The New Delhi lok Sabha seat has been bagged by a woman candidate after a gap of four decades. In the just-concluded elections for the 16th lok Sabha, BJP leader Meenakshi lekhi defeated sitting MP and Congress heavyweight Ajay Maken from New Delhi seat by a huge margin.
lawyer-turned-politician lekhi, is the third woman to have gained victory on this seat after freedom fighter and former Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Sucheta Kriplani and later by another Congress leader Mukul Banerjee. Kriplani was elected to the lok Sabha in 1952 and 1957 from the New Delhi constituency while Banerjee won the seat in 1971.
Former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee had won from the New Delhi lok Sabha seat in 1977 on a Janata Party ticket. He managed to retain the seat in 1980 but on a BJP ticket. In 1984, KC Pant of the Congress was declared elected from New Delhi. In the next two subsequent elections (1989 and 1991), the seat was wrested from the Congress by BJP’s lK Advani. In the subsequent byelection in 1992, matinee idol Rajesh Khanna defeated Advani and bagged the seat on a Congress ticket. However, he lost to senior BJP leader Jagmohan in the 1996 elections who retained the seat in the next elections as well. Jagmohan was defeated by Congress’ Ajay Maken who dominated the seat from 2004 to 2014 and was defeated by Meenakshi lekhi this time.
lekhi secured 4,53,350 votes, followed by AAP’s Ashish Khetan finishing second with 2,90,642 votes and Congress’ Ajay Maken managing a mere 1,82,893 to end up third. lekhi is also the only woman representative from Delhi in the 16th lok Sabha. She, however, had a lower vote share than Aam Aadmi Party’s Rakhi Birla among the 13 women candidates who contested from the national Capital. lekhi, who defeated her nearest rival of AAP Ashish Khetan by a margin of over 1.6 lakh votes in the prestigious New Delhi constituency, secured 4,53,350 votes which is less than Birla’s 5,23,058 votes. Rakhi, an MlA from Mangolpuri, contested from North-West Delhi constituency where BJP’s Udit Raj defeated her by a margin of 1.06 lakh votes.
Among other prominent women candidates who contested from Delhi, former Union Minister Krishna Tirath, Congress candidate from North West Delhi Parliamentary seat, secured 1,57,468 votes. Performance by women candidates of regional and smaller parties —including TMC’s Sreerupa Mita Chaudhury (803), Rashtriya Janmorcha’s Musarrat Jahan (592), Bhartiya Pragatisheel Congress’ Rashmi Kashyap (538) — was dismal. In
South Delhi constituency, Independent candidate Ruby Yadav threw up a surprise by getting 56,749 votes. Another Independent Kamini Kaur, candidate from North-West Delhi constituency, got 666 votes. The maximum number of female candidates was in New Delhi seat — five women out of a total 29 candidates. While there were two constituencies West Delhi and North-East Delhi which did not see a single woman nomination.