National Conference (NC) vice-president and former chief minister Omar Abdullah will contest the assembly elections from Ganderbal. This announcement was made on Sunday by MP Syed Ruhullah Mehdi and party's divisional president Nasir Aslam Wani in the presence of Omar and MP Mian Altaf Ahmed. For a long time, Omar was repeating that he will not contest the elections.

After a long discussion, senior party leaders rejected Omar's earlier statement of not contesting the elections. Omar had said that as long as Jammu and Kashmir remains a union territory, he will not contest the elections.Omar Abdullah was the Chief Minister of Jammu and Kashmir from 2009 to 2015. He was also a two-time MP. Along with this, he was an MLA from Ganderbal (2008-2014) and Beerwah (2014-2019). He lost the 2002 assembly elections from Ganderbal to PDP's Qazi Mohammad Afzal.