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Polling caps high-stakes battle for Delhi, parties go into huddle for results day prep
AAP chief Kejriwal held a meeting with political campaign strategist Prashant Kishore and party leaders Sanjay Singh and Manish Sisodia in the evening to analyse the party’s constituency-wise performance and its preparedness for counting day.
Hours after polling ended on Saturday, political parties wasted no time in organising assessment meetings and planning strategies to guard electronic voting machines EVMs for the next two days.
The meetings followed after all exit polls predicted a big victory for the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in the Delhi assembly elections, with some even indicating it can repeat its 2015 landslide when it bagged 67 seats in the 70-member House.
AAP brainstorming
AAP chief Kejriwal held a meeting with political campaign strategist Prashant Kishore and party leaders Sanjay Singh and Manish Sisodia in the evening to analyse the party’s constituency-wise performance and its preparedness for counting day.
The party has deployed about 150 volunteers to ensure the safety of the EVMs, which are kept in 30 strong rooms across city. Counting of votes will take place on February 11.
“In Babarpur constituency, we found an officer had wrongly kept an EVM with him. We are going to complain to the election commission. To ensure there is no malpractice, we are deputing all our candidates and sitting MLAs to man each and every strong room in Delhi,” said Sanjay Singh, AAP senior leader and Rajya Sabha MP.
Sisodia congratulated all AAP workers for their hard work, saying the election is a “proof” of “our strong and selfless relationship”.
“Voting ended! Hearty congratulations to all the activists. All worked from early morning to late night and some worked for 24 hours in the last days This election is a proof of how selfless and strong our relationship is. We are winning by a huge margin,” Sisodia tweeted in Hindi, saluting the hard work of all his colleagues.
The BJP, in its part, rejected all poll predictions and said the final results would surprise the people. All exit polls gave the BJP a few seats.
BJP huddle
Late Saturday evening, BJP chief JP Nadda had called a meeting of all seven Delhi MPs and senior party leaders to assess the party’s performance. The meeting was attended by Delhi election in-charges and Union ministers Prakash Javadekar, Hardeep Singh Puri, Nityanand Rai, BJP organisational general secretary BL Santhosh, Delhi BJP chief Manoj Tiwari and all the Delhi Members of Parliament.
Shyam Jaju, Delhi BJP in-charge, said, “Exit polls have proved to be wrong in the past. This time, too, the result will surprise everyone.”
“ We don’t believe in exit polls, we believe in exact polls. Exit polls have often proved wrong in the past,” said Javadekar after he emerged out of the meeting. The picture on the ground is different from what has been projected by exit polls, he said.
On Thursday, Union home minister Amit Shah, who had micromanaged the elections, had tweeted, “Got a chance to interact with the people of Delhi during the elections. Delhi is tired of false promises, appeasement and anarchy. It now wants a development. Seeing the support for the BJP in Delhi makes it clear that on February 11, the BJP will form the government by winning 45 seats.”
Dismissing the exit poll results, senior BJP leaders were optimistic that the final result will be in BJP’s favour. Jaju said, “There is a neck and neck fight between AAP and the BJP. The nationalism issue has resonated among the middle classes and upper middle-class voters. This time we will get good support from the rural constituencies. There is an undercurrent for the BJP.”
BJP MP Meenakshi Lekhi expressed optimism that the mandate would be in BJPs favour. The sample size is limited and also many polls have not factored in the trends in the evening, she told reporters.
Late in the evening, BJP President JP Nadda and home minister Amit Shah were engaged in detailed discussions on Delhi’s political scenario,
As the exit polls gave the Congress zero to one seats, the grand old party went into a huddle to discuss its strategy and plan the party’s future course. These elections were crucial for the Congress as they have stayed out of the assembly these five years.
Congress confident
Delhi Congress chief Subhash Chopra said, “All exit polls are going to fail. BJP will not get even 20 seats and Kejriwal is not going to form a govt in Delhi. I’m hoping Congress is going to do much better than what exit polls are showing. Let us wait till the results are out.”
Senior All India Congress Committee (AICC) leaders said the party was hopeful of winning a few seats, including Seelampur, Gandhi Nagar, Kondli and Vikaspuri.
“We had pitched senior leaders who have a great hold in their respective constituencies. We are hopeful that we will be able to pull these seats off,” a senior AICC leader said on Saturday.
