People of Delhi will vote on May 25 in the sixth phase of the Lok Sabha elections to decide the fate of all seven parliamentary segments in the national capital. An intense battle is on the cards with the three main political parties wrapping up their high-voltage campaigns on Thursday.
The Bhartiya Janta Party (BJP) which won all seven seats in 2019 is against an alliance of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and the Congress, both members of the Indian National Development Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) bloc. This is a significant departure from the past when the city, which has a total of 1,52,01,936 voters, saw a three-cornered fight. While the AAP is contesting on four seats, the Congress has fielded candidates on three constituencies as per the seat-sharing arrangements between the two INDIA member parties.
During vigorous campaigning in the middle of a heatwave, both sides exuded confidence in winning all seven seats.
The AAP’s campaign got a shot in the arm after the release of Delhi chief minister and AAP national convenor Arvind Kejriwal, who was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on March 21 in connection with the Delhi excise policy case. He was lodged in Tihar jail. Since his coming out of jail, Kejriwal has been tirelessly campaigning in the city and conducted rallies and roadshows across constituencies. In his interaction with the electorate, he accused the saffron party of a dictatorial attitude and using the investigating agencies to muzzle opposition.
In Kejriwal’s absence, his wife Sunita Kejriwal held roadshows for party candidates whereas senior party leaders Sanjay Singh, Atishi, Saurabh Bharadwaj and Gopal Rai steered the party and electioneering through a tumultuous phase. The AAP launched the ‘Jail ka Jawab Vote se’ campaign in their supreme leader’s absence in an apparent bid to win sympathy votes.
From the BJP, Prime Minister Narendra Modi himself addressed two rallies in North East Delhi and West Delhi constituencies. Union ministers Amit Shah Rajnath Singh, Nitin Gadkari, Smriti Irani, and Piyush Goyal asked for votes on behalf of the party’s candidates reminding the electorate that the Narendra Modi-led BJP government at the centre is the only option for the country.
The BJP maintained throughout its campaign that the INDIA bloc partners in Delhi are “unnatural” allies and will fail to make any impact. The BJP attacked the AAP for not allowing the people of Delhi to benefit from the central government schemes such as Ayushman Bharat. The speeches of the BJP candidates reflected their dependence on the Modi factor to attract votes.
The Congress, which was pushed out of the Capital, ironically by the AAP about a decade ago, is trying to restore its support in Delhi by portraying that they are fighting a larger battle to save democracy and the Constitution. Hence, an alliance with the AAP. The Congress, however, got a setback when a section of its leaders including former Delhi Congress chief Arvinder Singh Lovely announced his exit from the party over tickets to Kanhaiya Kumar and Udit Raj from Northeast and Northwest constituencies.
The two constituencies which are expected to see an interesting battle are New Delhi and Northeast Delhi. In the former, the battle is between two lawyers – BJP’s Bansuri Swaraj, former union minister Sushma Swaraj’s daughter and AAP’s Somnath Bharti, three-time MLA from Malviya Nagar assembly segment. In the Northeast segment, singer-turned BJP incumbent Manoj Tiwari will take on Congress’s Kanhaiya Kumar.
When the city goes out to vote on Saturday, the battle in Delhi will be defined by a contest between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and AAP supremo Arvind Kejriwal.
