By Sushil Kutty
Did people vote for change in Delhi? The word reverberated the most in the New Delhi assembly constituency, which had the honour of being represented by AAP convener Arvind Kejriwal since before 2015. The former Delhi Chief Minister on the polling day on February 5 had many anxious moment as the voting trend did not give him the confidence like 2020 polls.
Don’t blame the Delhi voter. Getting two-timed twice in a row with a smile risks ending up fighting a grimace. Half of Delhi’s voters, who voted for AAP in the yester-years, admit they were fooled into voting for the AAP and they did so thinking they were on to something good.
The same lot now want ‘badlav’, which is Hindi for ‘change’. With that established, most of the Delhi electorate went to vote on February 5 in the glare of over 30,000 policemen keeping a strict vigil on the voting process; not counting 220 companies of paramilitary forces deployed across Delhi to ensure nobody stole the elections.
“Fair and smooth voting process” one newspaper elaborated in as few words as possible. Who doesn’t know that the Delhi Assembly has 70 seats to fill and the Aam Aadmi Party had cornered over 60 of the 70 in 2015, and 2020 as well?
This did not sink well with the Bharatiya Janata Party while the Congress sank into a silence that has lasted a decade and more, like the Sphinx in the shadow of the Pyramid. Of late, though, the Congress has been showing signs of coming alive, especially in constituencies east of the Yamuna, a river so dead that it might go the way of the mythical Saraswati.
The now foamy Yamuna should have been an overriding poll issue and for a while it was, too. But the voters are like ‘one bird in hand is better than two in the bush.’ Women voters in particular, whose faith in Kejriwal is in direct proportion with the coins he throws at them courtesy the freebies.
If Delhi has the worst stinking water, the lousiest polluted air and the most pathetic stretches of sewers in the whole of Asia, it is because women in the Delhi slums and the ramshackle colonies have gotten used to Kejriwal’s crumbs.
Think of Delhi’s women voters and think of low expectations and you can picture “Delhi voting!” Freebies are staple for the women voters of Delhi, living precariously in the congested slums of Delhi, where votes are sold and bought cheap.
The AAP has been screwing Delhi’s voters with freebies. All parties have freebies working for them. The only difference is, the BJP has a Hindu consolidation aiding it, courtesy Yogi Adityanath’s ‘Batenge toh katenge’ election-winning slogan.
That being said, voting on February 5 began at 7 am sharp. The close of voting was scheduled for 6 pm. Voting took place in 13,766 polling stations. The triangular contest featured AAP, Congress, and the BJP. There was no way Prime Minister Narendra Modi would maintain radio silence despite being at the Mahakumbh and taking a dip in the ‘Sangam’.
In a post on ‘X’, Modi asked youth voters to “participate in the festival of democracy.” There were 699 candidates in the fray. Eligible voters numbered 1.56 crore–83.76 lakh men and 72.36 lakh women. Plus 1,267 “third gender”, which is beyond US President Donald Trump’s ken, who says there are only “two sexes”.
Kejriwal needs all the “sexes” voting for AAP. The New Delhi assembly seat could go to the BJP’s ‘Jatpratyashi’ Parvesh Varma, the son of a Jat Chief Minister who is no more. The decks are choc-a-bloc against Kejriwal, who should have kept his tongue deep down in his throat, not remarked that the Haryana government “poisoned” the Yamuna.
Delhi’s jats didn’t like this any more than Haryana’s jats. Kejriwal is still searching for the marbles he lost when he made the comment. Arvind Kejriwal’s “high-octane battle” with Varma, and the Congress’ Sandeep Dikshit, also the son of a former Chief Minister, now no more, could end in the AAP convener’s abject surrender.
Then, there is the Kalkaji constituency, which is Delhi Chief Minister Atishi’s seat, from where she was taking on the Congress’ Alka Lamba and the BJP’s Ramesh Bidhuri, for whom ‘badlav’ was at play. Bidhuri is too “local” to not win over the “locals”. And Bidhuri speaks the “local” lingo like a native-speaker.
He also happens to be a role model for the “local” youth; however, it wouldn’t be right to write off Atishi’s chances. Women fed on a diet of free bus-rides are staunch Atishi supporters. They can just get up and take a bus ride to anywhere in Delhi, anytime of the day and night.
Meanwhile, the Election Commission had made it easy to check crowd levels in real-time at the booths, courtesy a “Queue Management System (QMS)”. The EC also made special provisions for senior citizens and the physically-challenged. Votes will be counted on February 8. Will Arvind Kejriwal retain his seat? Will AAP return to power?
The exit polls would have told the tale and unlocked a preview of the most likely results. Beating Prime Minister Narendra Modi had by all reckoning become a habit for Arvind Kejriwal and the AAP Supremo has been wearing his habit on his sleeve! Beating Kejriwal in his den would be a dream come true, especially when it’s also tax-free! The Middle-Class of Delhi was out in force on February 5. (IPA Service)
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