Delhi election 2020: 5 seats where AAP, BJP gave each other tough fight

From Bijwasan to Patparganj, these constituencies saw the smallest gaps between the vote shares of the winner and the runner-up.

Arvind Kejriwal-led Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) on Tuesday won the Delhi elections, reducing the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Congress to eight and eight and zero seats in the 70-member Assembly

The largest margin of victory was in Burari where AAP's Sanjeev Jha secured 139,598 votes. Janata Dal (United) candidate Shailendra Kumar was the runners up with 51,440 votes, trailing Jha by 88,000 votes.

The smallest victory margin was also secured by an AAP candidate. Bhupinder Singh Joon retained the seat for his party with 57,271 votes, defeating a close second Sat Prakash Rana (BJP) ticket and secured 56,518 votes a difference of just 753 votes. AAP won in 5 of the constituencies in which the victory margin was the lowest.

ALSO READ: Delhi election 2020: Top 5 seats where AAP got its most comprehensive wins

In terms of vote share, while the AAP saw a marginal decline from 54.34 per cent to 53.57 per cent, the BJP’s share rose by 6 percentage points from 32.19 per cent to 38.46 per cent. The Congress’ vote share, meanwhile, plumbed further to 4.34 per cent from 9.65 per cent in 2015.

Business Standard takes a look at the five constituencies where the difference in vote share of the winning candidate and their nearest rival was the lowest:

1. Bijwasan Assembly Constituency

Winner: Bhupinder Singh Joon (AAP)

Winner’s vote share: 45.83 per cent

Runner-up: Sat Prakash Rana (BJP)

Runner-up’s vote share: 45.22 per cent

Defeat margin: 753 votes

Difference: 0.60 percentage points

Delhi: AAP kept its nerve even as BJP breathed fire in the campaign

AAP seems to be cruising to victory in Delhi, the result of not getting diverted by BJP's campaign.

Early trends suggest that the Aam Admi Party is set to get a second term in Delhi and Arvind Kejriwal a third shot as the chief minister. It began as a comfortable cruise for the AAP, turned into a closer contest with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and a bounce back for the AAP.

At the time of writing AAP was projected to win 55 of the 70 seats while the BJP was placed at a distant second with leads in just 15 seats. The Congress seemed unlikely to open its account for the second consecutive time since 2015. However, the spike in the BJP's vote share to a little over 40 percent as of now suggested that a chunk of the Congress votes might have shifted to AAP.

However, the surprise element was that Manish Sisodia, Kejriwal's man for all seasons and reasons, was trailing in his constituency, Patparganj in East Delhi. Sisodia was perceived as the Delhi government's mover and shaker and the author of its far-reaching education and health reforms. The shock reversal of Sisodia's fortunes has been attributed to a statement he made in the penultimate phase of electioneering that was construed as his support to the Shaheen Bagh protests, contrary to the official line that directed that the AAP's stand must be neutral.

However, Sisodia's reversal is a side story to an election in which the AAP fought back every inch of the way against the BJP's formidable organisational machinery and a feverish campaign, that bordered on the vicious, led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Home minister Amit Shah, with "stars" like Adityanath, the Uttar Pradesh chief minister, deployed to accentuate the "faith" divide in the aftermath of the agitation against the Centre's citizenship package.

Delhi Election 2020

Chandrababu Naidu begins fast over Andhra special status; Opposition to extend support

A TDP delegation led by Chandrababu Naidu will submit a memorandum to President Ram Nath Kovind on Tuesday.

Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu began a day-long fast in Delhi on Monday, demanding that the Centre grant special status to the state and fulfil all promises made before its bifurcation in 2014.

A number of Opposition party leaders - including Congress president Rahul Gandhi, National Conference president Farooq Abdullah and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal - are expected to extend their support to the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) chief's fast at the Andhra Pradesh Bhavan.

Before beginning the fast, Naidu offered tributes to Matama Gandhi at Raj Ghat and to B R Ambedkar at Andhra Pradesh Bhavan.

ALSO READ: LIVE: Priyanka in Lucknow, Modi in Vrindavan; Naidu begins day-long fast

A TDP delegation led by Naidu will submit a memorandum to President Ram Nath Kovind on Tuesday.

Naidu has been trying to unite the opposition parties to take on the BJP in the general elections. Over the last three months, he has held a number of meetings with the opposition party leaders on forming an anti-BJP front.

In March last year, the TDP had pulled out of the NDA government over its refusal to grant special status to Andhra Pradesh.

The party has been accusing the Narendra Modi government of not releasing enough funds for the Polavaram irrigation project, the Kadapa steel plant and Amravati, the under-construction ultra-modern state capital.

On June 2, 2014, Andhra Pradesh was split into two, and Hyderabad became the capital of the new state Telangana.

Business Standard

Replace EVMs with 'tried and tested' ballot papers in Lok Sabha polls: AAP

The party has also exhorted all opposition parties to boycott the polls if their demand was not paid heed to.

The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) on Wednesday demanded that in view of the latest charges against the electronic voting machines (EVMs) by a hacker in London, the old, tried and tested ballot papers should be used again in the forthcoming Lok Sabha elections.

The party has also exhorted all opposition parties to boycott the polls if their demand was not paid heed to.

Rajya Sabha member of AAP and in-charge of Uttar Pradesh, Sanjay Singh told IANS that this was necessary to "save democracy and install faith of the people once again in the election process".

The national spokesman of the AAP further said that the latest revelations clearly shrouded the neutrality of the EVM's and hence should be replaced with ballot papers.

"These EVM's show the benefit of EVM's going to the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and takes away from the opposition a level playing field" he said further.

Chief spokesman of the party's state unit, Vaibhav Maheshwari while claiming that the Election Commission was not ready to concede that the EVM's were open for tampering demanded that the poll panel ensure a "public audit" of the EVM's.

Raising doubts on the fairies of the EVM's, the party has demanded that all political parties should write to the Election Commission of India, saying that they will boycott the elections for the Lok Sabha if the EVM's were used for the polls.

"There is no other option but to ban the EVM's and conduct the Lok Sabha and all future elections through ballot paper method" Sanjay Singh said.

Samajwadi Party (SP) chief Akhilesh Yadav on Tuesday had spoken on similar lines and had cited the example of a "developed nation like Japan" which still used the traditional ballot paper method for elections in their country.

"In view of the recent revelations, further doubts have been created in the minds of people and the EC should taken them into account" the former UP chief minister has said.

The ruling BJP leaders, both in the state and the centre, have trashed the accusations made by the opposition parties and have claimed that by raising doubts on the EVM's, the opposition was making ground for an almost certain defeat at the hustings in the Lok Sabha 2019 polls.

Business Standard

After chilli attack, cleric held with live bullets at Kejriwal's residence

A live cartridge of .32 bore was recovered from his purse by security staff deputed at Kejriwal's residence.

A 39-year-old man, who was going to meet Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal at his residence here, was arrested after a bullet was found in his purse during frisking, police said Tuesday.

Mohammad Imran, a caretaker of a mosque in Karol Bagh and resident of Seelampur locality, was arrested when he was going to attend a Janta Darbar (public meeting) at the chief minister's residence on Monday, they said.

He is a maujjim at the Masjid Bawli Wali.

Last week, a man threw chilli powder at Kejriwal inside the Delhi Secretariat.

Imran had come to meet the chief minister at the Janta Darbar around 11:15 am, a senior police officer said.

He had come with 12 imams and maulvis to discuss the issue of increasing salary of staff working at the Delhi Waqf Board, he said.

During the search, a live cartridge of .32 bore was recovered from his purse by security staff deputed at Kejriwal's residence, the officer said.

Imran was handed over to the local police and accordingly, a case was registered at the Civil Lines police station under relevant sections of the Arms Act, he said.

During interrogation, Imran said he was a maujjin at Masjid Bawli Wali in Karol Bagh and two to three months ago, he found a cartridge in the mosque's donation box. He said he had planed to throw it in the Yamuna river but did not do so and kept it in his purse, the officer said.

Business Standard

Delhi air pollution: Know govt's emergency plan to avoid smog filled winter

Authorities have predicted further deterioration of air quality in the coming days.

Delhi Air Pollution : Last winter, the Delhi-NCR suffered one of the worst bouts of pollution. The entire region was in the grip of haze and smog. Now, the dreadful pollution is back to the national capital and its nearby states. Meanwhile, recent satellite images from the NASA showed that farmers in Punjab and Haryana have started burning crop residue earlier this month.

On Sunday, the air quality in Delhi remained poor, as the overall air quality index (AQI) recorded at 10 am Sunday stood at 208 which falls in the poor category, according to Centre-run System of Air Quality and Weather Forecasting and Research (SAFAR).

The PM10 level (presence of particles with diameter less than 10 micrometres) in Delhi stood at 183 and the PM2.5 level was recorded at 93, according to the data.

Authorities have predicted further deterioration of air quality in the coming days.

An emergency action plan has been implemented from Monday to combat air pollution that has begun to show a trend towards poor category. (Business Standard )

ALSO READ: Delhi air pollution: Emergency plan to kick in from Monday

Here are the emergency measures that will be taken under Graded Response Action Plan (GRAP)

1. Air Quality in moderate poor category

If the air quality lies in moderate to poor category- measures like stopping garbage burning in landfills and other places, and enforcing all pollution control regulations in brick kilns and industries would be implemented.

2. Air Quality in poor category

If the air quality falls in the very poor category, additional measures of stopping use of diesel generator sets, enhancing parking fees 3-4 times and increasing frequency of metro and buses would be implemented.

3. Air Quality in severe zone

If the air quality falls in the severe category, additional measures would be implemented of increasing frequency of mechanised cleaning of roads, sprinkling of water on roads and identifying road stretches with high dust generation.

4. Air Quality in severe plus

If the air quality falls to severe plus emergency category, then measures like stopping entry of trucks into Delhi (except essential commodities), stopping construction activities and appointment of task force to take the decision on any additional steps, including shutting of schools, are implemented.

Meanwhile, South Delhi Municipal Corporation (SDMC) has asked the state-run NBCC, which is building a world-class convention-cum-exhibition centre at the site of the Pragati Maidan.... Read More

Delhi Metro Pink Line: All the details about the 'corridor for shoppers'

The metro network in the national capital has expanded to 296 Km through 214 stations.

The Metro service on the Durgabai Deshmukh South Campus -Lajpat Nagar section of phase III of the Delhi Metro network opened on Monday, August 6. The 8.10 km-long stretch has interchanging facilities at INA (with Yellow Line) and Lajpat Nagar (Violet Line). The service began for passengers at 1 pm.

Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and Union Housing and Urban Affairs Minister Hardeep Singh Puri jointly inaugurated it at the Metro Bhawan. The new stations are -- Sir Vishveshariah Moti Bagh, Bhikhaji Cama Place, Sarojini Nagar, INA, South Extension and Lajpat Nagar. Only Sir Vishveshariah Moti Bagh station is elevated, and the rest all are underground.

The stretch is named ”corridor for shoppers” as it will be connecting four major markets of the city Sarojini Nagar, INA, South Extension and Lajpat Nagar (Central Market). This one stretch of the network will also cut travel time for commuters by up to 20 minutes.

This stretch is part of the 59 km-long Majlis Park-Shiv Vihar corridor (Pink Line) which falls under the Phase-III network of the DMRC. A total of 23 trains will be put into service, with a frequency of 5 minutes and 12 seconds during peak hours and 5 minutes and 45 seconds during non-peak hours, the senior official said.

The operational span of the Pink Line from Majlis Park to Lajpat Nagar will become 29.66 km and the entire operational span of the DMRC will reach 296 km with 214 stations.T he travel time between INA and Rajouri Garden stations would reduce from 40 minutes to 23 minutes; Lajpat Nagar-Rajouri Garden stations from 45 to 28 minutes and Lajpat Nagar and Netaji Subhas Place (Red Line) from 47 minutes to 39 minutes.

Article Source BS

As dust storms brew, India breathes toxic air throughout the year

In 2018 alone, there have been 50 severe storms across 16 Indian states that have led to more than 500 deaths, compared to 22 storms between 2003 and 2017.

Deadly dust storms sweeping over the densely-populated north Indian plains are part of a "new normal" of disruptive weather events worsening the country’s already-lethal air pollution and causing disruption in the $2.3-trillion economy.

In recent months, dust clouds and storms have killed hundreds of people, destroyed thousands of homes and farmers’ crops and led to flight cancellations. The government in New Delhi, a city of more than 20 million people, ordered a halt to construction activities as the airborne sand significantly worsened north India’s air quality, far outside the winter months that usually herald the region’s descent into a months-long toxic haze.

"It’s definitely a new normal -- the frequency and intensity of these storms is unprecedented," said Sunita Narain, director general of New Delhi’s Centre for Science and Environment, who added that recent weather is related to desertification, deforestation and an over-extraction of groundwater.

In India, extreme weather events can quickly lead to dozens of deaths and cause economic hardship, with the World Bank estimating that environmental degradation costs India roughly $80 billion each year. At the same time, soaring levels of tiny, deadly particulate matter have prompted concern about a brewing public health emergency in the politically-gridlocked capital, where doctors warn of rising lung cancer and heart disease cases.

Economic Threat
In 2018 alone, there have been 50 severe storms across 16 Indian states that have led to more than 500 deaths, compared to 22 storms between 2003 and 2017, and only nine between 1980 and 2003, the CSE said. Nearly 5,000 houses collapsed, while livestock were killed and crops were ruined across the states of Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar and others, according to a report by the CSE.

Flights were cancelled across north India on airlines including Air India, Indigo and Spice Jet, said Kapil Sabharwal, a spokesman for New Delhi’s airport.

Read More