As counting of votes for the Lok Sabha elections 2024 is underway, the Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) is leading with a comfortable vote margin in all of Delhi's seven Lok Sabha seats, continuing its 2019 spree in the capital city.
While the BJP and Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) had fielded candidates in all seven constituencies, Congress and the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) fought the elections together with the former contesting on three seats and the latter on four seats.
The total voter turnout in Delhi, which voted in the sixth phase of the Lok Sabha elections, was 58.7 percent -- 2.5 percent lesser than 60.6 percent, recorded in the 2019 general election.
The BJP's vote share in Delhi had dropped from 56.9 percent in 2019 to 54.32 percent in 2024. Meanwhile, the Congress vote share has also dropped from 22.6 percent to 19.07 percent; whereas AAP's vote share has made significant gains at 24.04 percent. However, it must be remembered that that the Congress contested only three seats as opposed to seven last time and AAP contested four as opposed to seven last time.
Winning By How Much Vote Margin?
In the closely-watched seat of North East Delhi, BJP's candidate and former state chief Manoj Tiwari is leading by at least 1.33 lakh votes against Congress candidate Kanhaiya Kumar. Their campaigns were marked by high-decibel electioneering. In the 2019 elections too, the BJP had won the seat by nearly 3.66 lakh votes. Among all seats, the voter turnout in North East Delhi was the highest at 62.9%.
Similarly, in the North West Delhi seat, BJP candidate Yogender Chandolia is leading by a comfortable margin of over 2.85 lakh votes against Congress' Udit Raj. In the last parliamentary elections, the BJP had won the seat by a margin of 5.5 lakh votes.
In Chandni Chowk too, Congress candidate JP Agarwal lost to the BJP's Praveen Khandelwal by a margin of nearly 90,000 votes. In the 2019 general election, the BJP had won the seat by a margin of 2.28 lakh votes.
Another hotly contested seat was the New Delhi constituency, where AAP's Somnath Bharti was challenged by BJP candidate Bansuri Swaraj, daughter of former external affairs minister Sushma Swaraj. As per the Election Commission, Bansuri is leading from the seat by a margin of over 77,000 votes. In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the BJP had won this seat by a margin of 2.56 lakh votes.
In the South Delhi constituency, AAP candidate Sahi Ram Pahalwan lost to BJP's Ramveer Singh Bidhuri by at least 1.24 lakh votes. In the previous Lok Sabha elections, the BJP had won this seat by 3.67 lakh votes.
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