The increase in voter turnout across the Capital in the Assembly polls mirrored increased acceptance for the Aam Aadmi Party's candidates in Sikh-dominated constituencies, and spelled doom for both the Bharatiya Janata Party and its ally the Shiromani Akali Dal .
Rajouri Garden, Hari Nagar, Kalkaji and Shahdara – the four constituencies where SAD candidates either contested on their own or under the banner of the BJP – saw AAP candidates prevailing with massive victory margins despite the runners-up getting more votes than the winners of the previous Assembly polls.
The fledgling party also won Tilak Nagar where the BJP’s Rajiv Babbar was in the fray.
At the Rajouri Garden constituency, home to posh localities inhabited by refugees from erstwhile West Punjab, for instance, the AAP’s Jarnail Singh’s margin of victory was upwards of 10,000 votes over his nearest rival, the SAD’s Manjinder Singh Sirsa.
During the Assembly polls of 2013, Mr. Sirsa had registered a victory over the Congress’ Dhanwati Chandela with a similar margin, but a lesser number of votes had been polled throughout the constituency with the former bagging 41,721 votes over the latter’s 30,713.
Meanwhile, Tilak Nagar, considered a BJP bastion over several decades before the AAP’s Jarnail Singh was able to breach it, albeit with a tight margin of around 2,000 votes in 2013, recorded a massive voter turnout this year. Mr. Singh’s margin was amplified to close to 20,000 votes over his nearest rival, Rajiv Babbar of the BJP.
As opposed to a little over 34,000 votes, which were polled in his favour last year, Mr. Singh had over 57,000 residents of the refugee colony voting for him.
“It is time for the corrupt to start fearing for their lives,” Mr. Singh declared while flashing a victory sign at a counting centre with his supporters and family members combining chants of “Jo Bole So Nihal” and “Bharat Mata Ki Jai” in the background.
“Free WiFi, water, power and a clean government will be provided to each Delhiite tomorrow onwards,” he said.
But the AAP’s most monumental victory was reported from the mostly middle class-inhabited constituency of Hari Nagar where DDA flats look upon small islands of prosperity in which clusters of kothis are located.
Here, the party’s Jagdeep Singh for the second consecutive time in two years, not only doubled his support base from the previous year, but won by a margin of over 26,000 votes.
In 2013, Mr. Singh had 38,912 voters in his favour while his rival, Shyam Sharma of the SAD had 30,006. This time, his rival polled more than Mr. Singh’s figure from last year, but was still remained defeated.
