Union Home Minister Amit Shah was in for a drubbing by BJP’s former partner in Maharashtra, the Shiv Sena on its defeat in the Delhi Assembly Election 2020 stating that the victory of Aam Aadmi Party in the Delhi Assembly election was not surprising. Sena on Wednesday termed it as a personal defeat for the former BJP head Amit Shah as he was personally handling the Delhi poll campaigns.

In party mouthpiece ‘Saamana’s’ editorial and its newspaper ‘Dopahar ka Saamana,’ the Sena said that despite deploying almost the entire Union Cabinet, over 150 MPs, state Chief Ministers and ministers, more than 200 MLAs from across India, the BJP suffered a “clean sweep” by AAP’s ‘jhadu’ (broom).

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“This is a rare instance when a Chief Minister (Arvind Kejriwal) went to the people with his performance record and sought votes against this, the BJP’s ‘in-the-air’ policies failed.”

Earlier, Sena President and Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray too without naming the BJP had said yesterday that the people of Delhi have listened to ‘Jan ki baat’ and ‘Mann ki Baat’ will have no relevance in the country now.

‘Saanana’ added that with AAP victory in Delhi, and the recent Shiv Sena-Nationalist Congress Party-Congress coalition taking power in Maharashtra, the BJP has lost out on the country’s political capital and the commercial capital due to its “selfishness and arrogance”.

“In Delhi, the BJP was always confused on what issues to confront AAP with, so as usual it raked up emotional and communal issues like Hindu-Muslim, patriotism and anti-nationalism. However, the voters kicked aside these and overwhelmingly voted for Kejriwal’s performance in the past five years, giving AAP 62 out of 70 seats,” the Sena said.

Referring to the BJP’s victory on all seven Delhi Lok Sabha seats barely eight months ago, the Sena said it was “a one-sided win” since there was nobody strong enough to challenge Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

“In February 2020, the BJP heated up the political atmosphere with issues like CAA-NRC, there were sit-in protests in Shaheen Bagh to which the BJP gave a ‘Muslim only’ tag to grab votes, but failed in all its tactics as the Delhiites remained solidly behind AAP,” the Sena pointed out.

Sena lauded Kejriwal for the unprecedented strides in education and health which have grabbed global attention, and the relief like free water and power but “without misleading the people” that helped him notch such an impressive hat-trick win.

“The police administration does not come under Kejriwal’s purview. When the law and order deteriorated in Delhi, he effectively blamed Modi-Shah, who retaliated by calling him a ‘terrorist’. Ultimately, Kejriwal’s broom swept aside all and he rode back to power,” the Sena said.

Sena concluded that though BJP may be ‘satisfied’ it got more seats (eight of 70) and even notched a slight increase in the vote share, but finally it was Kejriwal’s superior performance which won the day for him.

The Arvind Kejriwal-led AAP yesterday again created history, sweeping the Delhi Assembly election comprehensively for the second consecutive time.

The party bagged 62 of the total 70 seats, restricting the principal challenger BJP again to a single-digit figure of mere 8 seats in a bitterly-fought, fiercely-contested electoral battle that took place in the national capital in the midst of continuing protests against the controversial Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and the National Register of Citizens (NRC).

The Delhi election was marked by bitter, fractious and polarising campaigning, trading of allegations and counter-allegations between the parties, brazen “hate” speeches, and divisive politics. It even witnessed violence and firing at anti-CAA-NRC protest sites at Jamia and Shaheen Bagh.

The Election Commission was at times forced to take some action as it gave leaders like Union Minister Anurag Thakur, UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, and BJP MP Parvesh Verma a slap on the wrist over their “hate” remarks.

(With PTI inputs)