Voting for the 270 wards of the three municipal corporations on Sunday started on a sluggish pace. However, as the day progressed, the writing on the wall was clear as hordes of voters started pouring in at polling stations across the city. As the polling ended, exit polls predicted massive win for the BJP.
Earlier, it was reported that the BJP was locked in a triangular battle with the Congress and the AAP. More than 1.3 crore eligible voters spread over 13,022 polling stations were wooed by the contenders with promises to make their lives better if elected.
In the run up to the high voltage polls, the BJP and the Congress exuded confidence about winning the electoral battle while the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) ran an intense campaign to repeat its 2015 Assembly elections performance, despite suffering a drubbing in the Rajouri Garden bypoll.
Polling began at 8 am amid tight security arrangements across the city. Out of the 13,022 polling stations, Delhi Police had declared 3,284 as sensitive and 1,464 as hyper-sensitive. Over 1.1 lakh voters were eligible to exercise their franchise for the first time. Also, for the first time in MCD elections, None Of The Above (NOTA) option has been made available.
There are a total of 1,32,10,206 voters entitled to exercise their franchise in electing councilors for the wards falling under the three corporations - NDMC (104), SDMC (104) and EDMC (64).
Counting of votes will be held on April 26. The Delhi State Election Commission has deployed ample staff to man its polling stations, some of which fall in outer Delhi areas.
The verdict of the poll will have political ramifications beyond the Capital’s borders and reshape the political equations here.
The BJP is seeking to retain the turf which it has held for the last 10 years and fielded all fresh faces from 267 wards. The party has projected for itself a tally of over 200 out of the 272 seats.
The AAP and the Congress too have claimed that they will cross the 200-mark. The AAP has fielded candidates on all 272 wards while the Congress has 271 candidates in the fray.
Incidentally, in May last year, bypolls to 13 wards were held, in which the AAP had finished on top with five seats, followed by the Congress with 4, BJP at 3. One seat had gone to an independent candidate.
The AAP which had bagged 67 out of 70 seats in 2015 Delhi Assembly polls suffered a humiliating defeat in the recent Rajouri Garden bypoll. Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, however, has refused to acknowledge the result as a “trailer for MCD polls”.
His party has been highlighting “corruption” in the BJP-led civic bodies, an issue it seeks to leverage in this contest. The erstwhile unified Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) was trifurcated in 2012 into North, South and East Municipal Corporations.
There are 1,004 candidates vying in the NDMC area, 985 in SDMC and 548 in EDMC. The BSP and the JD(U) have fielded 211 and 95 candidates respectively while the SP has entered the fray with 28.
The Generation-1 electronic voting machines (EVMs) are being used for the polls, which the Commission has described as “foolproof”. This would be the first civic poll after the latest delimitation which has redrawn the civic wards.