BJP to woo Delhi voters with regularisation of colonies, friendly budgetBJP to woo Delhi voters with friendly budget, regularisation of colonies

Vibha Sharma

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Tribune News Service

New Delhi, January 2

Apparently, the BJP has found a “perfect” recipe to win the upcoming Delhi Assembly elections — an issue of prestige for the saffron party out of power here for more than two decades now.

However, regarding the tricky issue of a chief ministerial face to take on a “relatively popular” Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and the “popular” schemes of his AAP government, it is yet to take a call.

The party believes it has hit the right nerve with the Narendra Modi-led Centre’s recent decision to regularise 1,731 unauthorised colonies in the National Capital. It also hopes that the upcoming Union Budget will also have sufficient to woo the sulking urban middleclass that constitutes a sizable fraction of Delhi voters.

Alongside, the BJP, which is trying to find the right candidates to take on AAP and Congress candidates, has decided to hold a “transparent selection procedure” with concurrence of local electorate. A Delhi-specific manifesto backed by “recently fulfilled promises” of the Narendra Modi government 2.0 will be an added advantage, say leaders.

The National Capital Territory of Delhi (Recognition of Property Rights of Residents in Unauthorised Colonies) Bill that seeks to grant ownership rights to residents of Delhi’s unauthorised colonies is expected to benefit as many as 40 lakh persons.

The buzz also is that the Centre is mulling a restructure of personal income tax rates to encourage the middle class to spend more in its bid to boost consumption, which the BJP believes will prove to be another weapon in its armoury for Delhi.

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman is expected to present the Union Budget on February 1.

Meanwhile, regarding the crucial decision of a chief ministerial candidate against Kejriwal, sources say names of several prospective candidates are doing the rounds. It is unlikely to leave the choice after the results as an internal survey has shown that Delhi’s electorate want to know who its CM will be if they vote the BJP to power.

“Prime Minister Modi is leading the Delhi campaign, but the people want to know who BJP’s CM candidate is,” they say. “Normally, when the BJP contests elections in a state it holds it goes with the incumbent CM, otherwise the CM is declared after the results. In Delhi, having a CM face has not worked for the BJP in the past few years whether it was VK Malhotra in 2008, Harsh Vardhan in 2013 or Kiran Bedi in 2015. But if the BJP fights without a face this time Kejriwal will get a point to corner it,” they add.

Therefore, apart from its seven sitting Lok Sabha MPs, including Harsh Vardhan, Manoj Tiwari, Gautam Gambhir and Parvesh Verma, the name of Rajya Sabha MP and former union minister Vijay Goel is also doing the rounds for the post.

Box: Sops for middle class

The party believes it has hit the right nerve with the Narendra Modi-led Centre’s recent decision to regularise 1,731 unauthorised colonies in the National Capital

It also hopes that the upcoming Union Budget will also have sufficient to woo the sulking urban middle class that constitutes a sizeable fraction of Delhi voters.