New Delhi: It has been one of the most fiercely contested state elections in India and now the fate of 673 candidates including 63 women will be know in a few hours as counting for the 70-member Delhi Assembly starts at 8 am on Tuesday.
In the battle for Delhi the two principal contestants - Bharatiya Janata Party, which is in power at Centre and 10 states out of which it is the junior alliance partner in two, and the two-year-old Aam Aadmi Party led by IIT Kharagpur graduate Arvind Kejriwal - fought a bitter, acrimonious and a no-holds-barred election the outcome of which would have ramifications on the national political landscape too. A marginalised Congress which ruled Delhi from 1998-2013 is staring at a complete rout.
Even though both AAP and BJP are claiming victory, major exit polls have predicted the former will form the government in Delhi. Despite using all its might including several rallies of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, dozens of Union Ministers, states chief ministers and 120 MPs, the BJP is predicted to come second and Congress a distant third.
Many heavyweight contenders like BJP's Kiran Bedi, Krishna Tirath, Vinod Kumar Binny, Jagdish Mukhi; AAP's Arvind Kejriwal, Manish Sisodia, Somnath Bharti, Rakhi Bidlan; Congress's Ajay Maken, Shoaib Iqbal and Sharmistha Mukherjee are anxiously awaiting the results.
Counting of votes will take place in 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, Rajkiya Pratibha Vikas Vidyalaya Raj Niwas Marg, 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.
After a stunning show in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections and riding high on the Narendra Modi wave, the BJP witnessed victories in Haryana, Maharashtra, Jharkhand and stood second in Jammu and Kashmir elections. The party left no stones unturned to regain Delhi after being out of power since 1998 but in Kejriwal and his loyalists are facing a tough challenger.
Unlike the high voltage advertisement blitzkrieg and top heavy approach of the BJP election campaign, Kejriwal and AAP volunteers struck to the basic plan of reaching out to people by door-to-door canvassing, cycle rallies, jan sabhas effective use of radio and social media while refraining from holding big rallies.
BJP President Amit Shah also inducted former IPS officer Kiran Bedi into the BJP and appointed her as the chief ministerial candidate to take on Kejriwal. PM Modi also addressed five rallies since January 10 criss-crossing the national capital and appealing to Delhiites that AAP is only good at holding dharnas and taking U-turns.
The entire election campaign centered around Kejriwal who became a public face after he joined hands with Anna Hazare in 2011 for the anti-corruption movement and then by entering the political space by forming his own party on October 2, 2012
He single-handedly took on Congress and BJP in 2013 Delhi polls and won 28 seats. He ran the government for 49 days with the outside support of the Congress which was marred by dharnas followed by his resignation on February 14, 2014.
AAP's promises of reduction in electricity and water bills, crackdown on corruption, reduction in Value Added Tax, ensuring civic amenities in slums, resettlement colonies and unauthorised colonies and better law and order to ensure women's safety struck a chord with many.
Even though the BJP tried to make the election as the contest between Kejriwal and Bedi, it came down to Kejriwal vs Modi.
Dissent within the Delhi unit was another problem that the BJP had to grapple with during the election campaign. Bedi's induction and coming in of several new faces witnessed infighting and protests at the BJP Delhi office as many old timers were sidelining and denied tickets for elections. A few BJP leaders even contested as Independents.
The national capital witnessed a record turnout in the February 7 poll as 67.14 per cent voters exercised their franchise. Repolling in one booth each of Delhi Cantt and Rohtash Nagar constituency, where votes could not be cast on Saturday due to faulty EVMs,Lpp took place on Monday.
A massive three-tier security grid was thrown around Delhi with over 36,000 police personnel, 11,000 home guards and 120 companies of Central Paramilitary Force deployed to ensure peaceful polling. A total of 12,177 polling booths were set up in 2,530 complexes out of which 741 booths were declared as critical and another 191 as highly critical.
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