India Politics | 10 February 2015
India Politics
AAP creates history again; sweeps off opposition
Please refer to our note ‘The AAP-
rising' dated on 24 Dec 2013
Delhi gives thundering second chance to AAP experiment
AAP swept the 2015 Delhi state elections, winning 67 out of the 70 seats. Also, for the
first time in Delhi, a majority of the voting electorate (55%) voted for AAP.
While BJP’s tally went down from 32 seats to just 3 seats, its vote share remained
nearly equal at 32%. The Congress failed to get any seat and suffered a 15% drop in its
vote share. Voter turnout reached its highest.
Voter choice has swung from nearly equal seats to AAP and BJP in the 2013 assembly
elections, to all seven Lok Sabha seats in the 2014 general elections to BJP, and now
almost all seats to AAP.
Opinion/exit polls were directionally correct but fell way short of predicting the extent
of swing. However, they threw up rich data to show support of AAP across cross
sections, but particularly among minorities, youth, government and urban underclass.
In hindsight, the timing of election, campaigning tone, organizational strength,
carefully drafted manifesto - all seem to have gone in favor of AAP. Once in
government, the transparent benchmarks would set a high standard of evaluation. In
particular, AAP’s capacity to innovate would be severely tested in making good on the
promise of providing basic economic services at much lower cost.
The AAP government would take oath of office on February 14, 2015 - the anniversary
of its resignation a year ago, ending its 49-day stint in government.
AAP sweeps Delhi elections, again a no-coalition, no-opposition mandate
The Arvind Kejriwal led Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) nearly cleanly swept Delhi
elections winning 67 of the 70 Assembly Election seats, reflecting a swing of 39
seats from its 2013 tally. BJP won only 3 seats (down with 29 seats). Congress
failed to mark its presence and lost all the 8 seats it won in 2013 elections.
AAP’s vote share of 55% signifies a majority elected government, a rare event
that represents the extent of the mandate that they got from the electorate.
Most of the swing in vote share however, came at the cost of Congress as BJP
nearly maintained its vote share at 32% (33% in 2013).
The mandate reflects an increasingly polarized choice where voters are
according massive mandate to a single party effectively voiding the space for
coalition or even opposition.
The results are also striking as from 2013 election where the honors were nearly
equally divided between BJP and APP, voters swung completely in favour of BJP
to hand over 7 out of 7 Parliamentary seats in 2014 General Elections and now
have swung the other way to give 67 out of 70 Assembly seats in less than an
year to AAP. Apart from voters’ mood swing this may also reflect i) their distinct
preferences at the state and federal levels, ii) applying a stricter performance
criteria for the government in power (loosely termed as anti-incumbency), or
simply iii) relative success of political strategies adopted by the contesting
parties (including its choice of Chief Ministerial candidate, timing of election,
extent of campaigning, organizational strength and preparedness, etc.).
Again keeping with the recent trend people came out at large to give a decisive
mandate taking the voter turnout ratio to highest ever in Delhi.
Ashish Gupta
(Ashish.Gupta@MotilalOswal.com); +91 22 3982 5544
Dipankar Mitra
(Dipankar.Mitra@MotilalOswal.com); +91 22 39825405
Investors are advised to refer through disclosures made at the end of the Research Report.
Motilal Oswal research is available on
www.motilaloswal.com/Institutional-Equities,
Bloomberg, Thomson Reuters, Factset and S&P Capital.