Doctor gets the pulse right

NEW DELHI: As a veteran politician, a minister at both the state and Centre, Dr Harsh Vardhan perhaps is used to electoral wins and losses. However, this year’s victory in Chandni Chowk must be especially pleasing. He had won the seat in 2014 too, but got just 44.6% in what was considered a Narendra Modi wave. This year, with many denying a BJP wave at all, he romped home with a highly satisfying 52.9% of the votes. Harsh Vardhan trumped J P Agarwal of Congress, an old horse who wasn’t quite a walkover, in a constituency with a significant Muslim population of over two lakh. Muslim voters claimed to have supported Congress unlike in 2014 when its votes went to AAP.
Agarwal wrested 29.6% of the votes to leave AAP’s Pankaj Kumar Gupta languishing in third place with 14.7%, a far cry from the 30.7% logged by AAP in 2014. “People have rejected the negative politics of the opposition and voted in favour of the strong leadership of Narendra Modi,” declared the triumphant BJP candidate. “130 crore Indians have voted for Modi’s development politics.”