What the exit polls say about Delhi Assembly Elections 2020
The elections in Delhi were held on February 8. The voter turnout was recorded at 62.59 per cent. The AAP questioned the "delay" behind making the announcement — the turnout was declared only on Sunday evening. Delhi went to polls on February 8. Barring a few exit polls, all of them gave the AAP over 50 seats out of a total of 70. While the party had come to power with a majority of 67 in the Delhi House of 70 seats in the 2015 Assembly polls, most pollsters this time gave them more than 50 seats. The BJP is expected to improve on the tally of three seats it got the last time, but still, is likely to finish a distant second. With most exit polls predicting an absolute rout for Congress, the revival of the party, which failed to open its account in the 2015 Assembly elections, is unlikely this time too.
For AAP, the results will show if its gambit of seeking a mandate on its performance has paid off; for BJP, if Modi name, Hindutva agenda prove stronger than CAA anger. All the exit polls have predicted a comfortable win for Arvind Kejriwal's AAP.
The past month had seen two very different campaigns run by the AAP and BJP — with the former asking people to vote on the basis of its work, and the latter focusing its campaign around Shaheen Bagh, where protests against the new citizenship law have been on for almost two months now.
In its manifesto, AAP has chosen not to reiterate any of its older or incomplete promises. Instead, it has introduced two new points — a “Deshbhakti Curriculum” which CM Arvind Kejriwal had announced in August 2018 as a means to instill a sense of “duty” and “responsibility” towards the country, and introducing spoken English and soft skills for students who have graduated from any Delhi school in the past five years to increase their employability.
The BJP’s campaign had been dominated by Union Home Minister Amit Shah’s public meetings, in which he had alleged that AAP has not fulfilled its education promises or built a single new school or college.
The biggest promises that the party has made in the field of education are to increase the education budget by 10% each year, and to open 200 new schools and 10 new colleges. It has also promised introduce a “Sanskrit board” and Sanskrit learning in the Sanskrit medium.
The Congress manifesto claimed that under AAP, lakhs of students shifted from government to private schools. It also alleged “more publicity by the AAP government than actual improvement in school”.
🔴 Read: Will BJP bet on Shaheen Bagh work? Jury is out
🔴 Read: Arvind Kejriwal interview
🔴 Tavleen Singh writes: BJP losing Delhi will be just punishment for shameless attempt to divide and rule
🔴 Read: Delhi anti-CAA protesters say their fight is with Centre, not Arvind Kejriwal
🔴 Read: Delhi elections 2020: Education, jobs, safety for women — what first-timers voted for
🔴 Read: In complex capital landscape, vote for AAP may not mean disagreement with BJP
Arvind Kejriwal, along with his family, addresses party workers at Aam Aadmi Party headquarters in New Delhi on Tuesday. (Express Photo: Tashi Tobgyal)
After the Lok Sabha polls, as AAP reeled under a crushing defeat, a small team of researchers and volunteers from political consultancy firm Indian Political Action Committee (I-PAC) quietly got to work, “gathering data and surveying the mood”. A formal announcement came December 14, with Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal tweeting: “Happy to share that I-PAC is coming on-board with us. Welcome aboard.”
“Ground work started around June (2019). We did work with the Congress during the Punjab Assembly polls, but since AAP was the principal challenger, we were in touch with them as well… We always had that mutual understanding, which later took a more formal shape. It’s not about whether they approached us or we approached them,” Rishi Raj Singh, director and co-founder of I-PAC, said. Read more
The Delhi BJP is likely to see fresh faces in its organisational set-up when it goes for its next election assignment — the 2022 MCD polls, where it will be facing 15 years of anti-incumbency. Senior party leaders said that since Delhi BJP chief Manoj Tiwari’s tenure had ended and he was on an extension, the party could think of fresh names.
The party’s next line of leaders who could hold a chance at becoming the state president are MPs Parvesh Sahib Singh and Gautam Gambhir, former MP Maheish Girri, and senior leader Ashish Sood. Read more
As Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) swept the Delhi Assembly polls, eight candidates fielded by the party failed to find favour with people. The eight constituencies where the AAP lost to BJP are Ghonda, Karawal Nagar, Rohtas Nagar, Gandhi Nagar, Vishwas Nagar, Laxmi Nagar, Rohini and Badarpur. Of these, the BJP won in Vishwas Nagar and Rohini in the 2015 Assembly polls too.
Voting patterns show that the Congress had little role to play in the outcome, except in one seat where the dip in AAP’s vote share was inversely proportional to the Congress vote share.
The five minority-dominated constituencies of Matia Mahal, Ballimaran, Mustafabad, Okhla and Seelampur, once considered Congress strongholds, have seen solid consolidation of votes behind AAP. Even in 2015, when the party did not win a single seat, Congress had managed to come second on two seats. However, this time, it finished third, with vote share in single digits, except in Seelampur. Read more
The AAP recorded a significant victory margin in Okhla, a constituency which includes Jamia Millia Islamia and Shaheen Bagh — the epicentre of protests against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act.
Stepping out of the counting centre at Maharani Bagh in the evening, Khan told The Indian Express: “This is a win for the public. They trusted us. They voted for the work we did. The BJP tried to fight the elections on communal lines and make Shaheen Bagh an issue, but it didn’t work. People voted for development. This is a win for the people of Delhi. They have shocked Amit Shah with ‘current’ from their votes.”
Nineteen first-time legislators are on their way to the Delhi Assembly, including former councillors, spouses of former MLAs and former Lok Sabha aspirants.
Of BJP’s eight entrants into the Delhi Legislative Assembly, two — Ajay Mahawar (Ghonda) and Abhay Verma (Laxmi Nagar) — are first-time MLAs. However, both are senior hands in the party’s Delhi state unit. While Mahawar is the party’s district president from North East Delhi, Verma is the state BJP vice-president.
The 17 first-time MLAs from AAP, however, present a diverse set of profiles. Among them are three — Atishi (Kalkaji), Raghav Chadha (Rajinder Nagar) and Dilip Pandey (Timarpur) — who had contested unsuccessfully for the party in last year’s Lok Sabha election. While Atishi and Pandey trailed behind both BJP and Congress in the parliamentary election, Chadha had come in second then, behind BJP. Read more
Much was said and heard about Shaheen Bagh during the Delhi Assembly election campaign. On results day, Shaheen Bagh has chosen its own way to give out its message — silence.
The protesters chose to stage a silent protest on the counting day, saying that they do not endorse any party. “You can shoot, click pictures. But the protesters won’t speak to you today. Words can be twisted. This protest is not about opposing or supporting any one political party. We don’t want anyone to get the wrong message today. We won’t allow either the victors or the losers to manipulate us,” a protester said. Read more
On counting day, two of BJP’s most vocal leaders, who had been penalised by the Election Commission — Model Town candidate Kapil Mishra and West Delhi MP Parvesh Sahib Singh — found themselves with little to say. While Mishra lost to AAP’s Akhilesh Pati Tripathi by over 10,000 votes, in Singh’s Lok Sabha constituency, the BJP lost all 10 seats.
After a campaign that saw jibes at anti-CAA protesters in Shaheen Bagh and other provocative statements, on Tuesday, both Bagga and Mishra were far more muted.
The Congress’s abysmal showing in the Delhi Assembly elections did not come as a surprise to many in the party but the slide in its vote share — leading it to conclude that it could have lost both Hindu as well as Muslim votes — is forcing the central leadership to think how to navigate the minefield of the ideological issues the BJP pushes and the emergence of parties like AAP which take a nuanced centre-right position.
The other challenge for the Congress is that in states where there are strong regional parties, it is increasingly ceding the anti-BJP space to them. And where regional parties are in power, the BJP is squeezing the Congress out.
The BJP, which had secured majority in 65 of the 70 Assembly seats in the Lok Sabha elections in Delhi nine months ago, was optimistic that the Centre’s decision to clear regularisation of unauthorised colonies in the national capital — a move that could benefit 40-50 lakh people — could be the “game changer” it needed to take on AAP.
But when the BJP campaign, led by Union Home Minister Amit Shah, began three weeks ago, the focus soon shifted from unauthorised colonies and Central schemes such as Ayushman Bharat to the anti-CAA protests with the attack focused on Shaheen Bagh where women have been sitting on an agitation for almost two months. Read more
Overcoming a high-octane divisive BJP campaign right in the middle of anti-CAA protests that rocked the Capital, Arvind Kejriwal and his Aam Aadmi Party returned to power in Delhi Tuesday for a second five-year term at the head of another landslide.
The campaign itself was a study in contrast, with the AAP keeping the focus on showcasing its achievements over the past five years and the BJP raising the pitch on national issues such as the new citizenship law, Article 370 and the Ram temple.
As the campaign progressed, anti-CAA protests at Shaheen Bagh became the focal point of the BJP attack, with top leaders accusing the AAP and Kejriwal of fuelling dissent and feeding protesters “biryani”. The AAP maintained distance on the issue, with the CM telling The Indian Express in an interview that “everyone has the right to protest but not to inconvenience other people. If you will block a road and cause pain to so many people, it will not be acceptable in any democracy, any society. Gandhiji would not have accepted this either”. Read more
The Aam Aadmi Party routed the BJP for the second successive time in Delhi’s Assembly elections on Tuesday. Many of AAP’s detractors, especially in the BJP, have repeatedly argued that it solely relies on offering fiscally-ruinous “freebies” to the voters and luring them to vote for AAP. Its supporters, on the other hand, argue that AAP’s policy choices — with stress on improving provisioning of public education and public healthcare — present a new model of governance, and point out that under AAP, Delhi has not only grown faster than the India average but also increased its share to the national GDP.
Where does the truth lie? Has the AAP government run its schemes by borrowing money from the market and increasing fiscal deficit? Or has it run one of the most fiscally-prudent governments in India? More importantly, is the AAP model sustainable? Read to know more
The triumph of AAP, Arvind Kejriwal said Tuesday, was the beginning of a new model of politics. In a recent interview with The Indian Express, Kejriwal had said AAP’s victory would also give birth to a new ideology of “work” — a remarkably amorphous position to take in a country riven by social and political faultlines along religion, caste and language.
On Tuesday, the AAP office was a living testimony of that fluidity, which helps it draw in its fold people identifying with varying schools of thoughts, perhaps best reflected in Kejriwal’s speeches beginning and ending with Bharat Mata ki Jai, Inquilab Zindabad and Vande Mataram. And a message for Delhi: “Gazab kar diya aap logon ne.”
AAP 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. 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.
The AAP won a landslide victory on Tuesday in the high-stakes Delhi Assembly polls, leaving the main rival BJP way behind and decimating the Congress in a bitterly-fought contest.
Eight of the nine women candidates fielded by the AAP in the Delhi Assembly polls won, helping the party register a thumping election victory on Tuesday. The three prominent parties -- the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Congress -- had fielded a total of 24 women candidates, with the Congress accounting for a maximum of 10 of them.
The Aam Aadmi Party has emerged victorious on all the 12 seats reserved for SC candidates in the high-stakes Delhi Assembly polls, with the minimum victory margin being almost 12,000 votes. Rajendra Pal Gautam, who is social welfare minister in the outgoing government, retained the Seemapuri seat by a whopping margin of over 56,000 votes against Lok Janshakti Party's Sant Lal. The BJP fought this election in alliance with Ram Vilas Paswan's Lok Janshakti Party.
Counting on for eight more seats where AAP is leading in seven seats. The AAP held on to the nearly 54 per cent votes it had got in the 2015 Delhi Assembly polls, while the BJP bagged its second-best of 38.5 per cent votes in Assembly elections in Delhi and the Congress registered its worst-ever performance with its vote share slipping to four per cent.
After the Congress failed to open its account for the second time in Delhi, its chief Subhash Chopra tendered his resignation.
In Delhi's West Delhi, AAP wins all 10 constituencies namely Dwarka, Madipur, Rajouri Garden, Hari Nagar, Tilak Nagar, Janakpuri, Vikaspuri, Uttam Nagar, Matiala and Najafgarh.
BJP's Ajay Mahawar won the Ghonda assembly constituency by a margin of over 21,000 votes. He defeated AAP's Shridutt Sharma. BJP has won 6 of eight leading seats.
Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal's wife Sunita Kejriwal said she could not have asked for a better gift on her birthday than the mandate given by the people of Delhi in the assembly polls. Speaking at the party office, Sunita, a former IRS officer, said the campaigning saw several "ups and downs" but the party members had complete faith in their work. "Delhi people have given me a gift, could not have asked for a better gift. There was anxiety, several ups and downs were going on. We trusted our work. Delhi has made 'kaam' (work) victorious," Sunita said. She also said the personal attacks on her husband during the campaigning were uncalled for. "Fight politics positively," she advised.
The counting of votes in the Delhi polls will be a time-consuming exercise, the Chief Electoral Officer for the city said on Tuesday, asserting that ensuring accuracy is the top priority for the poll body. Results for nearly half of the 70 constituencies have been declared as per reports around 6pm, while counting of votes on other seats are underway. A total of over 1,200 rounds of counting are scheduled to take place for the entire exercise.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi Tuesday Congratulated Kejriwal and his party for winning elections in Delhi.
In Badarpur, BJP's Ramvir Singh Bidhuri took lead by a close margin of nearly 2,000 votes. Ram Singh Netaji of AAP has
After the Congress has failed to open an account yet again with all its heavyweights, including Alka Lamba and Arvinder Singh Lovely trailing, Congress leader Wayanad MP Congratulated Kejriwal on winning the Delhi Elections.
BJP wins in three of seven leading seats. Om Prakash Sharma, Vijender Singh, and Jitendera Mahajan won from Vishwas Nagar, Rohini and Rohtas Nagar respectively.
Aam Aadmi Party's Amanatullah Khan won the Okhla seat by over 70,000 votes after defeating BJP's Braham Singh. The city's Shaheen Bagh and Jamia Nagar fall under the Okhla constituency. Shaheen Bagh has become the epicentre of protest against the Citizenship (Amendment Act) as women with young children have been on a sit-in protest there for nearly two months. Less than two kilometres away from Shaheen Bagh, Jamia Millia Islamia students with the support of Jamia Nagar locals have been holding protests against the CAA on the road outside the varsity.
AAP wins in three more constituencies. Saurabh Bharadwaj wins Greater Kailash seat with 60,372 votes. Janakpuri's Rajesh Rishi won with 67,756 votes. and Shiv Charan Goel won from Moti Nagar
BJP secures the second seat in Delhi. BJP's Vijender Gupta won the Rohini seat by a margin of over 12000. He defeated AAP's Rajesh Nama Bansiwala
Addressing a presser, Delhi BJP Chief Manoj Tewari Tuesday said that the party will evaluate the defeat. " We couldn't perform well, we'll evaluate this. Sometimes we get discouraged when results are not as per our expectations but I would like to tell our workers to not be disheartened...Compared to 2015 our winning percentage has increased," he said.
The Election Commission has declared results in 18 seats. AAP has so far won 17 of the 18 seats.
BJP opens account, wins the Vishwas Nagar seat. MLA Om Prakash Sharma defeated Deepak Singla of by a margin of over 16,000 votes.
As Kejriwal is set to become the Chief Minister for the third consecutive time in Delhi, reactions poured in from across states.
Delhi BJP chief Manoj Tiwari conceded defeat in the Delhi Assembly Election with the Aam Aam Aadmi party leading in 63 seats and the BJP in only 7. Tiwari had earlier asserted that his party will win more than 45 seats in the 70-member Assembly and form the government.
BJP's Kapil Mishra, who lost from Model Town constituency seat in Delhi, said he still stands by his statement on anti-CAA protesters and Shaheen Bagh, the hotbed of protests in the national capital. "Don't be under the impression that we will change our stance on CAA and Shaheen Bagh," he said responding to a tweet.
Haryana Home Minister Anil Vij on Tuesday described the AAP win in the Delhi Assembly elections as a victory of freebies. The BJP leader took to Twitter as trends indicated that the Aam Aadmi Party would sweep the Delhi polls. "Delhi ke chunaav mein muddhay haar gaye, muftkhori jeet gai (in the Delhi elections, issues lost, freebies won)," he wrote on his Twitter handle.
AAP's Abdul Rehman has won the Seelam Pur seat and defeated BJP's Kaushal Kumar Mishra. The Seelampur assembly seat falls under the North East Delhi parliamentary constituency.
AAP wins the fifth seat from Ballimaran. MLA Imran Hussain defeated BJP's lata by a margin of over 35,000 votes.
'Today's Tuesday, Hanumanji Ka din, Hanumanji has showered his blessings on Delhi. Like always, AAP and the people will continue to develop the UT even better,' said Kejriwal.
"The message from Delhi is - votes will go to the one building schools, providing affordable healthcare. This is a good message for the country and this politics shall ensure India's progress. This is the triumph of the entire country," said Kejriwal thanking the voters.
'People of Delhi have given rise to a new era of politics, politics of development,' said Kejriwal.
AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal begins to address the party worker's at head office in New Delhi.
As trends show at least 62 seats for the AAP, so far, Atishi won the Kalkaji seat, Manish Sisodia secured Patparganj seat, Raghav Chadha won the Rajinder Nagar seat and Jarnail Singh retained the Tilak Nagar seat.
AAP's sitting MLA Jarnail Singh wins West Delhi's Tilak Nagar seat against BJP's Rajiv Babbar.
"People of Delhi have proven that Delhi's son Arvind Kejriwal isn't a terrorist but a true patriot. He's working for nation-building, the work he's doing is what constitutes patriotism. What BJP is doing, isn't patriotism," said Raghav Chadha after winning the Rajinder Nagar seat by 59,135.
"I am happy to become the MLA from Patparganj assembly constituency again. BJP tried to do politics of hate but people of Delhi chose a government that works for the people," said Manish Sisodia after winning the seat by a slight margin of over 2000 votes.
Aam Aadmi Party's Raghav Chadha has won from Rajinder Nagar constituency by a margin of 20,058 votes.
After trends show victory for AAP, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee said, " BJP is slowly becoming stateless."
After a see-saw battle in Patparganj, Manish Sisodia managed to win the seat. After the results were announced, Sisodia was seen flashing the victory sign at the counting center
Congress leader P Chidambaram said the people of Delhi have defeated the polarising, divisive and dangerous agenda of the BJP. 'AAP won, bluff and bluster lost. The people of Delhi, who are from all parts of India, have defeated the polarising, divisive and dangerous agenda of the BJP. I salute the people of Delhi who have set an example to other states that will hold their elections in 2021 and 2022,' he tweeted.
Though its tally remains zero, the Congress, which won 9.65 per cent of the vote share in the 2015 Assembly elections, stood at 4.24 per cent at 1.30 pm on Tuesday. For the party’s state unit, which was faced with infighting through the past month, one thing is clear: Running a campaign based solely on highlighting former Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit’s achievements had no impact on voters, who want to look ahead, not to the past. The party, which had finished second in Delhi during the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, had little to offer this time except criticism of AAP and BJP. The road ahead for the party will need more than just introspection. Read more here
"We fought on topics related to Delhi. We asked questions about electricity, safe drinking water, free WiFi. But our competitors raised different topics to divert voters. The counting is still underway. Let's see," BJP leader Shahnawaz Hussain told reporters. Earlier this week, Hussain was part of The Indian Express' Idea Exchange program. He spoke about Shaheen Bagh protests, statements made by BJP leaders during the campaign, among other things. Have a look at what he had to say
For AAP, the one seat where trends have come as a major surprise is Patparganj — this is where deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia is a candidate. According to the party’s assessment, he was expected to win by a significant margin. Sisodia was the only senior AAP leader who, during a television debate, said he stood in support of Shaheen Bagh just like he stood in support of JNU. During BJP’s door-to-door campaign, a video of him saying this was shared with voters across the constituency, something that party insiders think harmed Sisodia’s campaign.
Taking a dig at the AAP and Manish Sisodia, BJP's Parvesh Verma says, "If Delhi's election was on education model then Manish Sisodia would not be trailing." He also said that the party will give a better performance in the next polls. "I accept the result. We will work hard and give a better performance in the next elections."
Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) Okhla candidate Amanatullah Khan says, "Dilli ki janta ne aaj BJP aur Amit Shah ji ko current lagane ka kaam kiya hai, ye kaam ki jeet huyi hai aur nafrat ki haar. Maine nahi, janta ne record( his lead margin) toda hai. (People of Delhi have given a current to BJP and Amit Shah. This is the victory of work and defeat of hatred)." Khan is leading from Okhla — epicentre of anti-CAA protests.
AAP candidates were poised for victory with margins of over 10,000 votes in 15 constituencies, including Chandni Chowk and Tilak Nagar while BJP's Jagdish Pradhan was the only candidate from the saffron party to lead by a margin of over 26,000 votes from the Mustafabad seat, the latest election trends showed. Incumbent AAP MLA Sanjeev Jha was ahead of his JD(U) rival Shailender Kumar by 18,285 votes from the Burari seat, which has a considerable Poorvanachali population. Deoli, which is a reserved seat, saw AAP's sitting MLA Prakash Jarwal, surging towards victory with a margin of 10,679 votes. BJP's Arvind Kumar was on the second spot. In Model Town constituency, AAP's Akhilesh Pati Tripathi, was ahead of AAP rebel Kapil Mishra, who was fielded by the BJP, by a margin of 10,400 seats. Mishra was a minister in the AAP-led Delhi government but had rebelled against the party and later joined the saffron party.
Among the 13 seats BJP is leading, the saffron party has gained Bawana, Krishna Nagar, Karawal Nagar, Kirari, Shahdara, Tri Nagar, Ghonda, Patparganj, Rohtas Nagar, Shalimar Bagh. As per recent trends, BJP has held on to Mustafabad, where sitting MLA Jagdish Pradhan is leading by over 25,000 votes, and Vishwas Nagar, where OP Sharma is leading by over 9,000 votes. After trailing in Rohini for the past hour, BJP’s Vijender Gupta is ahead by 2000 votes.
A beaming Arvind Kejriwal was snapped with election strategist Prashant Kishor. Kishor's I-Pac had tied up with AAP for Delhi polls. Earlier in the day. Kishor had "thanked" the people of Delhi for "protecting the soul of India."
Delhi Lieutenant Governor Anil Baijal dissolved the Sixth Legislative Assembly of Delhi. After the counting is completed and the final tally is out, a new set of leaders will be sworn-in. "Lt Governor Anil Baijal on Tuesday dissolved the Sixth Legislative Assembly of the National Capital Territory of Delhi with effect from February 11," the official said, as counting of votes in the Assembly election is underway. "A new order will be issued for the formation of the Seventh Legislative Assembly after the final results come," the official said.
Apart from being the counting day, today also marks the birthday of Sunita Kejriwal, wife of Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal. Volunteers and well-wishers took to Twitter to extend birthday wishes as well as congratulatory messages to Sunita Kejriwal who had campaigned extensively for her husband. Both were officers of the Indian Revenue Service before Kejriwal switched towards politics.
AAP leaders are byuoed by the party's performance in the Delhi elections. Addressing workers and volunteers at the party headquarters in Delhi, AAP's Sanjay Singh said: "People of Delhi have handed over a huge majority to their son. We are headed for a landslide. As of now, we are leading in 58 seats, but the number is set to rise. Your son was called a terrorist. Arvind Kejriwal was pained by it. It was said it's an India Pakistan match. Hindustan jeet Gaya!"
Rajya Sabha MP Sushil Gupta said, "People of Delhi have spoken. They have rejected BJP's politics of hate. People of Delhi have spoken. They have rejected BJP's politics of hate."