Srinagar, Sep 19: The four-time Member of Legislative Assembly (MLA) from Eidgah assembly constituency in Srinagar, Mubarak Gul seems in a tight spot in the ongoing assembly elections as the candidate of National Conference (NC) has faced anger of the locals, who wanted the party to choose the ‘deserving’ candidate for the polls.
A total of 61885 voters are set to cast their ballots on September 25 in favour of 13 candidates, who are vying for the seat from Eidgah constituency. The voters include 31094 male, 30789 female and two transgender.
Among the candidates in fray is NC leader, Mubarak Gul, who has never lost the assembly elections from the seat since 1996. He was first elected as MLA in 1983 and didn’t contest in 1987.
However, it seems the situation is not similar for him this time as the NC workers had shown resentment against the party’s decision of giving mandate to Gul again.
Gul will face Peoples Democratic Party’s Khurshid Aalam, Bharatiya Janata Party’s Arif Majeed and other leaders in the second phase of the assembly elections.
However, the political pundits believe that the seat is no more a cakewalk for the National Conference with two main reasons behind it. One of the reasons according to them is the resentment against the party workers and the other ia strong contender of PDP.
Khurshid Aalam a former trade leader, has a huge fan base in Srinagar City, who gave a tough competition to NC’s senior leader Ali Muhammad Sagar in 2014 assembly elections in Khanyar seat.
The political pundits believe that Aalam and Gul are the main contenders from the seat and it would be interesting to see the competition in Srinagar’s constituency. “The tight competition is expected in Eidgah and it would be interesting to see whether Gul will retain the seat for the fifth straight time,” they said.
