Deputy CM’s ‘Vote Chor’ remarks against BJP trigger noisy scenes in J&K assembly

The Jammu and Kashmir assembly on Monday witnessed noisy scenes after the Deputy Chief Minister Surinder Choudhary accused the BJP of having indulged in “Vote Chori” (vote stealing) during the recent election for four Rajya Sabha seats from the union territory.

The issue of cross-voting in the Rajya Sabha election came up during the Question Hour when Choudhary alleged that the BJP had stolen four votes to win one of the four seats for which the election was held.

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Provoked by these allegations, the BJP MLAs were on their feet and made accusations against the ruling National Conference (NC). The NC MLAs reacted by calling the BJP a “vote chor”.

Jammu and Kashmir People’s Conference MLA, Sajad Gani Lone, accused both the NC and the BJP of collusion. “It was match-fixing,” he alleged.

The detention of AAP MLA Mehraj Malik under the Public Safety Act (PSA) also triggered heated exchanges among legislators.

NC MLA Sajjad Shaheen sought an hour-long discussion on Malik’s “unjustified” detention, with several members joining him in demanding the immediate revocation of the PSA order.

Another NC MLA, Nazir Ahmad Khan, stressed that the Assembly is supreme, even above the courts, and insisted that the House must deliberate on the reasons behind Malik’s detention.

The BJP MLAs, however, objected to the demand, claiming that the issue was sub judice and therefore not appropriate for discussion in the House.

Some BJP members also accused ruling party members of attempting to politicise a legal matter. “Such issues should not be discussed on the floor of the House when due process of law is already underway,” BJP legislators said.

Several legislators, including those from the PDP and NC, supported Shaheen’s demand, describing Mehraj Malik’s detention as “unjustified and politically motivated”. The issue, they said, symbolised a larger pattern of preventive detentions being used to suppress dissenting voices.

Speaker Abdul Rahim Rather intervened and assured that all members would be allowed to raise matters of public importance as per the rules and procedure.