JAMMU, Aug 27: Four groups representing approximately 200,000 Kashmiri Hindu migrants on Tuesday announced their intention to boycott elections in occupied Kashmir scheduled to start next month.

Ajay Chrungoo, representing one of the groups, said in held Jammu that they had decided to boycott the polls because of New Delhi’s refusal to rehabilitate displaced Hindus.

Hundreds of thousands of Kashmiri Hindus — known as Pandits — fled their ancestral homes in the held state after the freedom movement started in 1989.

A large number are housed in refugee camps in the held state as well as New Delhi.

Chrungoo accused the Election Commission (EC) of adopting double standards in deciding on polls in held Kashmir and Gujarat.

While the EC ruled out elections in Gujarat as the law and order situation in the state was not conducive for polls, and because 20,000 Muslims were living in relief camps following violence in March and April, Chrungoo said the commission had not applied the same yardstick to occupied Kashmir.

“The same commission has ignored the plight of thousands of refugees and refused to defer the assembly polls in Kashmir,” he said.

O.N. Trisal, another Kashmiri Hindu, said the migrants had cautioned New Delhi that the elections would be a farce unless their problems were resolved.

“We repeat this warning because the conditions for free and fair polls are non-existent in the (held) state,” Trisal said.—AFP