Anantnag: In a clean sweep, the India Alliance secured all seven Assembly seats in the Anantnag district of south Kashmir, dealing a crushing blow to the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), which failed to win a single seat in what was once considered its stronghold.
The most striking defeat came in the Bijbehara constituency where National Conference (NC) candidate Bashir Ahmad Veeri triumphed over PDP’s Iltija Mufti with a significant margin of 9,770 votes. Veeri secured 33,299 votes, leaving Iltija with 23,529 votes.
The India Alliance’s success extended across all constituencies in Anantnag. Abdul Majeed Larmi National Conference won the Anantnag West seat by 10,435 votes, while Altaf Kaloo took the Pahalgam constituency with a margin of 18,159. In Shangus, NC’s Reyaz Ahmad Khan secured victory by 14,523 votes, and in Anantnag 44 Main, Congress candidate Peerzada Mohd Syeed edged out PDP’s Dr Mehboob Beigh by 1,686 votes. Congress’s GA triumphed in Dooru with a massive margin of 29,413 votes and NC’s Zafar Ali Khatana won the Kokernag ST constituency by 6,162 votes.
The complete defeat of the PDP in Anantnag has left party workers shocked, marking the first time the party has been wiped out from the district. In the 2014 elections, the PDP won four seats, including Bijbehara, Dooru, Kokernag and Anantnag Main, while NC secured Pahalgam and Anantnag West and Congress won Shangus.
