1,790 candidates lose deposits

Ananya Panda

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, April 26

The Municipal Corporation of Delhi poll verdict on Wednesday has not only given reason to the BJP to rejoice— as Delhi chose it over its arch rivals Aam Aadmi Party and the Congress—but also made the State Election Commission richer with 1,790 candidates out of the total 2516 forfeiting deposits up from last time’s 1782.

In the 2017 MCD elections, the Congress which saw a decline in its vote share as well to 21.11 per cent this time vis-a-vis 30.50 per cent it totalled in 2012, suffered a downfall with 92 candidates fielded by it losing their poll deposits unlike last time’s 26 followed by the AAP whose 40 candidates left in the same category.

All hopes of the Bahujan Samajwadi Party and Janata Dal United dashed as both failed to open account with the former’s 192 candidates and latter’s all 94 contesting failing to win back their poll deposit.

In 2012 civic polls, the BSP had won 15 councillors while JDU was banking high on Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar’s “governance” model.

Debutant Swaraj India led by Yogendra Yadav and Prashant Bhushan too drew a blank. BJP’s 'Modi luck' couldn’t save the deposits of five candidates this time as compared to last time’s 18 candidates.

Candidates with highest and lowest winning margins

Victory turned out to be sweeter than expected for BJP Delhi vice-president and candidate Kamaljeet Sehrawat in Dwarka-B (38 –South MCD) as she defeated AAP competitor Sushma Bansal by a whopping 9,866 votes, the highest winning margin in the three municipal corporation elections.

The lowest margin recorded was by BJP winner Anita Kanwar in South Delhi's Chattarpur ward where she got better over her challenger Pinky Tyagi by just two votes.

Among some other major interesting wins registered were by Congress’ Yasmin Kidwai, niece of former mayor Farhad Suri, in the Daryaganj ward where she won by a narrow margin of 59 votes while the party’s senior leader Varyam Kaur, who was the Leader of the Opposition in the EDMC House, gave in to her BJP challenger by a huge margin of 9,115 votes.