NEW DELHI: The disenchantment among the voters of the Capital was visible on Sunday in the by-poll to the Subhash Nagar municipal ward when only 45.51 per cent voters exercised their franchise. As much as 60 per cent polling was recorded during the 2002 MCD polls in this particular ward.

According to State Election Commissioner S.P. Marwah, no untoward incident was reported during the polling nor did any of the political parties contesting the polls file a complaint against any kind of malpractices. Thanking the voters of Subhash Nagar and even the representatives of the political parties for ensuring a peaceful poll, Mr. Marwah said the move not to allow use of ration card as identity proof for polling had prevented any bogus voting in the by-polls.

The Congress candidate, Seema Luthra, is pitted against Meira Kanwaria of the Bharatiya Janata Party in a closely fought contest. The poll had been necessitated due to disqualification of Sunita Bharti by the Supreme Court for filing a false affidavit claiming to be a Scheduled Caste.

Political leaders said they had expected a low turnout in view of the strong resentment prevailing among the voters over various issues affecting their daily lives and the failure of the political leadership to resolve them. The Delhi Pradesh Congress Committee president, Ram Babu Sharma, said that Congress would emerge victorious in the by-poll as the people had realised the futility of voting for the BJP. For their part, the BJP leaders were upbeat and have termed the by-poll as a referendum on the policies of the Delhi Government and the failure of the Congress ruled MCD to work for the interests of the people.

A large number of senior BJP leaders including South Delhi MP, Vijay Kumar Malhotra, Arun Jaitely, Sushma Swaraj, film star turned politician Shatrughan Sinha and cricketer turned politician Navjot Singh Sidhu had campaigned for the BJP candidate. On the other hand, the Congress campaign was handled by Mr. Ram Babu Sharma and it got a last minute boost by the entry of Union Minister of State for Urban Development Ajay Maken.

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