‘Chandni Chowk and North East Delhi are considered weak constituencies.’
With an eye on the Lok Sabha elections due next year, the Delhi unit of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has embarked on the process of identifying seats that require more attention, sources in the Delhi BJP have said. The party’s state unit has already identified two out of the seven constituencies in Delhi, that, according to them, are “weak” with respect to the party’s prospect of winning them in the Lok Sabha elections.
A senior Delhi BJP leader told this correspondent that the two Lok Sabha seats—Chandni Chowk and North East Delhi—are being considered “weak constituencies”, given the demographics of these two Lok Sabha seats.
“We have already started our meetings to prepare for the 2019 elections. Booth level work and work to prepare the ground-level workers for the elections are on in full swing. We are in the process of identifying the constituencies where we think we are a little weak against our Opposition. Chandni Chowk and North East Delhi have so far been identified as seats requiring more attention and work, as the population demographics in these two seats are a little against the party,” the senior BJP leader from Delhi said.
Apart from this, the party is also looking at the work being done by the sitting MPs in their respective constituencies and is in the process of receiving feedback from the ground and people in Delhi on their respective MPs to come to a conclusion for distribution of tickets for the seven Lok Sabha seats in Delhi.
A senior BJP functionary from Delhi said: “We have already asked all the MPs to send in the details of the work that they have done in their respective constituencies in the last four years. A detailed study of their work would be done to decide who would retain their tickets for the coming Lok Sabha elections. The final recommendation would be sent to the Central election committee. It also seems that some of the sitting MPs could lose their tickets this time, given the response that is gathered from the ground.”
Sources in the BJP also hinted that they are considering their main opponent in Delhi as the Congress rather than the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP).
A source said: “The party is looking at cornering the Congress during the Lok Sabha elections, as it seems that the Congress is slowly gaining lost ground in Delhi. The party is less concerned about the AAP here, because they can be cornered during the campaign with several local issues. Moreover, the AAP does not yet have any national relevance.”