(Bloomberg) -- India’s northern region of Jammu and Kashmir will hold its first local government elections since it was stripped of its autonomy in 2019.
Voting in the Muslim-majority territory, which has been governed by the federal government for more than five years, will take place in three phases from Sept. 18 to Oct. 1, the Election Commission of India said Friday.
Voters in Haryana in northern India will also go to the polls on Oct. 1 to choose candidates for their state legislature. Results for both assemblies will be released on Oct. 4.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Hindu-nationalist government fulfilled a long-held campaign promise of removing Jammu and Kashmir’s special constitutional status when he returned to office in 2019. Local political leaders were placed under house arrest at the time, a communications blackout was imposed and tens of thousands of military troops were deployed across the valley.
Kashmir borders Pakistan and China and has faced decades of separatist violence. Both Pakistan and India claim territory in Kashmir as their own and have fought wars over the region.
In elections for the national parliament that ended in June, Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party didn’t contest any of the three seats up for grabs in Kashmir. The seats were won by regional and independent candidates. The BJP lost its majority in the national parliament for the first time in a decade and formed a government with coalition partners.
The BJP also performed poorly in Haryana and Maharashtra state in the recent elections. In Haryana, the BJP won only half of the 10 seats, while in Maharashtra, which is expected to hold elections for its legislature in coming months, the party secured just nine of the 48 seats.
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