Two sides of same street: AAP camp wears a jubilant look, BJP and Congress sombre

The mood of the city-state was apparent on Tuesday on Deen Dayal Upadhyay Marg, home to offices of the three main political parties contesting the Delhi assembly elections.

One entire side of this arterial passage connecting some of central Delhi’s busiest roads was sombre and sullen. That’s the side with the Delhi Congress office on one end and the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP’s) national headquarters on the other.

On the opposite side of the road, in the middle, is the Aam Aadmi Party’s (AAP’s) head office. The road in front was dotted by jubilant party workers, a wedding band, a flash mob, and hundreds of paramilitary and Delhi Police personnel, immediately after the Election Commission’s numbers made it clear that the new kid on the block had returned to power with a thumping majority. As slogans hailing chief minister and AAP national convener Arvind Kejriwal sounded through loudspeakers, senior party leader and Rajya Sabha member of Parliament Sanjay Singh said, “Today once again in Delhi AAP has achieved a historic mandate under the leadership of Arvind Kejriwal. The people of Delhi have chosen their leader and no one can defeat him.”

“(Home minister) Amit Shah and his entire team tried their level best to hijack the narrative by talking about Shaheen Bagh and other such issues. What have you done for the people? People want to see those results and their decision is clear in their mandate,” Singh told the media at the party’s office. “Politics of hate make no difference to the people. Don’t practise hate politics. People want to see issues being resolved and that is what Arvind Kejriwal has done,” he said.

AAP workers believe that the division of votes between the party and the Congress in certain constituencies has benefited the BJP.

Party workers also asserted that though votes had been split in a select few constituencies, religion was not an issue in the elections.

“AAP has never been in favour of politics of religion, which is what BJP practises. Shaheen Bagh and Jamia are not issues. So in some of the constituencies, votes have been split between AAP and the Congress and that has in turn benefited the BJP. Otherwise it is clear that people have rejected the BJP,” said AAP party worker Hasibul Hasan.

The Delhi office of the Congress, which failed yet again to win even one seat in the Delhi assembly elections, wore a desolate and forlorn look, with neither party workers nor any party leader making an appearance. A lone guard stationed at the premises said that “no one has come”.

The BJP won just eight seats and it too kept a low profile. Not a single party worker could be seen at the BJP office, situated about a kilometre from the Congress office, which was witness to massive celebrations after the results of the 2019 general election were announced.

Kejriwal’s appearance with his wife, who was marking her birthday, and children, rounded up celebrations and lessons on both sides of Deen Dayal Upadhyay Marg on Tuesday.

“This is not my victory. It it is the victory of every family that thought of me as their son. This is the victory of every family that gets electricity, whose children get education, whose family members get subsidized healthcare and treatment in hospitals. This is the birth of a new form of politics,” Kejriwal said in his victory speech.