By Sidharth Mishra

As one approaches Delhi from the North, the first major landscape which attracts attention on entering the national Capital is the garbage mount at the Mukarba Chowk. Once a busy crossroad leading to jams, the movement here is now relatively free thanks to the grade separators built during the Commonwealth Games. On taking left turn from Mukarba Chowk and driving down the road one approaches the sleekly built Signature Bridge.

Built about eight years back and made operational only two years ago, the Signature Bridge is gateway to North-East Delhi, the epicenter of the recent Hindu-Muslim conflagration. Parallel to the Signature Bridge still exists the Old Wazirabad Bridge and the road leading into this portion of the sprawling trans-Yamuna area is called the Wazirabad Road.

By Sidharth Mishra

That the Delhi BJP is in poor shape, one really did not really need to know from the organ of the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh – Organiser. In the editorial of its latest edition, it has been stated that the state units should not expect Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah to win all elections for them.

What the editorial preferred not to mention was that if the Delhi state unit was in poor shape, it was the making of the Central leadership. The state unit has been led for past four years by Manoj Tiwari, who is for sure is not an organisation man. A political traveler, Tiwari started his career from the Samajwadi Party in Uttar Pradesh, hobnobbed with the Congress for a while and finally took refuge in the Bharatiya Janata Party.

By Sidharth Mishra

The results of the Delhi Vidhan Sabha polls were somewhat foretold in the statement of RSS top functionary Suresh Bhaiyaji Joshi, who just a day earlier had mentioned that those opposing the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) were not necessarily opposing the Hindus. He also mentioned that the BJP was just a political party and it should not be equated with Hindu being.

The resounding victory of Arvind Kejriwal-led Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in the just concluded Delhi assembly polls has shown that a majority of the Hindus living in nation’s Capital have decided to vote against the BJP. The apparatchiks and the propagandists for the BJP are already blaming the “selfish Delhi voters” for having overlooked the “need to care for nation’s security and Hindus safety.”

By Sidharth Mishra

Campaign has ended for one of the most bitterly fought elections in the city. Ever since the Delhi Assembly came into existence in its present avatar in 1993, one doesn’t remember an election where the development of the city was reduced to such a cameo role in the poll narrative.

Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal in his interview given to at least four English and same number of Hindi dailies on a single day before the campaign ended, has claimed that this was the first time that votes were being asked in the past 70 years on the basis of development work done. Such claims by Delhi chief minister are excusable as Kejriwal is known for making tall claims without much ado and then also forget about them.

The political arena of this country in the second half of the post Mandal phase has been full of instances where development work has returned leaders to office. Some of the examples being Chandrababu Naidu, Y S Rajasekhara Reddy and SM Krishna down South, Naveen Patnaik in the East and Nitish Kumar in neighbouring Bihar.

By Sidharth Mishra

Delhi is just a few days away from casting vote on February 8 to elect the new city government. As the campaign enters the last lap, three very visible points emerge: 1. Arvind Kejriwal overcame the rout the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) received in 2019 Lok Sabha to start off as favourite for the assembly polls. 2. Despite a late start, the BJP campaign has peaked matching the AAP seat-to-seat though there is absence of a charismatic face at Delhi level. 3. The Congress has frittered away the gains, in term of vote percentage, it made in 2017 municipal polls and 2019 Lok Sabha polls.

The BJP performs well in Delhi whenever there is a three-way division in the vote share in the national Capital as it has a static support base, is the general perception. With the Congress campaign failing to take off with a complete breakdown of the poll campaign machinery, the AAP stands to again as it happened in 2015, polls pundits are tending to believe.

By Sidharth Mishra

As the campaign for February 8 assembly polls in the national capital is peaking, the narratives dictating the political fight is having a roller coaster ride. At the beginning of the campaign, Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal claimed that this was the first poll in the electoral history of Delhi that votes were being asked for the development done in the past five years.

This claim was received on a derisive note by both the opponents, the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Former chief minister Sheila Dikshit’s son Sandeep Dikshit has released a flurry of videos claiming that it was her mother who should be credited for ‘developing’ Delhi and the voters rewarded her twice in 2003 and 2008 voting her back to power.

By Sidharth Mishra

With nomination process having been completed, the roadmap of the ensuing polls for Delhi assembly has been unveiled. If someone thought that the rivals BJP and even the Congress were in any mood to give a walkover to the ruling Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), the battle at its start point suggest differently.

In their selection of candidates, both the BJP and the Congress have reposed confidence in the ability of the soldier at the ground level, that’s the party candidate. On a close scanning of the list of the ticket allottees, it becomes quite evident that there aren’t any seats where the two older parties have fielded a reluctant person.

By Sidharth Mishra

Facing the wrath of anti-incumbency against the Congress government at the Centre, which was embroiled in several cases of corruption, in 2013 then Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit was looking for a panacea to overcome adversities and come to power for the fourth time in the row. The development agenda of Dikshit had brought her back to power in 2003 and 2008.

A visionary leader that she was, she planned an overhaul of the city during the Commonwealth Games 2010 and had believed that the fresh wave of development would see her getting another term from the people. However, her development drive was drowned in the cacophony let loose by the Anna Hazare movement, whose product is the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP).