As it begins introspection into the worst electoral debacle in Delhi since 1984, BJP has admitted that it had lost influence in its stronghold of urban, middle and upper class voters along with Sikhs, causing the party dearly at the hustings. Senior Delhi BJP leader V K Malhotra felt that there was a "wave" for Congress as the electorate apparently wanted to give the party a mandate for stability by decimating small parties.
BJP was completely routed in the Lok Sabha polls in Delhi, with Congress bagging all the seven seats, that too with huge margins of over one lakh votes in all constituencies. "Congress did exceedingly well as there were no vote spoilers for it this time in Delhi," said Malhotra, who was Chairman of Delhi BJP's Election Management Committee, while speaking on the poll debacle.
Malhotra said BJP got 35 per cent votes in the polls as against 37 per cent in last year's assembly election. "However, Congress' vote share increased from 41 per cent during assembly elections to 57 per cent in Lok Sabha polls."
He noted with concern that urban voters, upper and middle class voters as also Sikhs, who form BJP's traditional votebank, had not favoured the party this time. This, he said, had happened after 25 years and expressed confidence that the party would work to woo them back as was done in the past. "In 1971 also exactly this has happened. We lost in all seats by huge margins similar to this election. The same thing happened in 1984 also," Malhotra said.
Prepared to meet the challenge of regaining the traditional vote-base, he said BJP will work for demonstrative development, particularly in the run-up to the Commonwealth Games, through the Municipal Corporation of Delhi which is ruled by the party.
The former Deputy Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha said the voters across the country wanted to avoid a fractured mandate and thought that UPA had a better chance of forming a stable government. "They thought NDA will not get more than 200 seats. So they voted for Congress to ensure stability...People wanted to get rid of Lalu Prasad, Mulayam Singh and other smaller parties," Malhotra said.
"It was almost a direct fight between BJP and Congress. The BSP got only five per cent votes against 16 per cent in Assembly polls. So it affected us," he said, adding Muslims and Christians also voted overwhelmingly for the Congress.
Asked whether infighting in the party was responsible for the debacle, he discounted the possibility of it affecting the party's electoral prospects, saying said the party faced infighting during MCD polls also but still it won the elections with two-thirds majority.
