SRINAGAR: Polls closed in Kashmir’s main city yesterday, bringing to an end the crucial final phase of state elections in the disputed region after sporadic clashes between police and dozens of separatists.

Low voter turnout, scattered protests and a huge presence of security forces marked the seventh and final phase of state assembly elections in India’s Jammu and Kashmir state yesterday.

At least 22 people, including a photojournalist, were injured as small groups of anti-election protesters clashed with the police in Tankipura area of Srinagar, the state’s summer capital.

Elections were being held in 21 constituencies, eight of them in Srinagar district and the rest in Jammu and its adjoining Samba district in the last phase of the staggered elections.

Election Commission officials said the turnout in Srinagar district was about 13 percent up till late afternoon, while the combined turnout in Jammu and Samba was 30 to 35 percent.

The lead-up to the vote had been overshadowed by heightened tension between India and Pakistan, which both claim Kashmir, after last month’s Mumbai attacks. India deployed thousands of police and troops in case of separatist violence in Kashmir.

In Srinagar, the heart of a nearly 20-year separatist campaign against Indian rule, police said 15 people were injured when police clashed with dozens of stone-throwing protesters in three areas. Three police were among the injured.

Police responded with batons and tear gas. “Overall the voting was peaceful and the turnout is considerably higher than in 2002 elections,” said Kulbushan Jandail, the Jammu and Kashmir government’s chief spokesman.

Muslim-majority Srinagar, Kashmir’s summer capital, and the Hindu-majority city of Jammu, the state’s winter capital, both went to the polls yesterday. Kuldeep Khoda, director general of Kashmir police, told reporters that intelligence intercepts indicated “terrorists and separatists” would try to disrupt voting.

In Srinagar, police and soldiers armed with assault rifles blocked off lanes with razor wire and iron barricades, while sniffer dogs searched polling booths for bombs. Indian police said on Tuesday they had arrested three militants, one of them a Pakistani soldier, for allegedly planning a suicide attack during the vote but Pakistan denied the man was a serving soldier.

Kashmiri separatists, many of them in jail, called for a boycott of the seven-stage polls, saying India portrays voting as an endorsement of its rule over the Himalayan region.

Many polling stations in Srinagar remained virtually empty throughout the day, especially in the city center. But there was a cheerful mood on the city’s outskirts as voters queued outside, dressed in flowing woolen robes to keep out the winter chill.

Very few people came out of their homes to cast their votes in an atmosphere that was palpably charged with high tension, while majority of the electorate choose to stay away from the poll exercise. The security forces had sealed constituencies from each other to prevent passage of people from one constituency to another in the summer capital.

The Election Commission staggered the elections to ensure maximum protection for voters and candidates. At least 70,000 police, and soldiers were deployed around polling booths for yesterday’s elections. Thirty thousand of them were guarding booths and patrolling streets in Srinagar city and its adjoining areas.