Will BJP break its losing streak in Delhi?

Days ahead of the announcement of the Delhi Assembly election date, there were speculations whether the BJP would project a chief ministerial face. But the suspense ended quickly as Prime Minister Narendra Modi arrived on the scene and, in a series of public meetings, announced a flurry of project inaugurations, setting the tone for the BJP’s campaign.

So it is clear now that Modi will be the mascot and lead campaigner for the BJP, as the party tries to end its 27-year drought in the capital city.

This points to the BJP’s failure to nurture a leader in New Delhi to take on AAP’s national convenor and former Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal. This has always been one important pillar of the AAP campaign. However, Modi’s campaign is also about his own pride. He is looking for personal glory and to put an end to his own 10-year-long wait to win in the nation’s capital.

New Delhi was among the BJP’s first defeats after Modi stormed to power at the Centre in 2014. Riding high on the Lok Sabha victory, he led the BJP’s campaign for New Delhi. However, he was humbled by a political startup that had no presence anywhere else in the country at the time. The city proved to be elusive for Modi in 2020 as well.

The BJP won both the 2014 and 2019 Lok Sabha elections with a huge majority, including all seven of New Delhi’s Lok Sabha seats. However, when it came to State elections, people chose the AAP to govern them with Arvind Kejriwal as Chief Minister.

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In the 2014 Lok Sabha election, the BJP’s vote share was 46.4 per cent, which rose to 56.85 per cent in 2019. In the Assembly elections in 2015 and 2020, held just months after the Lok Sabha election, the party’s vote share stood at 32.3 per cent and 38.7 per cent, respectively. The AAP garnered a 54.3 per cent vote share in the 2015 election, winning 67 out of 70 seats, while the BJP got 3. In 2020, the AAP got 53.57 per cent votes, winning 62 seats, and the BJP won 8.

The BJP’s dependence on Modi in its bid to win in New Delhi shows that the party is hopeful of tapping into the support it got from the electorate in the 2024 Lok Sabha election. The BJP’s campaign focusses on its usual theme of “double-engine” government, in which Modi plays the leading role. The speeches made by Modi have been about the work done by the BJP-led Centre in the national capital.

“Prime Minister Narendra Modi has delivered on the welfare schemes or the developmental projects in Delhi, be it flats for slum dwellers or free ration for poor. On the other hand, Arvind Kejriwal and his party have saved only themselves. They have indulged in corruption and extravagance,” said Delhi BJP president Virendra Sachdeva.

The BJP leaders believe that the anti-incumbency factor against the AAP government and the allegations of corruption against the party’s top leaders, including Kejriwal and former Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia, will result in the capital following the same voting pattern as in the Lok Sabha election.

According to them, what makes the situation different this time is the perceived dent to the AAP’s image as “the party with a difference” and Kejriwal’s image as the aam aadmi. The BJP has levelled allegations of corruption against AAP leaders, especially with regard to the now-scrapped excise policy, and the renovation carried out by Kejriwal in the Chief Minister’s residence when he was staying there. “The people of Delhi were under a great illusion when Arvind Kejriwal came into politics and they gave a huge mandate to the AAP. But Kejriwal and the AAP stand exposed today,” said Chandni Chowk BJP MP Praveen Khandelwal.

The main target for the BJP is Kejriwal, as the election in the national capital revolves around him. This was evident when Modi took on the former Chief Minister directly, talking about “Sheesh Mahal” (grand palace), a reference to the renovated chief ministerial residence. The BJP leaders quoted from the Comptroller and Auditor General report, not yet tabled in the Assembly, to claim that the renovations cost more than Rs.33 crore. Replicas of the renovated residence were placed at the venue of Modi’s rally on January 5 as a selfie point.

“I could have also constructed a Sheesh Mahal. But I have chosen to work for the poor and provide them respectable housing,” said Modi, as he handed over possession papers to apartments built for slum dwellers. He also coined a slogan for the election, describing the AAP as “AAPda” (disaster) for New Delhi.

The AAP made a forceful counter to these charges, describing Modi’s official residence as a “Rs.2,700 crore Rajmahal” (royal palace) and calling him a “king” who allegedly uses pens worth Rs.10 lakh, owns 67 pairs of shoes, and whose house is adorned with diamond-studded chandeliers worth Rs.200 crore.

The real campaign, however, is of a different order. As the political expert Abhay Kumar Dubey said: “An important aspect of the BJP’s strategy is to establish the idea that if the AAP comes to power again, the Central government will not let the AAP government work. That is what has happened in Delhi in the last 2.5 years.”

Campaign strategy

The choice of event—a slum rehabilitation project—to launch Modi’s campaign for New Delhi was telling. The BJP has in the run-up to the election reached out to the residents of slums, who used to be the main support base of the Congress and had shifted to the AAP after 2015. The party leaders spent nights in slums as part of a “Ratri Pravas Samvaad” (Night stay dialogue) campaign. This is part of the BJP’s strategy to hold on to the voters who supported it in the Lok Sabha election. It is also aimed at denting the AAP’s support base, which could prove decisive in an election that, according to the BJP’s internal surveys, could be very close.

Even as the saffron party’s central leadership plays a key role in the election campaign, the focus is on local issues such as civic amenities and delivery of services. The BJP is criticising the AAP government for failing to maintain roads and for deficiencies in sanitation services. It has also questioned the claims made by the AAP with regard to improvement in school infrastructure and hospitals. That the Municipal Corporation of Delhi, which was under the BJP in the past two elections, is now with the AAP helps the BJP in its campaign.

Another important aspect of the BJP’s campaign is to rework its stand on the AAP government’s welfare schemes, which it had described as revdis (freebies). In fact, it was Modi who first used the word in July 2022 to describe populism, saying parties were distributing freebies to get votes and that this was harmful to the country’s economy and would affect development. However, with the BJP having turned equally to giveaways in all the recent elections, the party has taken great pains to reassure the people of New Delhi that it will not do away with any of the existing welfare schemes and would only ensure more efficient implementation.

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Modi said in his January 5 rally: “Sensing their defeat in the New Delhi election, they [AAP] have started spreading a lie that if the BJP comes to power, this would be stopped, that would be stopped. But I want to assure the people of Delhi that no schemes of people’s welfare will be stopped by the BJP. The schemes where AAPda people have looted people’s money will be run with complete honesty.”

BJP’s electoral history in Delhi

The BJP has not won Delhi since 1998. The only time it ruled the national capital was between 1993 and 1998, and even during those five years, it had three Chief Ministers, starting with Madan Lal Khurana, who was replaced by Sahib Singh Verma, who in turn had to make way for Sushma Swaraj. In the 1998 Assembly election, Swaraj led the BJP’s campaign but came up short against the Congress’ Sheila Dikshit, who was brought in from Uttar Pradesh by her party as its chief ministerial candidate. Dikshit went on to dominate the political scene in Delhi, being re-elected for three back-to-back terms. The BJP made Khurana its chief ministerial candidate in 2003, and V.K. Malhtora was the face of its campaign in 2008, but nothing could loosen Dikshit’s hold on Delhi.

In 2015, the party brought in former IPS officer Kiran Bedi, Kejriwal’s former associate in the India Against Corruption movement that brought down the UPA-II government at the Centre. Bedi was the BJP’s chief ministerial face while the election campaign was led by Modi. In 2020, as the party’s local unit dealt with infighting and could not project a credible alternative against Kejriwal, the party did not have a chief ministerial face and Modi led the campaign. The party lost in both the elections.

The BJP has left no stone unturned this time. It believes that the Delhi Assembly election will go down to the wire and that Modi is its best bet once again to take it across the finish line.