Why BJP couldn’t convert its votes into seats in Delhi

NEW DELHI: The BJP is plagued with a chronic inability to translate its votes into seats in Delhi.

For the sixth consecutive time, BJP's vote share in Delhi assembly elections has hovered in the 30s with 38.51% votes. However, the same consistency was found to be missing in the number of seats won by the saffron party. It could win a mere 8 seats in the 70-seat assembly.

So much so there were 57 constituencies, in comparison to AAP's 34, where BJP received more votes in 2020 than 2015. However, BJP yet again failed to break the jinx of Delhi.

Despite enjoying consistent support in the national capital, the number of seats, won by BJP in the last six assembly polls, have fluctuated from one extreme to another. It won a maximum of 34 seats in 2013 polls and a minimum of 3 seats in 2015.

In 1998 assembly polls, though it secured 34.02% votes, BJP lost to Sheila Dikshit-led Congress party. It seats plummeting to 15 seats from a previous high of 49 seats.

Even at the peak of the popularity of Dikshit government in Delhi, the party was able to keep its vote share intact — 35.22% (2003) and 36.34% (2008). Once again the BJP failed to translate its vote share into seats and could win 20 (2003) and 23 (2008) seats.

In 2013, in the backdrop of the Modi wave, BJP secured its biggest victory in Delhi by securing 34 seats — one seat short of the majority. Once again the party received one-third of the total votes polled. Surprisingly, the vote share of 33% was less than the previous election in 2008 when it had secured 36.34% votes.

In 2015, the party suffered its worst defeat. Yet its support base remained intact at 32.3%.

BJP and its consistent support base in Delhi

The reason behind BJP's consistent performance with the voters in Delhi, and not the seats, lies in India's history of partition, according to Biswajit Mohanty associate professor in the department of political science, Deshbandhu College, Delhi.

A city of migrants, Delhi’s demography underwent a serious change following the partition when millions of refugees streamed into the city from Pakistan and settled in the dozens of refugee colonies built to rehabilitate them. The refugee families blamed the Congress for their plight and supported Jan Sangh, a party that is believed to have understood the sentiment of the migrant community. Since then the saffron party has occupied a soft soft for the refugees living in these colonies.

Later, the BJP — to gain the Hindu votes, especially of the erstwhile poor refugees and now prosperous Punjabi Hindus — aligned actively with the RSS in Delhi. As a result it came to represent the rich class, a section of the educated middle class and upper caste people.

"The urban rich, upper caste and middle class Hindus remained the stable base of the BJP, whose number in Delhi can be roughly estimated between 30 to 40%," Mohanty said.

On the other hand, the Congress, termed as the catch-all party, was favoured choice of the poor, lower middle class and Muslims. These groups formed a major portion of the population in Delhi and hence was able to defeat BJP despite it enjoying the support of the urban rich, upper caste and middle class Hindus.

Why BJP can't convert its votes into seats
From its inception, Delhi has been witnessing bi-party politics — BJP versus Congress till 2013 and then BJP versus AAP from 2015 onwards.

"The BJP could not do better in the most of the earlier elections even in the state elections where the congress would always begin with a 35% advantage with the Muslim and underprivileged support base," Mohnaty added.

Since 2013 the role of the Congress has been taken over by the Aam Aadmi Party in the national capital. The ever growing population of the economic migrants in Delhi from other states has also helped AAP to strengthen its base.

"The poor, lower class and upper caste votes had already become the support base of the AAP, a déjà vu of the Congress politics in the initial phase of 1990s in Delhi, the addition of the middle class became an added advantage. It is because of AAP’s vote share crossed more than 50 per cent with all the sections supporting it, the BJP’s vote share could not be converted into the seats across Delhi," Mohanty said.

Stay updated with the latest news on Times of India. Don't miss daily games like Crossword, Sudoku, and Mini Crossword.