The Hindu : New Delhi News : By-poll outcome will indicate mood among Delhiites

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Jun 29, 2004

New Delhi

New Delhi

By-poll outcome will indicate mood among Delhiites

By Our Staff Reporter

NEW DELH, JUNE 28. Though it is unlikely to make any impact on the Capital's political scenario, the outcome of the municipal by-election to be announced on Tuesday would indicate the mood among Delhiites almost 45 days after they gave the Congress a "historic victory" in the Lok Sabha elections in May, preceded by a handsome victory against the Bharatiya Janata Party in the Delhi Assembly polls last December.

Counting of votes for the six municipal seats, by-elections to which were held on Sunday, would be taken up at three centres at 8 a.m. on Tuesday. As the turnout was very low, the results are likely to be announced by late afternoon.

The counting of ballot papers for Tri Nagar and Keshav Puram would be taken up at the Government Senior Secondary School, Bharat Nagar, those of Nangloi and Khyala at the Guru Nanak Polytechnic, Sector 15 in Rohini and those of Nand Nagri and Timar Pur at Sarvodaya Vidyalaya No. 2, Ludlow Castle. Elaborate security arrangements have been made for the counting of ballot papers and the State Election Commissioner, M. P. Tyagi, reviewed preparedness with senior officials today.

Among the 51 candidates in the race are Amrit Lal of the Congress, Suresh Kumar of the Bharatiya Janata Party and Brij Mohan of the Bahujan Samaj Party from Tri Nagar; Anuja Popli (Congress) Laxmi Arya (BJP) and Reshma Negi (BSP) from Keshav Puram; Mohinder Kumar (Congress), Narender Kumar (BJP) and Rajesh (BSP) from Nangloi; Manoj Varun (BSP), Braham Swarup Sharma (Congress) and Bhim Sen (BJP) from Nand Nagri; Meghraj Chandela (a BJP rebel), Jagmohan S. Marwah (Congress) and Rajender Singh Techno (BJP) from Khyala; Anil Malhotra (Congress), Surender Singh (BJP) and Jagbir Singh Gehlot (BSP) from Timarpur.

Of these six seats, while the Congress had won five in the 2002 municipal elections, the lone Khyala seat was won by Dayanand Chandela of the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha, who later joined the BJP and went on to win the Delhi Assembly polls from Vishnu Garden. Mr. Chandela has now been expelled by the BJP for his anti-party activities for actively campaigning for his son Meghraj Chandela, who is contesting from the seat as a rebel.

Though, both the BJP and the Congress have been claiming that they would win all the six seats, the latter seems to be having an upper hand as the majority of the voters who came out to vote on Sunday were from the lower class and slum clusters, considered to be traditional Congress supporters. "But one never knows the mood of the voters," said a senior BJP leader in the MCD, hoping that people would vote against the ruling party in the aftermath of the power tariff hike and increase in gas and petrol prices, besides the poor situation on the water and power front. However, the Congress leaders expressed confidence that the party's victory run would continue and it would sweep the bye-elections.

Meanwhile, revising its Sunday's figures slightly, the State Election Commission today said 36.16 per cent of the 3,34,332 electorates cast their votes against 52.49 in 2002 and 43.2 per cent in 1997.

The lowest voter turnout of 30.31 per cent was in Keshav Puram, followed by 31.86 in Timarpur, 32.46 in Nangloi, 38.86 in Nand Nagri, 41.43 in Khyala and 42.2 per cent in Tri Nagar.

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