4 min readNew DelhiMay 29, 2024 10:10 AM IST
First published on: May 29, 2024 at 05:21 AM IST
In a first-of-its-kind election which saw the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and Congress forming a joint front against the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), four of the capital’s seven Lok Sabha seats have emerged as areas of concern for each of Delhi’s principal political protagonists during the countdown to results next week.
An overall dip has been observed in turnout — 58.69% — this time against a polling percentage of 60.6% in 2019. While Northeast Delhi saw the highest (62.98%), the lowest polling percentage was from New Delhi (55.43%).
While victory margins across all seven constituencies were expected to be “low” compared to the 2019 polls, seats such as Chandni Chowk, Northeast, West and South Delhi — insiders from all three parties said their polling analysis indicates — were likely to see the eventual winner “scraping through” in terms of vote share.
Despite the overall reduction in voting percentage, however, 9 assembly segments bucked the low voter turnout trend, recording higher turnouts as compared to those in 2019. The biggest jump — of 14.8 percentage points — was seen in Delhi Cantonment, which falls in New Delhi constituency.
Three segments in the constituency, where BJP’s Bansuri Swaraj contested against AAP’s Somnath Bharti, saw a higher turnout than in 2019. At Rajinder Nagar, turnout increased by 4.23 percentage points and the increase was nearly 2 percentage points in the New Delhi assembly seat.
The Northeast Delhi constituency, where BJP incumbent MP Manoj Tiwari faces Congress’s Kanhaiya Kumar, saw the highest turnout but still fell short of the 2019 mark. Three assembly segments in the constituency, however, saw an increase. In Babarpur, turnout went up by almost 4 percentage points; and in Seelampur and Mustafabad it rose by nearly 2 percentage points.
Three segments in Northwest Delhi constituency, where BJP’s Yogendra Chandoliya is up against Congress’s Udit Raj, also saw a higher turnout. While in Bawana, the turnout rose by over 2%, it rose by a little over 1 percentage point in Badli and Nangloi Jat.
“Increased voting in Assembly segments where JJ clusters/slums and unauthorised colonies are located will seemingly have a significant say in which candidate and party emerge as winners; this is also true of areas where minority communities make up a majority of the population,” a BJP insider said, attributing high voter turnout in such segments to the possibility of polarisation between communities.
“The voter is completely silent… we are confident the Congress vote successfully got transferred to AAP where it was required, but that does not appear to be the case regarding the Congress’s vote,” an AAP insider said.
According to sources in the Congress, the party was confident of winning Chandni Chowk and Northeast Delhi. AAP said it was expecting a positive result in the West and East Delhi seats.
The BJP, meanwhile, said it was certain it would sweep all the seven seats — albeit with lower margins than last time — but it was, however, concerned about Chandni Chowk, Northeast and West Delhi.
According to Election Commission of India statistics, the lowest victory margin in 2019, at 23.27% or 2.28 lakh votes, was recorded on the Chandni Chowk seat with incumbent BJP MP Dr Harsh Vardhan claiming almost 53% of the vote share.
At 40.13%, or more than 5.78 lakh votes, the highest victory margin was recorded in the West Delhi seat where incumbent BJP MP Parvesh Verma had claimed almost 60% of the vote share.
As per ECI statistics, lowest victory margin in 2019, at 23.27% or 2.28 lakh votes, was recorded on the Chandni Chowk seat. At 40.13%, or more than 5.78 lakh votes, highest victory margin was in West Delhi. 
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