Delhi Election Results: BJP Returns To Power In Capital After 27 Years As AAP Falters

The Bharatiya Janata Party has handed the Aam Aadmi Party a stunning defeat in the Delhi assembly elections to return to power in the national capital after 27 years.

As of 2:30 pm on Saturday, the BJP had won 11 out of the 70 seats in the legislative assembly and was leading in 37, according to the Election Commission of India. The AAP secured 10 seats and was ahead in 12, while the Congress drew a blank.

As compared to the last assembly polls in 2020, the BJP improved its vote share by 8 percentage points to 45.95% while the AAP’s vote share eroded by 10 percentage points to 43.68%, as per the trends shared by ECI so far.

What underscored the AAP’s loss was the defeat of former Delhi chief minister and party convener Arvind Kejriwal, and former deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia.

Kejriwal lost the high-profile New Delhi constituency to the BJP’s Parvesh Singh Verma. He had held the seat since after dethroning former chief minister Congress’ Sheila Dikshit in 2013 to bring the AAP to power in New Delhi for the first time.

Sisodia, meanwhile, lost the Jangpura seat—seen as an AAP stronghold—to the BJP’s Tarvinder Singh Marwah. He won from Patparganj in 2013, 2015 and 2020.

Atishi, the outgoing chief minister, retained her Kalkaji seat.

“We accept the mandate of the people with great humility. I congratulate the BJP for this victory and I hope they will fulfil all the promises for which people have voted for them,” Kejriwal said in a video message. “We will not only play the role of a constructive opposition but will also remain among the people and continue to serve them.”

For the BJP, Delhi is the third major electoral success in the last six months after wins in Haryana and Maharashtra. This victory is special for it brings the saffron party to power in the national capital after 27 years. The late Sushma Swaraj was the last BJP leader to govern Delhi in 1998.

“It is a big feather in their cap,” Rahul Verma, a political scientist and fellow at the Centre for Policy Research, told Bloomberg News. “Winning this state means a big thing for them.”

To be sure, the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance has been in power in the Centre since 2014. Now, it will also control the Delhi Assembly.

“Development wins, good governance triumphs,” Prime Minister Narendra Modi said in a post on X, formerly Twitter. “We guarantee that we will leave no stone unturned to ensure the all-round development of Delhi and to make the lives of its people better. Along with this, we will also ensure that Delhi plays an important role in building a developed India.”

“I’m very proud of all my workers who worked day and night for this massive mandate. Now we will be even more strongly dedicated to serving our people of Delhi.”

The Aam Aadmi Party was founded by Kejriwal and his allies in November 2012 following an anti-corruption movement against the then Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government at the Centre. Activist Anna Hazare, the face of the movement, was against an electoral hue to his anti-corruption drive. The AAP then went on to win Delhi Assembly elections three times and is currently in power in Punjab.

“AAP lost as it failed to understand the need to serve people selflessly and took the wrong path. Money took the front seat which dented AAP’s image, leading to its defeat,” Hazare told the Press Trust of India on Saturday.

“With the liquor policy issue came the money and they drowned in it. The (AAP’s) image was tarnished. People saw that he (Arvind Kejriwal) talks about clean character and then about liquor.” 

The Delhi liquor policy sought to bring in private firms into the retail liquor sector.

The people of Delhi “voted for change” as they were “fed up with the way things were”, Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra said following the Delhi election results.

“I suppose they voted for change. My congratulations to all those who have won,” she told PTI in Kerala’s Wayanad—her Lok Sabha constituency. “For the rest of us, it just means we have to work harder, stay there, be on the ground, and be responsive to people’s issues.”