The Kashmir High Court Bar Association, comprising over 1200 lawyers of the Valley, on Tuesday deferred elections, a day after the Srinagar magistrate sought a clarification on the Bar’s constitution that sees J&K as “a dispute standing for a peaceful settlement”.
“We deliberated upon the notice of the government on Tuesday. A unanimous decision came to the fore in favour of deferment of elections. No new date for polls has been fixed yet”, Mudasir Gulzar Vakil, secretary of the Election Commission of the association, told The Hindu.
The magistrate had asked the body “to clear its stand on Kashmir as a disputed region between India and Pakistan or an integral part of the country”.
The polls, which were earlier deferred in October due to the COVID-19 pandemic, was to take place from November 10 in a phased manner for the top posts of the officer-bearers.
The KHCBA is a very influential civil society body of the Valley that had challenged the abrogation of Article 370 and 35A in the Supreme Court in 2019.
KHCBA president Mian Qayoom was among many other lawyers arrested in the crackdown launched ahead of the August 5 decision to revoke J&K’s special. He was released in July last.
