NEW DELHI -- Northern India's Jammu and Kashmir region kicked off its first legislative assembly polls in about a decade on Wednesday, with local demands for restoration of the region's special status being one of the major issues. Voting will continue in October and results are due on Oct. 8.
Jammu and Kashmir is one of eight union territories in the country, and a key region given long hostility between India and neighboring Pakistan over it. Elections come five years after the area's special status was scrapped by the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
