New Delhi: It is judgement day for the most intensely fought battle of Delhi, as the counting has already begun, the results will be out by noon, and it will be clear who amongst the three top contenders, Aam Aadmi Party’s Arvind Kejriwal, Kiran Bedi from the BJP and Ajay Maken from the Congress will win the crown of Delhi.
The odds are heavily in favor of Kejriwal with the exit polls predicting a land slide for him, but BJP has tried to make up for the lost ground by unleashing the might of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, but the question is will it work. The Congress has entered the race with little hope and their best bet will be if the grand old party can manage to win more than five seats the prospects of which look grim.
In the elections held in 2013 in the 70 member house, while BJP was the single largest party with 32 seats, AAP with 28 seats formed the government with the help of Congress which had 8 seats. The government lasted for 49 days with Kejriwal quitting in haste over the Lokpal issue.Â
Delhi, which remained under President’s rule for almost a year witnessed a record voter turn-out on Feb. 7, with 67.14 % voters exercising their right to elect their government.
The stage was set after a grueling month of campaign with 21,702 rallies conducted across 70 constituencies by various political parties for their 673 candidates in the fray.
The fight in the national capital was harsh and bitter as verbal attacks went personal, as the race for the Delhi throne inched closer to the finish line. It was a bitter political campaign with war of words that went beyond the usual political rhetoric, political leaders did not lose any chance to woo the voters by lashing out at each other.
According to pollsters, elections in Delhi were not just the matter of winning, as win or a defeat here would prove to be a turning point in Indian politics.
A win in the national capital would ensure that Kejriwal and AAP will be a big political force and they will aim for more states. A defeat for BJP will be a setback for Prime Minister Narendra Modi who had campaigned extensively in the elections, even though the blame would go on Bedi. For Congress a wipeout will pose an existential question and the party may also split if Delhi results are disastrous.
With a lot riding on the election results for political parties, they went all big guns blazing during the election campaign to not just woo the voters, but also prove their superiority.
Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP), since May last year has not lost a single election, whereas the grand old Congress party is hoping to salvage lost pride after losing most of the elections it has fought since Dec. 2013.
A win or defeat for AAP would decide the fate of the two-year-old party, which made its dream debut into politics during the 2013 elections, but has the taint of being a runaway bride.
AAP relied heavily on its anti-corruption activist-turned-politician Arvind Kejriwal’s image whereas the BJP stuck to its 2014 election strategy by projecting Prime Minister Narendra Modi as the face of the campaign for BJP along with its CM candidate Kiran Bedi accompanied by various Union Ministers and senior politicians.
Congress also came into the limelight with Party President Sonia Gandhi and Vice President Rahul Gandhi holding rallies and road-shows for the party’s CM nominee Ajay Maken in Delhi, but it seemed too late in the day.
The counting of votes will take place at 14 counting centres in different parts of the national capital. The centres are ITI Nand Nagri, Netaji Subhash Institute of Technology, Dwarka Sector 3, Integrated Institute of Technology Dwarka, Sector-9, Veer Sawarkar Training Centre, Pusa, NP Girls Middle School, Gole Market, NP Girls Senior Secondary School, Gole Market and Rajkiya Pratibha Vikas Vidyalaya Raj Niwas Marg.
Votes will also be counted in Shaheed Ameer Chand Sarvodaya Kanya Vidyalaya, Raj Niwas Marg, Jija Bai Industrial Training Institute for Women, August Kranti Marg, Badminton Hall, CWG Sports Complex and Delhi Technological University Campus, Shahbad Daulat Pur. The result of a State has never been so closely monitored ever before by all the political parties.  The results of Delhi will define whether Modi magic work or Kejriwal’s broom will sweep the upper hand of BJP.