India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi is visiting the main city in Himalayan Kashmir to campaign for his party in the staggered local election in a first such vote since New Delhi stripped the disputed region’s semi-autonomy in 2019.

With fresh faces emerging to challenge the traditional political powerhouses, the region’s political dynamics already appear to be changing.

In Indian-controlled Kashmir, residents are voting in elections that some hope will lead to restoration of the territory's statehood, which ended when it became a federally governed territory in 2019.

It is the first such vote since India's government stripped the disputed region of its special status five years ago.

Voters queued outside polling stations in India's Jammu and Kashmir on Wednesday to vote in the first provincial election being held in a decade in the Himalayan region that has grappled with years of militant violence.