Gokalpur Assembly Election 2020 | Fielded by the AAP in place of sitting MLA Fateh Singh, Surendra Kumar is leading in Gokalpur with a margin of more than 16,000 votes. Kumar bagged 69,174 votes, while the trailing candidate BJP’s Ranjeet Singh got 52,803 votes. The Gokalpur reserved constituency is represented by AAP’s Fateh Singh, who defeated Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) Ranjeet Singh in 2015 while Congress candidate Kumari Rinku garnered just over 3,000 votes. In 2013, Singh won the seat on a BJP ticket. Prior to that in 2008, the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) had won the seat and Surendra Kumar was elected as the MLA. [caption id=“attachment_7500501” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]
Representational image. PTI[/caption] Demography: The Gokalpur Assembly constituency lies in in the North East Delhi Assembly constituency and district. The district consists of 27 villages and a few urban areas. Total population of the district is 17,63,710 out of which 9,53,070 are men and 8,10,640 are women. The North East district has literacy rate of 77.85 percent. The Gokalpuri constituency is dominated by voters from scheduled sub-castes such as the Khatik, Mahala, Koli and Valmiki. The constituency holds the distinction for voting
for change in every election
and not re-electing a sitting MLA. Following is a brief description of the Assembly constituency (as of 2015): Constituency number: 64 Total electors: 1,97,112 Male: 1,09,042 Female: 88,070 Voter turnout in previous election: 73 percent Polling stations: 376 Major parties in the fray: BJP, AAP, Congress, BSP, NCP This year, AAP has fielded Surendra Kumar , the former state president of the BSP who switched to the Kejriwal-led party in October 2019 after a brief stint with the BJP. Kumar quit the saffron party as he was upset over the demolition of the Ravidas temple in August 2019. “Demolition of the Ravidas temple hurt my sentiments and I was very impressed by the work done by the AAP whether it was in the education sector or health. So I decided to join (the AAP),” PTI quoted Kumar as saying. The BJP is banking on former MLA Ranjeet Singh. Congress’ SP Singh, Nationalist Congress Party’s Choudhary Fateh Singh and BSP’s Praveen Kumar are also in the fray. Assembly elections in Delhi will be held in a single phase on 8 February while results will be announced on 11 February where 1.46 crore voters are eligible to cast their ballots. The term of the 70-member Delhi Assembly comes to an end on 22 February and a new House has to be constituted before that. The election notification for the Delhi Assembly Election was issued on 14 January. The last date of nomination of candidates was 21 January and the last date of withdrawal of candidature was 24 January. The Arvind Kejriwal led- Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) came to power in Delhi in February 2015 sweeping 67 of the 70 Assembly seats. The BJP had won three seats while the Congress drew a blank. The Delhi Legislative Assembly was first constituted on 7 March, 1952, under the Government of Part C States Act, 1951. The 70 constituencies are distributed across nine districts North West, North, West, Central, South West, District New Delhi, South, East, North East. With inputs from PTI
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