The West Delhi parliamentary constituency, which is a mix of urbanised and rural villages, middle and upper middle class colonies, upscale group housing societies and a large number of unauthorised colonies inhabited largely by the migrant populations (read Purvanchalis) is all set to witness a triangular fight with all the three major parties claiming to be leading the contest.
While the Aam Aadmi Party workers claim party candidate Jarnail Singh has the “momentum going in his favour, especially after the stupendous performance” of the fledgling party in the Assembly elections, the Congress feels sitting MP Mahabal Mishra would “retain the seat on the basis of his track record and performance of the UPA Government”.
Similarly, the BJP workers believe party candidate Pravesh Verma, son of former Chief Minister and Jat strongman Sahib Singh Verma, “would emerge victorious on the basis of his political legacy and the Modi wave, which would also wrest the Purvanchali voters from the Congress. The Purvanchali voters have traditionally voted for the Congress in the Capital.
If the vote share the three main parties could secure in the 2013 Assembly elections is any indication, the political battle is slightly tilted towards the BJP candidate.
Across the 10 Assembly seats in the constituency, the BJP candidates had together polled over 36 per cent of the votes polled by garnering 4.6 lakh votes, followed by AAP with 31 per cent votes and Congress with a 23 per cent vote share.
The Congress was badly drubbed with party candidates not winning any seat and managing to secure second place too in only two Assembly segments in the Lok Sabha constituency. The outcome was contrary to the 2009 Lok Sabha polls, when Mr. Mishra had registered a handsome lead in all the 10 Assembly segments.
As far as the caste combination goes, the Jat population is largely concentrated in Assembly segments of Najafgarh, Matiala, Dwarka, Vikaspuri and Uttam Nagar, while the Purvanchali voters have a sizeable presence in the Assembly seats like Dwarka, Vikaspuri, Uttam Nagar and Matiala. The Sikh and Punjabi voters dominate in Hari Nagar, Tilak Nagar, Rajouri Garden and Janakpuri Assembly segments.
