Why Delhi’s slums are the front line in AAP-BJP battle for National Capital

A clutch of official documents and court orders in hand, Delhi urban development minister Saurabh Bharadwaj, in a press conference last week, accused the BJP-led Centre of “destroying people’s homes and rendering them homeless”. Within a few days, he, along with several other MLAs started visiting slum clusters and jhuggi jhopri colonies where notices of demolition had been pasted.

During one such visit on Wednesday, AAP MLA Dilip Pandey told the people living in the slums of Wazirpur Industrial Area that the BJP was using central bodies and agencies such as the Railways, Delhi Development Authority (DDA), and the Land and Development Office (L&DO) to remove slums because it knows that people living in jhuggis vote for the AAP.

With political parties sharpening their attacks before the Lok Sabha elections, the AAP is hoping to retain its hold on a constituency of voters that it believes has been its biggest support base since 2013, when it contested its first election.

Battling the BJP on several fronts, from allegations of corruption in the Delhi excise policy case to a raging war with the bureaucracy in the state, the AAP has decided to take up the issue that hits home for a large number of Delhi residents. According to a Lokniti survey conducted on the eve of the 2020 Assembly elections, 61% of the poorest voters in Delhi voted for the AAP. This, however, was a drop from the 66% in 2015.

In fact, it was the BJP that made the most gains among the poorest voters and won 33% of their vote, an increase of 12% compared to 2015. According to the survey, the data suggested that the highest gain in the segment may have come from JJ clusters and slums, possibly because of the AAP’s jahan jhuggi wahin makaan promise. This also