The Hindu : New Delhi News : Voters’ turnout outnumbers Delhi Assembly poll figures

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Sunday, May 10, 2009
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Voters’ turnout outnumbers Delhi Assembly poll figures

Gaurav Vivek Bhatnagar

NEW DELHI: With a total of 5,770,599 voters exercising their right to franchise in the elections for the seven Lok Sabha seats from Delhi this past Thursday, the total turnout percentage as per official data released by the Chief Electoral Officer stood at over 52 per cent.

In comparison to the Delhi Assembly elections held recently, nine of the 70 Assembly segments recorded a higher turnout this time round. They are Madipur, Hari Nagar and Tilak Nagar in West Delhi; Shakur Basti in the Chandni Chowk Lok Sabha constituency; and Delhi Cantonment, New Delhi, R.K. Puram, Malviya Nagar and Greater Kailash in the New Delhi parliamentary constituency.

A close look at the statistics reveals that the New Delhi constituency recorded the highest turnout at 55.84 per cent. From here Ajay Maken of the Congress and Vijay Goel of the BJP were in the fray. And here too polling was particularly heavy in the Malviya Nagar, Moti Nagar and Karol Bagh Assembly segments which all recorded more than 59 per cent turnout.

The Chandni Chowk parliamentary constituency also witnessed a high turnout of 55.21 per cent. In this constituency, Kapil Sibal of the Congress was pitted against Vijender Gupta of the BJP and Haji Mustaqueen of the Bahujan Samaj Party. Here Shakur Basti and Shalimar Bagh witnessed over 58 per cent voting while Matia Mahal witnessed the lowest turnout of 50.83 per cent. Polling was also comparatively low in Ballimaran at 52.52.

East Delhi, where Sandeep Dikshit of the Congress faced Chetan Chauhan of the BJP, saw a 54.91 per cent turnout. In this constituency, the Jangpura Assembly segment had the highest turnout anywhere in the city at 75.61 per cent. This constituency is represented by Sikh leader Talwinder Singh Marwah of the Congress in the Delhi Assembly. On the other hand, neighbouring Okhla which is represented by Pervez Hashmi of the Congress saw only a 40.75 per cent turnout.

High and low

West Delhi, which witnessed the most interesting battle of the ballot between Poorvanchali leader Mahabal Mishra of the Congress, Jagdish Mukhi of the BJP and one of the richest candidates in the country, Deepak Bharadwaj of the BSP, saw a 52.47 per cent turnout. Here voting was comparatively higher in the Punjabi-dominated constituencies of Janakpuri, Hari Nagar, Rajouri Garden, Tilak Nagar and in the reserved Madipur Assembly segment. The lowest turnout was 40.64 per cent in Najafgarh which is represented by Bharat Singh of the Indian National Lok Dal in the Delhi Assembly. Incidentally, INLD had backed Prof. Mukhi in this election.

In North-East Delhi, too, the turnout was almost similar at 52.39 per cent. Here Delhi Pradesh Congress Committee president J.P. Agarwal had a direct fight with B. L. Sharma `Prem’ of the BJP after the BSP candidate Haji Dilshad Ali retired from the contest in his favour. Among the assembly segments here Seemapuri and Rohtas Nagar (which also saw a Delhi Assembly by-election) witnessed an over 59 per cent turnout while Burari and Karawal Nagar recorded low turnouts.

Both South Delhi and North-West Delhi recorded sub-50 per cent voting. In North-West Delhi the turnout was 47.44 per cent. Here Krishna Tirath of the Congress was pitted against Meera Kanwaria of the BJP with BSP’s Rakesh Hans being another major candidate. Here while voting was high in Mangolpuri and Rohini segments, it was very low in Mundka, Kirari, Bawana and Narela.

Finally in South Delhi, where Ramesh Kumar of the Congress faced Ramesh Bidhuri of the BJP and Kanwar Singh Tanwar of the BSP, the voting was the lowest at 47.13 per cent. A re-poll is scheduled to take place at two of the booths in the Chhattarpur Assembly segment of this constituency on Sunday. Among the Assembly segments here, the highest voting was recorded in Ambedkar Nagar (56.25 per cent) and the lowest in Badarpur (41.57 per cent).

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