Pakistan’s Kashmir votes: Why the election hinges on 12 disputed seats

What the report says

Al Jazeera reports that elections in Pakistan-administered Kashmir, officially Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK), are being held amid severe unrest and a dispute over 12 legislative seats reserved for refugees from Indian-administered Kashmir living elsewhere in Pakistan. The vote for the 45-seat assembly was originally set for July 27, but has been divided by region: Mirpur division voting on that date, Muzaffarabad division and the refugee constituencies on August 2, and Poonch division on August 10.

The unrest follows weeks of protests led by the Jammu Kashmir Joint Awami Action Committee (JAAC), which the local government banned on June 5. Al Jazeera says nearly 40 people have died in clashes since early June, with sit-ins, road blockades, bank closures and continuing mobile and internet suspensions across much of the territory. JAAC, whose leaders are not contesting the election, has called for a boycott. Its agenda has expanded from demands over flour subsidies, electricity prices and hydropower benefits to a 38-point platform that includes abolishing the refugee seats.

The contested seats date back to electoral arrangements introduced from 1960 onward and were later embedded in AJK’s 1974 Interim Constitution, according to the report. Supporters, including former AJK Supreme Court chief justice Chaudhry Muhammad Ibrahim Zia, argue they have historical and constitutional standing. JAAC members counter that people outside AJK’s territory should not help determine its assembly.

The AJK Supreme Court has said the seats cannot be removed by executive action or pressure and would require a constitutional amendment. The dispute matters because it links immediate election legitimacy to deeper questions over representation, autonomy and Islamabad’s role in governing the region.