Tag: delhi election live

AAP’s Big Victory: Here’s What the Polling Data from Delhi Reveals About Modi vs Kejriwal

AAP has got more votes than the BJP did in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls. It has also gained nearly a lakh votes since its last assembly election.

New Delhi: Numbers tell their own story. With the final figures of the Delhi polls now out, it can now firmly be said that on polling day, more people reposed faith in the Aam Aadmi Party, its convenor Arvind Kejriwal and its candidates in 2020 than they did in the Bharatiya Janata Party, Prime Minister Narendra Modi or the saffron party’s candidates in 2019.

More votes for AAP than BJP got in LS polls

In the last Lok Sabha election, the BJP polled 56.86% of valid votes in Delhi, and in the recent assembly election, AAP ended up with 53.57%  vote share. However, in absolute terms, AAP polled 65,981 votes more than BJP.

In the Lok Sabha elections, when BJP won all the seven seats in Delhi and fought in the name of Modi, it got 49,08,541 votes. And this time, when AAP asked Delhi to vote it back to power in the city and make Kejriwal chief minister again, it had 49,74,522 people voting for it. Clearly, AAP has managed to draw more support now than the BJP could in the Lok Sabha polls.

Also read: Arvind Kejriwal May Be Liberal India’s Darling, But He Isn’t the Solution We Need

But there are two caveats here. The BJP did not contest three seats in the assembly election, leaving those  for its allies, the Janata Dal (United) and Lok Janshakti Party. Also, the total number of eligible voters rose by nearly 4 lakhs between the two elections.

AAP gained remarkably, BJP faltered

Between the Lok Sabha polls in May 2019 and now, AAP improved its performance significantly. The party’s appeal for votes in the name of the Kejriwal government’s performance, the free power, water and travel it provided, the improvement in education and health facilities, and its decision to not let the BJP draw it into the issue of the anti-CAA protests at Shaheen Bagh, clearly worked wonders for it.

From getting just 15,71,687 votes and a 18.2% vote share in the Lok Sabha polls, AAP made deep inroads into the hearts and minds of the voters. Ultimately, it managed to influence over 34 lakh more people to vote for it.

On the other hand, the BJP’s vote share dropped by 18.35 percentage points during the period as nearly 13.33 lakh fewer people voted for it in the assembly elections.

A young child dressed as Arvind Kejriwal at the AAP headquarters in Delhi on Tuesday. Photo: PTI

In the case of the Congress, which had secured the second position in the Lok Sabha polls, the loss was even sharper with its vote share dropping by over 18 percentage points and with over 15.58 lakh people who voted for it seven months ago not returning to vote for its candidates this time.

In last five years AAP gained 96,125 votes

A comparison between 2015 and this 2020 assembly election shows AAP’s vote percentage dropping marginally by 0.77 percentage points to 53.57%. The total votes for the party increased by just 96,125 over the period. Considering that the total number of voters have increased by nearly 14 lakh during this five-year period, this is a small number.

However, considering that the base figure of AAP’s votes five years ago was very high and that it was contesting this election on its performance, an increase in votes reflects the party’s popularity.

BJP gained 7.85 lakh votes, Congress lost 4.70 lakh in five year period

In the case of BJP, its vote share improved by 6.32 percentage points to 38.51% between the two assembly elections and it bagged nearly 7.85 lakh more votes this time.

The Congress, which had a vote share of just 9.70% in the 2015 polls, when it failed to win even a single seat, fared even worse with a 4.26% vote share this time. It also saw an erosion of nearly 4.70 lakh votes during the last five years as it again drew a blank in these elections.

Impact of BJP’s focus on Shaheen Bagh protests

All the opinion polls in early January had indicated that AAP would sweep the elections and BJP would get between 25 and 35% votes. By choosing to attack AAP over the Shaheen Bagh protest and repeatedly raising the issue of the blockade of Kalindi Kunj road, the BJP did manage to strike a chord with a section of the electorate. This reflected in its higher vote share.

Also read: After Election Losses, Sangh’s Hindutva Pitch Will Be Even Louder and Sharper

But if the effect of the BJP’s campaign strategy was visible in the areas surrounding Shaheen Bagh, its impact diminished with distance.

In Okhla, its candidate Braham Singh polled 58,540 votes and got a 29.65% vote share. Though the seat was won by Khan by a margin of 71,827 votes, the high vote share of BJP indicated that its campaign strategy worked in some part. In 2015 too, Braham Singh was the BJP candidate but he had only bagged 39,739 votes then.

In Badarpur, which starts from the other side of Kalindi Kunj road, the BJP candidate Ramvir Singh Bidhuri in fact won by 3,719 votes. He wrested the seat from AAP, polling a total of 90,082 votes, nearly twice the 46,659 which Bidhuri had polled as its candidate in 2015.

AAP MLAs to Meet at Kejriwal’s House to Pick Legislature Party Leader

The AAP stormed back to power in Delhi, winning 62 seats in the 70-seat assembly.

New Delhi: Aam Aadmi Party convener Arvind Kejriwal has called a meeting of the party’s newly elected MLAs at his residence on Wednesday, senior party leader Gopal Rai said.

In the meeting scheduled at 11.30 am on Wednesday, the AAP’s leader of legislature party will be chosen by the MLAs, he told PTI on Tuesday.

Also read: With Another Win in Delhi, Is Arvind Kejriwal Moving to the National Pulpit?

Another AAP leader said the party was considering two dates for the oath-taking ceremony of the chief minister February 14 and February 16. Both in 2013 and 2015, Kejriwal had taken oath as chief minister on February 14.

However, it has not yet decided on a venue for the oath-taking ceremony, he said.

After the selection of the leader of legislature party, Lt Governor Anil Baijal will be apprised about it. Thereafter, a notification will be issued.

The AAP stormed back to power in Delhi, winning 62 seats in the 70-seat assembly.

AAP Wins Big in All 5 Seats With Over 40% Muslim Population

The most significant victory was that of Okhla candidate Amanatullah Khan, who BJP has long since been trying to pin as the ‘organiser’ of the Shaheen Bagh protests.

New Delhi: Aam Aadmi Party consolidated its hold over all seats comprising 40% or more Muslims by winning them all this time. In the 2015 polls, one of these seats had gone to the Bharatiya Janata Party.

AAP has won 62 seats out of Delhi’s 70. BJP has won in eight.

This result speaks volumes about the strategy of AAP going into the polls. Though it was party MLA from Okhla, Amanatullah Khan, who was portrayed by BJP as having “begun” the local women-led anti-Citizenship Amendment Act protests in Shaheen Bagh, chief minister Arvind Kejriwal and the party never came out in support of the agitation fearing its fallout in the Delhi polls.

Some senior leaders like national spokesperson Sanjay Singh did visit the protest site, but the party kept focusing on its development agenda to seek votes and refused to get drawn into the politics of polarisation.

 

When BJP national leaders like Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union home minister Amit Shah attacked Kejriwal for staying silent when the Shaheen Bagh protesters blocked the Kalindi Kunj road causing reported hardship to people travelling to and from South Delhi and Noida, Kejriwal answered back, asking why Delhi police, which reports to Shah, did not act.

In fact, he accused the BJP of not addressing the demands of the protesters and keeping the blockade going for political interests.

Also read: The Fruit of AAP’s Labour

This argument appears to have ultimately resonated with the voters and stalled BJP’s progress.

AAP ‘best bet’

Also, despite the Congress attempting to take a nationwide lead among political parties on the issue of anti-CAA protest, in Delhi, the Muslim vote in favour of AAP reflects that the party was thought of as the better bet among the BJP and itself.

In Ballimaran, Delhi minister Imran Hussain of AAP defeated Lata Sodhi of BJP by 36,172 votes. Former Delhi minister Haroon Yusuf of the Congress finished a distant third with 4,797 votes and 4.73% vote share.

Shaheeb Bagh protesters on February 11. Photo: PTI

Likewise, in Matia Mahal, five-term legislator Shoaib Iqbal, who had represented Janata Dal, Lok Janshakti Party and also the Congress in the past, this time won on an AAP ticket. He polled 67,250 votes and defeated Ravinder Gupta of BJP by a margin of 50,241. Mirza Javed Ali of the Congress managed to garner only 3,403 and came a distant third.

Okhla candidate from AAP, Amanatulla Khan, after his victory. Photo: PTI

The AAP candidate from Mustafabad, Haji Yunus, came from behind to poll 98,850 votes and defeat sitting MLA Jagdish Pradhan of the BJP by 20,704 votes. At one point, Pradhan was leading in the seat by over 29,000 votes but gradually Yunus rose and then surged ahead.

Amanatullah 

In Okhla, sitting MLA of AAP Amanatullah Khan came from behind to score an emphatic victory over Braham Singh of BJP by over 70,000 votes. At one point, Singh was leading by close to 2,000 votes but then when counting of votes of EVMs from areas considered Khan’s strongholds was taken up, he moved far ahead.

Khan’s record victory ensured that Okhla, which has a majority of Muslims, continued to send a member of the community to the Delhi Assembly. Former Congress minister and Rajya Sabha MP Parvez Hashmi managed to poll just about 2.5% of the votes.

Finally, in Seelampur, AAP won despite replacing its sitting MLA Mohammad Ishraque with Abdul Rehman. Rehman polled 36,920 votes more than Kaushal Kumar Mishra of BJP.

The Congress candidate, five-term MLA Mateen Ahmad, came a distant third. But he still polled 20207 or 15.61% of the total votes. A former Delhi Wakf Board chairman, Ahmad was popular among the Hindus of the area too as he organised one of the largest Kanwar camps in the city.

The Fruit of AAP’s Labour

AAP, in a way, is the first party to address Delhi as a city in its own right, and not merely a power centre. Herein lies its success.

New Delhi: The last time a political leader relied on a slogan that focused on ‘kaam’ was when Samajwadi Party’s Akhilesh Yadav sought a second chief ministerial stint in the 2017 Uttar Pradesh assembly polls.

But Akhilesh’s campaign song Kaam bolta hai could not save him from a crushing defeat at the hands of Bharatiya Janata Party, which made Hindutva its sole motto for the assembly polls in the state.

What distinguished him from Aam Aadmi Party leader Arvind Kejriwal, who used a similar slogan to rout the saffron party by sweeping 62 of 70 seats, is that the Delhi chief minister forayed into the polls with a range of universal, not targeted, welfare measures for people of Delhi.

Thus, although the BJP denounced these measures as a set of “freebies”, it was Delhi’s electorate cutting across caste and class that gave a thumbs up to AAP.

The 62-8 victory in favour of AAP can’t be bracketed as a win for some communities over others. The traditional caste, class and religious political dynamics hardly played any major role during the campaign for Delhi polls, despite the BJP having gone on an overdrive to pitch the majority of Hindus against Muslims towards the latter half of the campaign.

Also read: With Another Win in Delhi, Is Arvind Kejriwal Moving to the National Pulpit?

AAP’s sober campaign on developmental issues like health, education and service delivery held greater attraction among voters, as it secured an absolute majority with more than 53% of the total votes polled.

Its leaders successfully showcased that Kejriwal government had turned the national capital into a state with a surplus budget despite implementing universal welfare schemes. By introducing a range of subsidies, it made lives easy for working people.

AAP leader and Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal with his wife, Sunita on Tuesday. Photo: PTI

It questioned the BJP on why it did not attack the Modi government at the Centre for drastically cutting corporate tax and why it feels sops for the rich corporations are not “freebies”.

At the same time, it refused to get caught with questions BJP wanted it to answer. Barring one single time when deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia’s support to Shaheen Bagh’s protest was overblown by the saffron party as an anti-national act, AAP doggedly sidestepped BJP’s every effort to dominate the political narrative, and instead, stuck to its own.

Also read: Chants of ‘Bharat Mata Ki Jai’ and ‘Vande Mataram’ Mark AAP’s Celebrations

With this win, AAP has emerged as a party which has made state-led welfare fashionable again. While other parties pride themselves for introducing greater economic reforms while leaving common people to fend for themselves, AAP reversed the model quite creatively to focus on local governance that intends to improve quality of life in Delhi.

AAP, in a way, is the first party to address Delhi as a city in its own right, and not merely a power centre.

Sheila Dikshit as the three-term chief minister turned the national capital into a big infrastructure hub but failed to address it as cosmopolitan metropolis that houses several thousands of migrants.

Kejriwal as the chief minister took into account that Delhi over the last few decades has gradually transformed into a working class city – much on the lines of Mumbai – and pivoted his party’s politics around concerns of the working people.

Along with larger reforms centred around healthcare and education, Kejriwal gave an impression that he was much better placed to improve basic infrastructure like sewerage system, water and electricity supply, colony-level roads etc. and make them affordable too.

BJP, on the other hand, had no clear vision for the city. Its lacklustre leadership in Delhi only made its case worse. On one hand, there was AAP which trumpeted its local governance model, with gains in the last five years to show, but on the other hand was BJP, which attempted to distract the electorate with its high-pitched Hindutva agenda.

Manoj Tiwari, Arvind Kejriwal and Subhash Chopra of the BJP, AAP and Congress in Delhi respectively. Photos: Twitter

The results are there for everyone to see.

Following its re-election, AAP brand of politics seems like a natural progression for the ever-expanding Delhi. It may not succeed outside the urban peripheries of Delhi but its success can’t be belittled as its governance model has successfully drawn towards itself people belonging to different parts of India who have now settled in the national capital.

“Kaam karke dikha diya Kejriwal ne (Kejriwal has shown how to work)” was a common refrain which one would have encountered across Delhi during the election campaign. Its party leaders were on the ground driving this message home. AAP was a disciplined, organised force throughout the last few months.

Also read: With AAP Victory in Delhi, a Unique Form of Political Awareness Solidifies in India

Merely six months after almost 58% Delhi’s voters helped BJP secure all the seven parliamentary seats from Delhi, AAP has turned in a humongous victory in the assembly polls. Each person was touched by one or more welfare measure introduced by AAP.

This result would also come as a blow to a large section of big media. A large number of television channels, especially the Hindi ones, and regional newspapers did not hesitate to become carriers of BJP’s anti-Muslim campaign as the canvassing progressed.

The takeaway from this round of Delhi poll is simple and clear: people will, on any day, choose a party with a good track record in governance over a party which solely relies on a divisive and hate-filled campaign.

AAP’s clean image and visible changes Kejriwal’s government introduced in functioning of the national capital finally triumphed over BJP’s extensive use of money and muscle power. That it could break away from the polarising debates that has filled Indian society over the last few years successfully, and emerge as an independent political force, will be a lesson for all political parties in the days to come.

‘Rejection of BJP’s Hate Politics’: Opposition Leaders Across Country Congratulate AAP

Among those to tweet in the aftermath of the victory were Mamata Banerjee, Rahul Gandhi, M.K. Stalin and Sitaram Yechury.

New Delhi: As it became certain that the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) was set to form the government in Delhi with a thumping majority of 62 out of 70 seats, West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee was among the first to congratulate Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal. 

In a not-so-subtle dig at the Bhartiya Janata Party, the Trinamool Congress chief said “leaders playing on faith through hate speech and divisive politics should take a cue”

Through the campaign the BJP had relied on Hindu consolidation with an attempt to paint anti-Citizenship Amendment Act protesters as ‘traitors’. 


There has been considerable bonhomie between the two chief ministers. Kejriwal had openly supported Banerjee during the 2019 Lok Sabha elections when at attempt was being made by her to organise parties against the BJP. Banerjee will now face a challenging assembly election next year with the BJP having gained significant ground in West Bengal. 

The Twitter handle of former chief minister of the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir, Mehbooba Mufti, also congratulated Kejriwal. 


Since Mufti has been under detention since August 5 – and recently under the Public Safety Act – without trial and recourse to legal assistance, her daughter Iltija Mufti has been tweeting through her handle. 

Leader of opposition in the Tamil Nadu assembly and leader of the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) M.K. Stalin joined in the congratulatory messages and he too criticised the BJP’s ‘communal politics’. Stalin also brought in the issues of ‘federal rights and regional aspirations’ which are integral to politics in south India and for regional parties with limited national presence. 


The leader of opposition in Bihar Rashtriya Janata Dal’s (RJD) Tejashwi Yadav said that the verdict is a mandate against the BJP’s ‘negative and blatant hate politics’. He also urged the BJP to drop ‘communalism and bigotry’ in its politics. 


Chief minister of Maharashtra, Uddhav Thackeray congratulated Kejirwal and said that the people of Delhi have chosen ‘jan ki baat’ over ‘mann ki bat’ – a pun on Narendra Modi’s radio show.

“The Delhi voters have also shown nationalism is also a personal matter and only those wearing it on the heart may not necessarily be true nationalist. This myth has been busted with this result today,” he said.

General secretary of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) Sitaram Yechury said that the Delhi results are a thumbs up to the protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), National Population Register (NPR) and the National Register of Citizens (NRC). He urged Prime Minister Narendra Modi to withdraw the CAA and to denotify NPR. 

Among other regional leaders who by evening had congratulated Kejriwal were Samajwadi Party’s Akhilesh Yadav, Haryana deputy chief minister Dushyant Chautala, TDP chief N Chandrababu Naidu, Biju Janata Dal chief and Odisha chief minister Naveen Patnaik, Telangana Rashtra Samity chief K.T. Rama Rao, YSRCP head and Andhra Pradesh chief minister Jagan Mohan Reddy, Jharkhand chief minister Hemant Soren and Kerala chief minister Pinarayi Vijayan.

The Congress – which has drawn a blank and could lose its deposit in all seats – also joined in the celebrations. Former party chief Rahul Gandhi tweeted his congratulations.


Former finance minister P. Chidambram said that the voters have rejected “the polarising, divisive and dangerous agenda of the BJP.” 


Senior leader of the Congress Abhishek Manu Singhvi conceded, while talking to NDTV, that the Congress was never really in the contest. “We never really got into the fight because we lost a tall leader and we could not in the short time project an alternative. Need to choose and project somebody who can spend the next three years on the ground being completely backed by the Congress party,” he said. 

Most of the BJP brass has congratulated Kejriwal as well, including prime minister Narendra Modi and Defence Minister Rajnath Singh.


Its Delhi chief Manoj Tiwary said that he accepts responsibility for the defeat. He has also congratulated Kejriwal on Twitter. As has East Delhi MP Gautam Gambhir.

Curiously, Nitin Gadkari’s tweet congratulating Kejriwal, to which the Delhi chief minister seems to have replied, has been deleted.

Watch | Ecstatic AAP Supporters Celebrate Victory At Party Office in Delhi

AAP has now repeated its winning feat twice.

The Aam Aadmi Party has registered another landslide victory in the Delhi assembly elections and is set to form government again. According to the Election Commission, AAP has won in 62 seats and the Bharatiya Janata Party in eight seats. AAP’s vote share is currently at 53.5%, and the BJP’s at 38.5%.

The Congress, according to the EC, is not leading in a single seat. Its vote share is a mere 4.2%.

With Another Win in Delhi, Is Arvind Kejriwal Moving to the National Pulpit?

The AAP model of governance, focusing on micro-level issues, has dealt a severe blow to the BJP’s communal campaign and politics.

The Aam Aadmi Party’s (AAP’s) impressive third consecutive victory in Delhi catapults what we can call a ‘Delhi model of governance’ to the centre of political discussion. Not only that, the AAP’s electoral triumph – juxtaposed with the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP’s) abysmal performance – could push Arvind Kejriwal closer to the national pulpit.

Kejriwal’s party has won 62 out of 70 seats, while BJP have won eight.

Let’s not forget that the BJP rode to power on the back of a much-touted, and roundly criticised, ‘Gujarat model of governance’ heralded by Narendra Modi. The question is: are we going to witness a Modi vs Kejriwal contest in the next national elections? Have the 2020 Delhi assembly elections opened up a way to approach the Lok Sabha elections in 2024? That the question can even be asked is significant.

Conventional wisdom draws a binary between state and national elections. Political pundits repeatedly gesture towards a local vs national distinction in issues of politics as well as concerns of governance. Let’s consider, in this context, the pitches made by the two political parties, AAP and  BJP, in the just-concluded Delhi elections.

If the AAP campaigned on its five years of performance focusing on the model of governance it created, then the BJP ran a dangerously divisive and vicious campaign. In a deliberate strategy, Kejriwal stayed away from sites of anti-Citizenship (Amendment) Act and National Register of Citizens protests, refusing to be drawn into acrimonious debates with the BJP on citizenship. That his party voted against the CAA in the Lok Sabha debate made clear its stand on what perhaps has emerged as the single most emotive political issue of recent years.

On the other hand, what needs to be emphasised is that the AAP model of governance has dealt a severe blow to the BJP’s communal campaign and politics. Since 2018, the BJP has been solely preoccupied with polarising the people along the Hindu-Muslim axis, whipping up issues that feed such politics – be it the Ram Mandir issue or citizenship. Failing to deliver on the economic front, the BJP devoted its energies to deepening demographic anxieties and criminalising Muslims. The party scaled up its campaign to dangerous heights in Delhi, hoping to draw more Hindus into their fold.

It looks like this time around Delhi, not known for being excessively averse to the Hindu Right has, however, privileged governance over communalism. It would be naive to assume that the AAP’s recent victory is tantamount to a rejection of Hindutva politics. It can nevertheless be argued that strengthening government schools, paying attention to under-privileged parents, treating them as important stakeholders in the school education system, alongside building easily accessible local health centres, has proven rewarding.

Also read: The BJP Has Been Defeated By its Hindu Delusions

With its emphasis on social sectors – particularly health and education – the Delhi model challenges the Gujarat model of governance shepherded by then state chief minister Narendra Modi. In its 2014 Lok Sabha campaign, the BJP pitched its Gujarat model as Modi’s unique achievement. The effort was to downplay the 2002 anti-Muslim pogrom in the state by holding up a model they claimed could be extended to the whole country. Six years on, we not only know that the Gujarat model was hugely flawed, but also that wishful attempts to replicate that model were bound to fail.

In fact, the Delhi model is strong precisely in the sectors where the Gujarat model floundered: education and health. In a Wall Street Journal article in 2012, Modi said Gujarat’s economic progress can become a model for the nation. Questioned about widespread malnutrition in the state, Modi’s took the plea that the state was by and large vegetarian. Besides, he added, Gujarat is also a middle-class state, and “the middle class is more beauty conscious than health conscious – that is a challenge. If a mother tells her daughter to have milk, they’ll have a fight. She’ll tell her mother, ‘I won’t drink milk. I’ll get fat.’ They have money but she’s beauty conscious, she’s not health conscious.”

The Gujarat model also had little to show by way of primary school education. Two years ago, the Centre’s National Achievement Survey showed a continued fall in learning outcomes of students from Class III to Class VIII in both government schools and government-aided schools. The sharpest decline was registered in mathematics, language and science. According to a news report: “…the response level of students fell from 65 to 47 per cent in mathematics, 71 per cent to 64 per cent in language and 68 to 52 per cent in science subjects.”

Contrast this with the AAP’s Delhi model. Since coming to power in 2015, the Kejriwal government has made good on its promise of making school education a key governance plank. This meant revamping government schools both in increasing financial allocation and improving the quality of education.

The AAP government successively increased its budget allocation for school and higher education from Rs 6, 208 crore in 2015 to Rs 15,133 crore (budgeted) in 2019-20. Moreover, the increased funds have been used to improve the standard of education in Delhi’s government schools. According to the Neta App Janata Barometer Survey conducted on the eve of the February 8 polls, a high 61% of respondents (out of 40,000 citizens surveyed across 70 constituencies), said they would prefer sending their children to a government rather than a private school.

Celebrations at the AAP Delhi office on Tuesday. Photo: Haris Jeelani Toogo

Everything in the AAP government-led system has not fallen in place. But the Kejriwal government has indeed turned the lens of governance on education and health. And in doing so, the party has set a new, welcome precedent. Unlike the Modi government at the Centre, the AAP has not made grand policy declarations. Instead, the Delhi government has paid attention to micro-level concerns, by sprucing up government schools and instituting mohalla clinics.

Good governance, however, is not the only criterion for judging a government. In the days and months ahead, the AAP will face huge political challenges. The ongoing protests against the CAA/NPR/NRC will demand that AAP take a categorical stand on a matter as critical as the possibility of disenfranchisement of large sections of Muslims. Uncomfortable matters will have to be named and dealt with.

It may be reasonably argued that the BJP is not going to back down on its agenda of promoting divisive politics. Insurgent students and restless citizens alike will demand answers from the thrice-elected chief minister. How Kejriwal deals with these volatile subjects remains to be seen.

Also read: BJP Has Lost the Delhi Elections, But Done Better Than it Did in 2015

In either case, nitpicking aside, one has to recognise the significance of the results in Delhi for what they are. Not only has AAP returned with a substantial majority, it has done so after years of sustained obstruction by the Central government – from the intimidation of its ministers to the deployment of the full-force of Delhi’s Lieutenant Governor against the party.

Since 2016, the BJP has systematically used rhetoric and force to both create crises on campuses like Jawaharlal Nehru University, Jamia Millia Islamia and (as we recently learned) Gargi College. It has used the police to confound the Delhi government’s ability to address local matters, and – in the lead up to the present elections – described Kejriwal as a “terrorist,” colluding with protesters in Shaheen Bagh.

This is the context in which we must understand the verdict in Delhi, along with AAP and Kejriwal’s future on the national stage.

With AAP Victory in Delhi, a Unique Form of Political Awareness Solidifies in India

Not only is AAP’s narrative post-ideological, by subscribing to it people have shown that they can distinguish between centre and state.

The 2020 elections for Delhi’s 70-member state assembly saw a bitter campaign fight between 672 candidates across 13,750 polling booths.

Recording a turnout of 62.59% on February 8, Delhi’s voters have made their decision. The poll results indicate a thumping win for Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), which already looks likely to win 62 seats, while the BJP is leading in single digits. 

The significance of this electoral contest – for all the national media spotlight it got for weeks – was with respect to the direct electoral contest seen between the incumbent Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), and the national ruling Bhartiya Janta Party (BJP). The electoral campaigns of both parties represented two divergent political imageries.  

Also read: Despite Jamia Shooting, Amit Shah’s Divisive Rhetoric Continues Unabated

One is that of an ideological-heavy position of Hindutva underlining a deeply divisive politics of communal hate (against Muslims) and creation of new targets to polarise voters. This was observed in BJP’s electoral campaign, led by Amit Shah and others, who continued to constantly vilify Muslims and those protesting and present in Shaheen Bagh. 

Union home minister Amit Shah campaigning in the West Patel Nagar constituency. Photo: PTI

The other attempted to offer an alternative, ‘post-ideological’ narrative, with a reliance on a civic-focused agenda reflecting the goods of past performance, and offering a manifesto for the future course of development in the state. This was seen in AAP’s campaign under Arvind Kejriwal’s leadership, reflecting the emergence of a new centrist form of progressive politics. A form of centrism that builds upon a new politics of infrastructure, in an otherwise polarised electoral landscape. 

Interpreting the poll results now, one can say AAP’s projected political imagination has won this contest, and that too with a handsome margin. 

What can one make out of this victory? And how does this reflect the emergence of new competitive form of federalism from a politics of infrastructure in India? There are two critical points to observe in response to these questions.

On voter’s split voting preference in states and national elections

For some time now, from Haryana to Maharashtra, to now Delhi, with one state-election after another, it is being observed how the average Indian voter has instituted a split-ticket voting preference where (s)he exercises her or his enfranchisement to vote while differentiating on parties and candidates when it comes to states and national elections. 

A rhetorical agenda relying extensively on national security and anti-Pakistan slogans, may perhaps get people mobilised enough to vote for a party like BJP during national elections. In absence of a credible presidential-style alternative to Narendra Modi, Modi’s BJP can continue to consolidate and command popular support. 

Also read: Another Landslide Victory for AAP in Delhi

However, the same politics of creating new targets for polarisation or banking on national issues, including laws, passed by the Union parliament (reading down of Article 370, or passing the Citizenship Amendment Act) can have a very little say in influencing voter preferences in state or local elections. It is also clear that within the BJP’s own vote-share, there seems to be a divergent electoral preference for a Modi-vote and a BJP-vote.

The former can consolidate votes in the Lok Sabha elections and the latter is far more volatile and fluid, given the results of recent state elections which BJP lost. 

In its 2020 Delhi campaign, AAP practiced a centrist politics of infrastructure, seeking votes in name of schools, clinics, jobs, electricity, affordable housing, etc. than succumb to any “rhetoric of revolution, glory and sacrifice”. There were multiple occasions where Kejriwal, ignoring the direct attacks made on him, continued to challenge the BJP leadership to field candidates (including home minister Amit Shah himself) for an open-debate on discussing Delhi’s local issues and not on national problems. 

A strategy to focus on local issues and ask people to vote on governance (as against their ideological positionings) seem to have worked reasonably well.

AAP supporters celebrate outside the party office in Delhi. Photo: Haris Jeelani Toogo

This was seen in Haryana and Jharkhand too, where, a huge chunk of BJP’s Lok Sabha vote-share ended up voting for local parties, expressing resentment on the high state-level unemployment, poor performing local industries, land issues (in tribal areas of Jharkhand) and overall state of governance.

The urban poor of Delhi prefers to care much about her or his own self-interest, for basic public goods and services than stretch her or his self-imagination to resonate with any other ideals (say, of a nation, religion etc.) projected by a political party. 

The Delhi voter may thus be less influenced by hierarchies of caste, class or by hatred against a given group, and more with what can help him or her address day-to-day issues with relative ease. So, women’s safety, affordable housing, free electricity and water will be valued more than anything else. Municipal concerns of waste accumulation and others carry more weight. 

It is also interesting to perceive how, in urban environments (such as in Delhi), voters may be less inclined in pursuing (or talking about) politics as a vocation in majority, but rather see political processes in context of to a temporal, time-bound discourse (during elections) to assess the performance of one party, and stay vigilant enough to vote for a party (or candidate) that promises ‘ease of living’ than demand street-fights, revolution or communal hatred. 

Competitive federalism from increasing political centralisation of power

Modi’s BJP may still be the dominant political party at the Union level, and with no credible national opposition nor candidate to stand up to him, the party may continue to hold on its hegemonic presence for some years to come. 

Still, quite intriguingly, regional parties at the level of states have stood up to defeat the BJP in most of the recent state-level elections. The party lost Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Chattisgarh, Jharkhand, and failed to get an absolute majority in states of Haryana, Maharashtra (giving way to a Shiv Sena-Congress-NCP coalition there). 

The national dominance of the BJP and Modi’s own popularity and presence hasn’t trickled down much to the state-level and this, in a polarising scenario and an environment of mistrust or fractures between the state and Centre, can surface all kinds of issues in implementation of Union laws (some state assemblies have already passed a resolution to not implement CAA) and its policies. It says a lot about the changing dynamics of the existing federal power structure. 

The past few years have witnessed a fundamental restructuring of the federal power structure between the Union and states under the Modi-Shah administration. A greater control exercised by the Centre on autonomous public institutions, in almost coercively introducing laws for national implementation, and in powers of financial autonomy and devolution of funds to the state (in a post GST scenario), can be attributed to a cause to establish a centralised nation-state that depends on the power of a strong Centre (or doesn’t see itself as a Union of states) and is governed under a supreme leader.

The focus has been much to reduce the agency or discretional political and financial autonomy of states. 

Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the Bharatiya Janata Party’s headquarters in New Delhi after the party’s victory in India’s parliamentary elections. Credit: Mayank Aggarwal/Mongabay.

While the recent people-led protest movements across the country against the NPR-NRC-CAA have attempted to rekindle the basic spirit of the Indian constitution and restore faith in fundamentals of the constitution’s basic structure, it is important to understand how a dominant narrative of centralisation could best be countered through a cohesive demonstration of a vibrant federal republic culture, where states and people at a local-level continue to stand up and fight processes of centralism (even if institutionalised or legitimised from the top).

Centralisation, and reduction of democratic agency is in fact leading to further de-centralisation and democratisation of preferences. 

As a result, the political layering of power structures at the national, state, and local levels in the current scheme of things, and with AAP’s win in Delhi, may seem to have taken us to find a differentiated voter mindset in the Indian citizenry, which, shall continue to vote differently for each party and candidate in different electoral battles and prefers to have multiple layers of parties involved in a competitive federal power structure. 

This preference to have a competitive federal base in its link with changing electoral preferences must therefore be understood as a collective resistance to centralisation of political agency and executive action, providing a new face for a vibrant federal spirit to emerge.

In assembly battles, a greater weight of importance is attributed to state level parties and their local politics of infrastructure, while in a national scenario, the Centre command may at best be able to rally around issues of national security, immigration, etc. for seeking votes in the General Election. 

Deepanshu Mohan is assistant professor of economics at Jindal School of International Affairs, O.P. Global Jindal University.

At AAP Headquarters, ‘Baby Kejriwal’ Celebrates Party’s Victory

Dressed in the Delhi chief minister’s ‘muffler look’, Avyaan Tomar caught the attention of supporters and media.

New Delhi: A toddler dressed as Arvind Kejriwal in his famed ‘muffler look’ made his presence felt at the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) office. A photo of him in the Kejriwal get-up was later tweeted from the official handle of AAP, going viral. Last seen, the photo was retweeted over 2,400 times and garnered over 17,000 likes.

AAP has won 62 out of 70 seats while BJP won in eight.

Packed with party supporters in celebratory mood from 9 am onwards, when early trends gave a massive lead to AAP, the toddler, Avyaan Tomar, was seen in the arms of his father Rahul Tomar at around 10 am. He immediately caught the attention of mediapersons, who were present in considerable numbers at the party’s headquarters on Delhi’s Deen Dayal Upadhyay Marg.

Media persons and AAP supporters fussed over ‘Baby Kejriwal’ flaunting a pair of glasses, a moustache, an AAP topi and a black muffler to complete Kejriwal’s winter look.

The boy’s father, a local businessman and a party supporter, also donned the white topi with ‘Main Aam Aadmi hoon’ written on it. After first posing with his son, he later put the boy on the ground, with at least a dozen camera clicking into action around him.

During the swearing-in ceremony of Kejriwal at the Ramlila grounds after the 2015 win, Tomar’s daughter, Fairy, too dressed up as Kejriwal with a muffler and glasses. Rahul Tomar’s wife Meenakshi then said PTI, “I want my daughter to become like Kejriwal and have the same qualities that he has — honesty, integrity, compassion…. We used to bring her to Anna Hazare’s rally and when Kejriwal came to the forefront of anti-graft struggle, we made our daughter the mascot of the effort.”

Watch | Full Show: Delhi Election Result Analysis – Welfare Politics Over Communal Politics?

Initial trends gave Arvind Kejriwal’s AAP an edge which the party maintained throughout the counting.

On The Wire’s live election result programming that began at 8 am on February 11, The Wire’s senior editor Arfa Khanum Sherwani, senior journalist and founding editor M.K. Venu and professor Apoorvanad of Delhi University spoke about the issues floated by the major parties in the run-up to the polling in Delhi on February 8.

While most voters that The Wire spoke to were impressed by AAP’s welfare schemes – free electricity and free water – the BJP fuelled nationalist sentiments throughout the election campaign.

Very early in the morning, initial trends gave Arvind Kejriwal’s AAP an edge while BJP spokespersons told reporters to ‘wait and watch’. By 11 am, the numbers showed signs of a clear victory for the AAP.

The Wire’s Maya Mirchandani, later, carried on the discussion with Professor Sudha Pai and Yamini Aiyar on the effects of AAP’s welfare politics on the minds of voters.