seat had fallen vacant following Chief Minister Omar Abdullah’s decision to leave it and retain his family bastion, Ganderbal.

The party has given its mandate to Shamim Begum from Nagrota, said NC’s Jammu province president Rattan Lal Gupta. Monday was the last day for filing nomination papers for the constituency.

During 2020 maiden District Development Council elections in Jammu and Kashmir, she was elected to Jammu DDC from Nagrota’s Dansal block.

“The people know me very well. They have seen my work as a DDC member over the last four years and they will support me whole-heartedly to give me a chance to represent them in the assembly,” she said.

Earlier, Jammu and Kashmir Pradesh Congress Committee (JKPCC) chief spokesperson Ravinder Sharma said the Congress had decided to leave the Nagrota Assembly seat to the NC, keeping in view the larger interest and goal of defeating the BJP. The decision follows detailed deliberations over a JKPCC report and also after considering various factors, including that the NC had emerged second in Nagrota in the 2024 Assembly elections, he said.

“Taking into account the broader parameters and principles of coalition, the INC central leadership has decided to leave the (Nagrota) seat to its ally NC, in furtherance of larger interests and goals of defeating the BJP,” Sharma said in a statement.

The BJP has fielded Devyani Rana, daughter of former MLA Devender Singh Rana, from Nagrota.

Devender Rana had won the Nagrota seat in 2024 by a record margin of 30,472 votes, defeating his nearest NC candidate Joginder Singh who had got 17,641 votes. Congress candidate Balbir Singh was pushed to the third position with 5,979 votes.

Earlier, he had won the seat in the 2014 elections on an NC ticket, but later switched to BJP in 2021.

With NC fielding Shamim Begum in Nagrota, the constituency will see a three-way contest between her, Devyani Rana and Jammu Kashmir National Panthers Party–India president and former minister Harsh Dev Singh.

On Sunday, the NC had announced senior party leader Agha Syed Mehmood as its candidate for Budgam.