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Assembly Elections 2018

BJP's city of joy: Riding on a Modi wave, BJP is poised to sweep six of the seven Lok Sabha seats in the Capital

Riding on a Modi wave, BJP is poised to sweep six of the seven Lok Sabha seats in the Capital while AAP and Congress may have to fight for the other. Ashok K. Lahiri
November 30, 1999
ISSUE DATE: April 14, 2014
UPDATED: April 8, 2014 19:04 IST BJP candidate Meenakshi Lekhi Delhi votes for the Lok Sabha on April 10. It sends seven members to the Lok Sabha and 70 to its Legislative Assembly. In the December 2013 elections to the Assembly, BJP got 31 seats, the Congress eight and the year-old Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) 28. If relative popularity has not changed in the last three months, BJP and AAP should get three Lok Sabha seats each, and the Congress one. But things have changed, and changed quite a lot. According to the India Today Group-Cicero opinion poll among 1,200 respondents on March 27 and March 28, Delhi is likely to elect six of the seven BJP candidates to the Lok Sabha. The Congress will be lucky to bag one and AAP has to satisfy itself with one victory. Since there is a residual uncertainty in every sample, the numbers can vary by A1.

Delhi's party loyalties last for about a decade. Then it changes its favourite. The 1980s belonged to the Congress, the 1990s to BJP. The Congress was again the darling of Delhiites until the last Assembly elections in December 2013. From its seven constituencies, in 2004, it grudgingly returned only one BJP member to the Lok Sabha, and in 2009, it refused to return any. In 2009, Delhi handed all the seven laurels to the Congress. In both 2004 and 2009 elections, the Congress got well over half the votes and BJP lagged behind by 14-22 percentage points. BJP's vote share went down from 41 per cent to 35 per cent between 2004 and 2009. The margin of victory of the Congress in 2009, at well over 20 per cent in five constituencies and over 10 per cent in the other two, is an indication of how resounding its victory was.

The Congress fell out of favour with Delhiites sometime before late 2013, perhaps as early as 2012 when the municipal elections were held. In the elections to the Legislative Assembly in December 2013, Delhi voters almost fiercely swung their allegiance from the Congress. The vote share of the grand old party came down to an all-time low of less than 25 per cent. The Congress had never done as badly in Delhi since Independence. BJP hung on to a share of 33 per cent, and AAP led by Arvind Kejriwal secured over 29 per cent of the votes. By bagging 28 of the 70 seats in the Delhi Vidhan Sabha, close to BJP's 31. AAP worried both BJP and the Congress no end.

Until the last Assembly elections in December 2013, Delhi's politics was dominated by two parties-BJP and the Congress. Though there were candidates from other parties such as the Bahujan Samaj Party, Samajwadi Party and Janata Dal (Secular), and many Independents, they hardly made a dent in the electoral arithmetic. Of a total 160 Lok Sabha candidates in the seven constituencies, all but 14-seven each from the Congress and BJP-forfeited their deposit. This time around, according to the opinion poll, it is not a bi-party fight but a contest with three main contenders-AAP, BJP and the Congress. The others, including the four candidates of Mamata Banerjee's Trinamool Congress, are likely to forfeit their deposit as usual. The Congress's troubles in Delhi continue, according to the opinion poll, but BJP is back in favour with the people. According to the poll, there has been a swing of eight percentage points in favour of BJP since the Assembly elections in December 2013 while the Congress has lost two more points. Even AAP has slipped by about a point and a half. The swing in favour of BJP appears to be stronger in the four parliamentary constituencies that cover Central Delhi and Trans-Yamuna. In relative terms, AAP continues to hold on to its popularity in the three constituencies of Outer Delhi, with a larger proportion of rural and semi-urban voters. This fact is also corroborated by the relative popularity of the different parties in rural and semi-urban areas in the opinion poll.

BJP has changed its candidates from 2009 in all but one of the seven constituencies. Ramesh Bidhuri, who lost the South Delhi seat to Congress's Ramesh Kumar in 2009 by less than a lakh votes, is the only leftover from 2009. The rest are all relatively new faces and they may help BJP. The Congress, on the other hand, has fielded its seven victors from 2009 for re-endorsement. Then, there is also the Modi wave in BJP's favour. In the opinion poll, 44 per cent of the respondents preferred Narendra Modi as the next prime minister compared to 24 per cent for AAP's Arvind Kejriwal and 19 per cent for Rahul Gandhi. The Modi wave may have put some wind in the sails of the BJP candidates.

Delhi is ahead of the rest of India in more ways than one. It has, for example, a literacy rate of 86.3 per cent (2011 census), which is considerably higher than the all-India rate of 74 per cent. The opinion poll also suggests high political awareness-99 per cent of the respondents were aware of the forthcoming elections and as many as 82 per cent had made up their mind about who they will vote for. Given the rising momentum of the Modi wave that various opinion polls have suggested, the scope for a late swing against BJP appears unlikely. When asked about their second choice, only 3 per cent voters indicated the Congress as their preferred choice compared to 15 per cent for BJP and AAP.

Dissatisfaction with UPA 2 appears widespread. Only 41 per cent of the respondents were fully or partially satisfied with its performance. About 30 per cent of those who had voted for the Congress in 2009 indicated they had switched their loyalty to BJP, with an almost equal proportion going for AAP.

The favourite for the chief minister's post in Delhi is Harsh Vardhan of BJP. Though determinants of voters' preference differ between Lok Sabha and Assembly elections, which are still some time away, this poll tends to support the view that there may have been some erosion in the AAP's appeal, particularly after people's experience of the party's 49-day rule. Interestingly, according to the poll, AAP is hardly the B-team of the Congress; with almost three in four prospective AAP voters indicating that they are switching from the Congress, AAP is doing more damage to the Congress than to BJP.

BJP's popularity cuts across the lines of caste, educational attainments, income and sex, but is markedly different across religious lines. Among the Muslims, BJP lags far behind both the Congress and AAP-only one in six Muslims is likely to support BJP.

Delhi accounts for only seven of the 543 Lok Sabha seats. Yet, in a way, the performance in Delhi-a sort of mini-India in its demographics-often foretells the all-India performance of BJP and the Congress. In all elections since 1977, except in 1991, the Congress has not fared well at the all-India level without doing well in Delhi. There is always a first time, but if opinion polls are anything to go by, this time won't be an exception. So will the party that wins Delhi also rule India?

Ashok K. Lahiri is an economist and psephologist

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