DHAKA: A bomb blast near a polling booth in Kashmir injured a policeman on Wednesday, amid further stone-throwing protests and a widespread boycott of India’s general election in the mainly Muslim region.

Separatists have called on voters to shun the election in India’s northernmost state of Jammu and Kashmir, holding staggered voting in its six parliamentary seats to allow 700,000 army troops and police to mount a mobile security operation.

That has failed to prevent a string of killings of village elders, blamed by police on militants seeking to intimidate voters.

In the most serious incident, three insurgents and one army officer were killed in a clash on April 27.

The bomb exploded outside a polling station at a village in the Baramulla constituency, one of two voting on Wednesday in northern Kashmir, injuring a police reservist, police said, reports The Straits Times.

BDST: 1818 HRS, MAY 07, 2014