Delhi BJP To Employ Tried And Tested Strategies Of OBC Outreach And Fielding Former MPs In Upcoming Assembly Election

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is planning to employ its tried and tested strategies, that helped the party win elections in several states, in the upcoming Delhi assembly election.

These two strategies are outreach programmes to Other Backward Classes (OBC) which helped the BJP in Haryana and Maharashtra and fielding former members of Parliament (MP) which helped it in Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh.

The BJP has already started reaching out to OBCs, specifically their 52 sub-castes. The party's first target was the Pal community. A meeting headed by Union Minister of State S P Singh Baghel has already convened with this community.

Delhi BJP's OBC Morcha president Sunil Yadav said that in the coming days, a similar meeting will be held with Rava Rajput, Kashyap, Rajbhar, Jogi, Lodhi and Teli castes and prominent party leaders will participate in them.

"The members of the OBC community are the largest section of voters in Delhi. Many among the other backward classes are lesser in numbers and they are the focus of this campaign," he was quoted as saying by PTI.

Apart from these caste meetings, two large conferences, one focusing on women and the other on professionals, industrialists and influential persons of the OBC community will also be convened, Yadav said.

The BJP will emphasise the work done by the Narendra Modi government for the OBC community like giving Constitutional status to the National Commission for Backward Classes.

Also, the BJP passed the 127th Constitution Amendment that allowed states and Union Territories to prepare their own list of backward classes, thus easing the penetration of reservation benefits to the OBCs.

Apart from emphasising these works in bigger meetings, community-specific smaller meetings will also be organised at assembly and ward levels, which are estimated to be 500 in number across the city.

The BJP had done a similar thing in the Haryana and Maharashtra elections held earlier this year and retained power in these states. However, these states witnessed a polarisation of OBC votes which seems to be missing in Delhi.

While OBC voters consolidated behind the BJP against Jats in Haryana and against Marathas in Maharashtra, there is no such equation in Delhi, given it is predominantly urban with lesser influence of caste politics.

Nonetheless, the BJP's efforts are rational, given the large number of OBC voters in Delhi. Since OBCs are known to back the BJP most of the time in recent elections, its efforts are likely to bear results.

To understand the BJP's other strategy, we should recall the 2023 assembly elections in Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh. The BJP fielded seven incumbent MPs in each of the two states.

While only four of them won in Rajasthan and five of them in Madhya Pradesh, their presence in the electoral fray infused enthusiasm among party workers, thus benefitting the party at an overall level.

Similarly, the BJP plans to field former MPs in the Delhi assembly election. We should recall that the BJP repeated only one of the seven Delhi MPs, Manoj Tiwari, in the 2024 Lok Sabha election, while cutting tickets of the remaining six MPs.

While Gautam Gambhir has returned to Cricket, giving up politics and former North-West Delhi MP Hans Raj Hans has been shifted to Punjab politics, given his Punjabi origins, four former MPs are likely to be fielded.

As per Jagran, former Union Minister and Chandni Chowk MP Harsh Vardhan can be fielded from Krishna Nagar, a constituency he represented for over two decades from 1993 to 2014.

Former New Delhi MP Meenakshi Lekhi can be fielded from Lajpat Nagar and former South Delhi MP Ramesh Bidhuri can be fielded from Kalkaji to challenge Delhi Chief Minister (CM) Atishi.

However, since Bidhuri had earlier represented Tughlakabad from 2003 to 2014, his name is under consideration from that constituency also.

Similarly, former West Delhi MP Parvesh Verma can be fielded from New Delhi against former Delhi CM and Aam Aadmi Party's (AAP) national convener Arvind Kejriwal. Earlier, Verma was MLA from Mehrauli.

Other than these former MPs, senior BJP leaders like Delhi BJP president Virendra Sachdeva can be fielded in Patparganj, a seat left by former Deputy CM Manish Sisodia, where the AAP has fielded UPSC coach Avadh Ojha.

However, Sachdeva's name is under consideration in Kasturba Nagar also. Former Union Minister of State Vijay Goel can be fielded from Model Town. Earlier, he was MP from Chandni Chowk and MLA from Delhi Sadar.

While these two strategies of the BJP are unique, it is locking horns with the ruling AAP over freebie promises and wooing auto drivers, while hoping to leverage the anti-incumbency factor.

The election dates are not announced yet but they are likely to happen in February next year. The AAP has already declared 31 candidates in two lists, while the BJP is likely to release the first candidate list in the next week.