Neyaz Elahi
Srinagar, Feb 6 : Well-known Retired senior police officer Ali Muhammad Watali has made explosive revelations about the 1987 Jammu and Kashmir Assembly elections, highlighting alleged rigging and political manipulation. In his book Guns Under My Chinar, Watali narrates instances of bribery, pressure tactics, and interference by politicians and intelligence agencies to sway election results reported news agency KNT.
Watali recalls being summoned to the residence of then-Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah, where Union Minister Rajesh Pilot and Congress leader Ghulam Rasool Kar were present. When asked for his assessment, he bluntly stated that the Congress had no chance of winning a single seat in the Valley.
He further reveals that a Congress leader later invited him to a midnight meeting at Broadway Hotel, offering him a suitcase full of cash to help them win the Anantnag Assembly seat. He refused. Similarly, Anantnag SP Javed Makhdoomi was also offered money and a promotion by another senior Congress minister, but he declined.
Watali as per the news agency Kashmir News Trust details how intelligence agencies were used to manipulate Farooq Abdullah, convincing him that his party was losing 20 seats to the Muslim United Front (MUF). This, he claims, was a tactic to induce panic and justify electoral fraud. However, Watali reassured Farooq Abdullah that, in a free and fair election, his party would not lose more than 10 seats.
Despite Abdullah’s commitment to a fair election, Watali exposes how his Principal Private Secretary misused his position to rig results in favor of Congress, allegedly in exchange for a post-retirement appointment as a university vice-chancellor. The interference was particularly evident in Anantnag, where counting was repeatedly delayed due to pressure from Congress workers.
Upon intervention by Watali and Divisional Commissioner G.Q. Lone, the MUF candidate Syed Shah—brother of separatist leader Shabir Shah—was finally declared the winner of the Anantnag seat. Watali asserts that, contrary to public perception, Farooq Abdullah and his administration were not involved in the rigging, except for a select group of officials under the Principal Private Secretary’s influence.
In his book, Watali describes the 1987 elections as a turning point that deepened political alienation in Kashmir, ultimately fueling the militancy that erupted in the following years. [KNT]
