Delhi set for key battles as BJP releases first list

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) released its first list of 29 candidates for the upcoming Delhi assembly elections on Saturday, setting up high-profile contests by fielding former parliamentarians on two key seats and announcing the names of four former state cabinet ministers from the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and the Congress.

The party pitted former MP Parvesh Sahib Singh against AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal from the New Delhi seat and former parliamentarian Ramesh Bidhuri against chief minister Atishi from Kalkaji. It also announced the names of former AAP ministers Kailash Gahlot and Raj K Anand from Bijwasan and Patel Nagar, former Delhi Congress chief and cabinet minister Arvinder Singh Lovely from Gandhi Nagar, and former Congress minister Raj Kumar Chauhan from Mangolpuri. The BJP also fielded former Congress MLA Tarvinder Singh Marwah against senior AAP leader and former deputy CM Manish Sisodia from Jangpura.

“I thank the BJP leadership for giving me the opportunity to contest the election from New Delhi. I hope that I will live up to the trust that the party has shown in me. We have to save Delhi from ‘AAPda’ (disaster)…We have to do a lot of work,” Parvesh, who is the son of former Delhi chief minister Sahib Singh Verma, said. He was earlier an MP from the West Delhi Lok Sabha seat.

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Kejriwal is seeking his fourth consecutive term from the New Delhi constituency. His debut win over former CM Sheila Dikshit in 2013 by a thumping margin of around 25,000 votes marked a seismic shift in Delhi politics. Subsequent victories in 2015 and 2020 solidified his position in the seat. The Congress has already fielded former MP Sandeep Dikshit, who is the son of three-term CM Sheila Dikshit, from the seat.

Bidhuri, who was earlier a parliamentarian from the South Delhi constituency, said the BJP will register a historic win from Kalkaji as he launched an attack on CM Atishi.

“The departure of anti-national leftist Atishi from Kalkaji is certain. Now, there will be a new beginning of development, trust, and dedication in Kalkaji. A BJP government will come that will give priority to the interests of the people,” he said in a post on X. The Congress has fielded its women’s wing chief and former MLA Alka Lamba from the constituency.

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Atishi is seeking a second term from the Kalkaji seat. She won the 2020 polls from the seat by over 10,000 votes. The Delhi CM blunted Bidhuri’s attack and said “Ramesh Bidhuri, who served as a Member of Parliament from South Delhi for ten years, had not been re-nominated by his party for the same seat. This decision clearly suggests that even his own party does not have faith in his track record. If the BJP itself cannot trust his work, how can the people of Kalkaji be expected to trust him?” .

The AAP hit out at the BJP for fielding Parvesh and Bidhuri. “BJP’s first list of candidates includes leaders ranging from those who use abusive language in Parliament to those caught distributing cash in their constituencies. This reveals how much faith the BJP has in democratic values,” AAP Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh said.

Bidhuri triggered a massive controversy in September 2023 when he hurled communally explicit remarks at the then BSP MP Danish Ali during a special session of Parliament. The AAP has also accused of Parvesh of trying to sway voters by distributing cash in the run-up to the polls.

The AAP has fielded candidates for all of the Capital’s 70 seats and the Congress for 48. The BJP’s list came a day after Prime Minister Narendra Modi effectively launched the party’s campaign for the high-stakes poll contest, likening the AAP to a disaster while opening a string of big-ticket infrastructure and educational projects in the Capital.

“Today we have offered 29 lotus flowers to the people of Delhi, and undoubtedly all these people will work to form a double-engine government in Delhi. There are young as well as experienced people on this list and also people who have been MPs. The people of Delhi have a clear alternative, and they will form the BJP government,” Delhi BJP chief Virendra Sachdeva said.

The party’s first list of 29 candidates included two women, eight turncoats, and four of its seven sitting MLAs — Ajay Mahwar from Ghonda, Jitendra Mahajan from Rohtas Nagar, Vijender Gupta from Rohini, and OP Sharma from Vishwas Nagar.

The party dropped Gandhi Nagar sitting MLA Anil Kumar Bajpai, replacing him with Lovely. It is yet to announce the names of candidates from Karawal Nagar and Laxmi Nagar, the two other seats it holds.

“I thank Prime Minister Narendra Modi ji, Union ministers Amit Shah ji and JP Nadda ji, the entire leadership of Delhi, and Delhi BJP President Virendra Sachdeva ji for trusting me to represent the party. I will give my best to meet their expectations,” Lovely, who represented the seat from 1998 to 2013, said.

Gahlot, who resigned from his ministerial position and the AAP in November, said he was committed to working for the people. “As a BJP candidate from Bijwasan Assembly, I pledged full dedication towards the development of the area and service to the people,” Gahlot said. He contested the 2015 and 2020 elections from the Najafgarh seat and registered successive wins as an AAP candidate.

Sisodia maintained that AAP was set for a comfortable win, calling the elections a mere formality. “It is just a matter of a few days before Arvind Kejriwal will again assume the position of Delhi’s Chief Minister and take forward all the work he has done in Delhi,” he said.

Some of the other BJP candidates announced on Monday were former Delhi BJP president Satish Upadhyay (Malviya Nagar), Ashish Sood (Janakpuri), Dushyant Gautam (Karol Bagh), Manjinder Singh Sirsa (Rajouri Garden), Rekha Gupta (Shalimar Bagh), and Kumari Rinku (Seemapuri).

The current term of the Delhi assembly ends on February 23, 2025. The AAP won 62 seats in the 70-member Delhi assembly in the February 2020 assembly elections, and the BJP won the remaining eight. Currently, the AAP has 58 MLAs in the House, as four of its lawmakers have either resigned or been disqualified. The BJP has seven MLAs in the assembly at present as its Badarpur MLA Ramvir Singh Bidhuri resigned in June after he was elected to the Lok Sabha from south Delhi. The AAP, which is battling mounting allegations of financial irregularities and crumbling civic infrastructure in the Capital, has been buoyed in recent months by the release of senior leaders such as Kejriwal and former Sisodia. In September, Kejriwal resigned as Delhi’s chief minister and handed the baton over to Atishi, marking the latest churn in the Capital’s political upheaval just before the assembly polls.