The bye-election for the in J&K, scheduled for November 11, may not tilt the balance of power in the Union Territory (UT), but ruling National Conference (NC) and opposition parties, Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and BJP, have a lot at stake.

The Budgam seat fell vacant after NC candidate Omar Abdullah, who won from two seats in the 2024 assembly elections, retained the Ganderbal seat. Mr. Abdullah had bagged 35,804 votes against 17445 votes of PDP candidate Aga Syed Muntazir Mehdi out of a total of 1.25 lakh votes. Around 30 percent of voters are Shia Muslims in Budgam. The results will be seen as a verdict and a statement on Omar Abdullah's one-year rule of J&K as Union Territory (UT).

It will be an uphill task for Mr. Abdullah's NC to repeat the numbers of 2024, even as the party fields an influential Shia cleric Aga Syed Muntazir Mehdi as its candidate to cash on Shia votes. With polls round corner, the NC is grappling with growing differences within the party between Mr. Abdullah and NC Member of Parliament Aga Syed Ruhullah, an influential Shia cleric whose hometown is Budgam. Mr. Ruhullah decided against campaigning for the party over "Mr. Abdullah's inability as chief minister to fulfil the promises made in the election manifesto, especially the issue of reservation and arrested youth".

Mr. Abdullah, in a jibe against Mr. Ruhullah, in an election rally said those who stayed away from campaigning "will not be allowed to attend the party's celebrations if it wins". "Maybe he (Ruhullah) likes the air of Germany better than the air of Budgam," said Mr. Abdullah, on the absence of Mr. Ruhullah from the election campaign. Many pro-Ruhullah voters have openly condemned Mr. Abdullah's remarks against Mr. Ruhullah.

"Aga is our religious leader. He is first our religious leader then a politician or an MP. Any insult to Mr. Ruhullah will not be acceptable. He is above any party," Amir Khan, a businessman and a Ruhullah-supporter, said.

The other factors working against Mr. Abdullah in this election are also anti-incumbency and the opposition Peoples Democratic Party's (PDP) deliberate bid to build its narrative around the government's failure to deliver in the past one year.

"Before the 2024 elections, Mr. Abdullah promised to remove smart meters, and instead defended its installations in poor pockets now. Similarly, promises regarding free gas cylinders were not met. Unemployment has increased," PDP president Mehbooba Mufti said. "Time has come to change the doctor who fails to attend to the ailment of the society," she added. She also cornered Mr. Abdullah over the issue of arrested youth.

Mr. Abdullah countered the PDP's narrative by citing the party's alliance with the BJP in 2014. "It's the PDP that brought the BJP to J&K. All that followed in J&K, including abrogation of Article 370 in 2019, was because of the PDP's alliance with the BJP. I will never join hands with the BJP ever, even if it means delay in Statehood restoration," Mr. Abdullah said, in his poll speeches. Against all odds, the NC's age-old party structure remains intact in Budgam, unlike the PDP.

Meanwhile, Awami Ittehad Party (AIP) candidate Nazir Khan, who is mainly wooing Sunni votes, could also play against both the NC and PDP prospects. Mr. Khan, whose original assembly segment is Beerwah, has worked as chairman of the District Development Council (DDC) till last year. BJP has also fielded a Shia candidate Aga Syed Mohsin. The three key Shia leaders in the fray are bound to split the Shia Muslim bloc into three.

The Nagrota seat, which fell vacant after BJP leader and MLA Devender Pana passed away last year, will see the deceased leader's daughter Devyani Rana taking over NC's Shamim Begum and Panthers Party's Harshdev Singh. "I carry the legacy of my father who worked hard for Nagrota. Nagrota will repeated its mandate and will remain a forte of the BJP," Ms. Rana said, in her speech.

The BJP remains on a stronger wicket in Nagrota where the party bagged 48,113 votes against 17,641 secured by NC's Joginder Singh in the 2014 elections. In the 2014 elections, deceased Rana had won the seat on NC ticket and defeated the BJP.

J&K's by-polls will be a verdict on Omar Abdullah government's one-year tenure