Delhi Assembly elections on February 8, results on 11, says CEC Arora

Assembly elections in Delhi will be held on February 8 in a single phase, Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Sunil Arora said on Monday (January 6). The counting and declaration of results will be on February 11.

Since the term of the 70-member Delhi Assembly will conclude on February 22, a new House has to be elected before that.

The notification would be issued on January 14 and the last day for filing nominations is January 21. The scrutiny of nominations will be on January 22 and the last date of withdrawal is January 24.

“The final voters’ list indicates that there are around 1.46 crore voters in Delhi, with 80.55 lakh males and 66.35 lakh females,” NDTV quoted Ranbir Singh, Chief Electoral Officer for Delhi, as saying.

All steps would be taken to ensure the safe conduct of the elections, the CEC said. “Around 90,000 officials will be deployed to conduct the elections. Adequate security measures will be enforced,” CEC Arora said.

Elaborating on the arrangements, the CEC said all polling booths would have “assured minimum facilities”. All booths would be on the ground floor and voters would have access to toilets and medical kits.

The phone numbers of election observers would be made available to the public.

The CEC said the model code of conduct would be in force immediately. The key parties, the AAP, the Congress, and the BJP would focus on the key issues of pollution and the Centre’s move to regularise 1,731 unauthorised residential colonies.

Shortly after the announcement of the date for polls, Delhi CM Kejriwal tweeted, “Ye chunaav kaam par hoga [This election will be based on the (government’s) work.]”

ये चुनाव काम पर होगा

— Arvind Kejriwal (@ArvindKejriwal) January 6, 2020

This would be the first assembly elections after the BJP won all the seven Lok Sabha seats in Delhi in elections early last year.

Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) chief and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal is contesting again this year after a massive victory in the previous Assembly polls in 2015. The AAP won 67 seats out of 70, and the BJP won 3 seats.

The AAP’s anti-corruption and pro-people policies had garnered huge public support and political analysts say corruption at the grassroots level have come down. During the initial days of the AAP rule, the CM had openly stated that on-the-spot action would be taken against ‘the corrupt’ and the government would adopt a zero-tolerance approach to graft.