NEW DELHI: Prime Minister Narendra Modi campaigned in India-occupied Jammu on Saturday in the build-up to elections for the local assembly, a day after two soldiers were killed in a gunfight with Kashmiri fighters.

The occupied territory has seen a rise in violent protests ahead of the first local assembly polls in a decade, which begin next week.

“The changes in the region in the last decade are nothing short of a dream,” Modi told supporters at a rally in Doda, part of India-occupied Jammu. Modi was referring to the repeal of occupied Kashmir’s special status by New Delhi on Aug 5, 2019.

“The stones that were picked up earlier to attack the police and the army are now being used to construct a new Jammu and Kashmir. This is a new era of progress, terrorism is on its last leg here,” he said.

Modi and his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) claim that the changes to the held territory’s governance have brought a new era of peace and rapid economic growth.

Kashmiris are resentful of chafing restrictions on civil liberties, and the BJP is only fielding candidates in a minority of seats concentrated in some areas.

The Indian prime minister pledged at Saturday’s rally that his party would “build a secure and prosperous Kashmir that is free of terrorism and a haven for tourists”.

But this year’s local polls, which begin on Wednesday before results are announced next month, follow a spike in clashes between Indian forces and Kashmiri fighters.

In past two years, more than 50 soldiers have been killed in clashes.

About 500,000 Indian troops are deployed in the occupied region of Kashmir since 1989.

Published in Dawn, September 15th, 2024