Delhi backs ‘MCD Mein Bhi Kejriwal’, but lessons for AAP to remain unbeatable

The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) on Wednesday dislodged the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Delhi’s Municipal Corporation polls after hours of neck to neck battle. Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal’s party won 134 seats out of total 250, ending 15-year-long run of the saffron party.

The BJP received 104 seats — 77 seats less than 2017. The Congress with 9 seats remains distant third, while 3 independents make it to the corporation this time.

The AAP, with this victory, has taken substantial control of Delhi and is set out to be cheering for its national impact. Though it throws BJP out of power, it can take solace from the fact that it retains a good chunk of votes and over 40 percent of the total seats. With the latest change of power in MCD, the AAP is set to run its first ‘Double Engine’ government but it needs to focus on hidden lessons that these local elections might have put on cards.

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Distance with Secular Intelligentsia

Muslims, who have been rallying behind the AAP, have slightly shifted their loyalties. The AAP, which has a reputation of sweeping Delhi every time it went to polls, failed to do so this time around. A good chunk of anti-BJP votes that was traditionally with the AAP has gone to the Congress this time — especially Muslim votes.

How Muslims Voted in MCD? All Data in %

The AAP’s strategical silence on Bilkis Bano, Jahangirpuri riots, NE Delhi Riots 2020 and other instances has cost the party hard. Its biggest minority face, MLA Amanatullah Khan, lost 4 wards out of 5 under his constituency. Out of the total 9 seats won by the Congress, seven are from minority-dominated wards.

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Muslim vote-share towards the AAP has drastically came down by 14 percent as compared to the 2020 Assembly elections of 2020. The party’s strategic silence on issues related to minorities have forced Muslims to shift towards the Congress.

The AAP’s tendency to ‘run with the hare and hunt with the hound’ hasn’t gone down well with Muslim voters. The community made it clear to the party not to take it ‘for granted’.

BJP is still a strong and significant force

Delhi might have become a citadel for the AAP, but it should not consider the BJP a spent force. Despite losing six Assembly elections in a row in the national capital, the BJP has managed to hold on to its core vote-bank. The problem with the saffron party in Delhi is not that it doesn’t have voters — but that it has failed to expand its voter base beyond a certain bandwidth.

[caption id=“attachment_11793451” align=“alignnone” width=“469”] BJP vote-share in Delhi[/caption]

Even in the defeat, the BJP’s vote-share rose by 3 percent as compared to the last civic polls in 2017. The saffron party bagged 39.09 percent votes against 36.07 percent in 2017. Interestingly, the vote-share of the BJP in the MCD polls is higher than what it got in the 2020 Delhi Assembly elections. In contrast, the AAP has registered a significant decline in its vote-share.

How Delhi voted? All Data in %

The AAP has over the years projected itself as a messiah of development and welfarism. However, in a bid to increase its national footprints, it has, of late, repositioned its stand vis-à-vis Hindutva. The party can see Muslim backlash against the same in the just concluded municipal polls in Delhi.

The author is a Political Consultant and Researcher. Views are personal. 

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