BJP J&K chief Ravinder Raina, NC’s Surinder Choudhary locked in a rematch from Nowshera
BJP’s Ravinder Raina had handed Surinder Choudhary a defeat from Nowshera in 2014, winning the seat for the saffron party for the first time
The assembly elections contest from Nowshera will draw plenty of eyeballs as Bharatiya Janata Party’s local unit president Ravinder Raina, 47, looks to repeat his 2014 performance in Congress’ bastion. He will take on arch-rival and National Conference (NC) pick Surinder Choudhary, 56, from the seat located in the border district of Rajouri on September 25.
The hilly constituency, close to the Line of Control, has 86,506 voters and election authorities have set up a total of 116 polling stations — five in urban areas and 111 in rural.
Riding the Modi wave, Raina had wrested the seat for the first time in 2014, defeating Surinder Choudhary, then with the Peoples Democratic Party, by a margin of 9,503 votes. He had secured 37,374 votes against Choudhary’s 27,871.
Things have changed since, as a BJP leader, who declined to be named, said, “Ravinder Raina, being president of the J&K unit of the BJP, did not get enough time to visit Nowshera and he was more interested in contesting the polls from Jammu district,”
“Though party leaders including Raina himself are campaigning vigorously, we anticipate a tough contest against NC’s Surinder Choudhary,” the leader added.
Choudhary, once a close confidante of PDP president Mehbooba Mufti had parted ways with the party on March 30, 2021 and had joined the BJP on April 5, 2022. However, after a year-long association, he quit the saffron party and joined the National Conference on July 11, 2023 in the presence of Omar Abdullah.
Congress, which has won the seat for a record eight straight terms from 1962 to 2002, has not fielded its candidate as part of the pre-poll alliance with the NC, a decision which has not gone well with the party’s local leadership.
“Nowshera largely has Hindu population, who are PoK refugees. They are largely Brahmins and some Sikhs. Given the Congress record, the seat would have been easily won by the party, but they gave it away to NC under pre-poll alliance,” Mandeep Kumar, a local resident, said.
Raina and Choudhary also have a history. The BJP leader served Choudhary a ₹5 crore legal defamation notice for levelling “baseless allegations against him with the sole aim to damage his reputation within the party and among the masses”.
While announcing his decision to quit BJP through a tweet, Choudhary had accused Raina of encouraging dynastic politics and corruption. “Goodbye BJP… Ravinder Raina enjoys your Parivarvad and corruption,” Choudhary had written on ‘X’.
On the contest between Raina and Choudhary, Mandeep Kuamr said, “It is being keenly watched. Anything is possible as both candidates are canvassing support vigorously. Though the Modi wave has subsided considerably, the BJP has lined up their star campaigners including PM Narendra Modi himself and home minister Amit Shah.”
While there are a total of five candidates in the fray — Raina, Choudhary, Haq Nawaz of the PDP, Manohar Singh of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and independent Shiv Dev Sharma, the contest is largely direct. It is pertinent to mention that the recently held Lok Sabha elections saw the NC maintain a lead of over 4,000 votes against the BJP in the Nowshera segment.
Beli Ram of the Congress won the Nowshera constituency (Sunderbani was part of it then) for a record six straight terms in 1962, 1967, 1972, 1977, 1983 and 1987. Subsequently, Congress picks Radhey Sham Sharma and Dr Romesh Chander Sharma were elected in 1996 and 2002 respectively. Radhey Sham Sharma later switched over to the National Conference and won the seat in 2008.