Delhi Election 2025: Unpacking AAP’s strengths and weaknesses ahead of high-stakes polls

Delhi Election 2025: The schedule of Delhi assembly polls is out. The 70 seats of the Delhi assembly will vote on February 5 to elect a new government. The results will be announced on February 8.

The fight in the national capital is triangular. The three major parties – the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), the Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Congress – are in the poll fray.

Born out of an anti-corruption movement, the AAP took its first electoral plunge in the national capital in 2013. Then, a fledgling political outfit, the AAP, dislodged the then-Congress government led by the late Sheila Dikshit, who was the chief minister for 15 years.

Kejriwal became the chief minister with the support of the Congress party. He resigned 49 days later. The party, however, won assembly elections in the national capital in 2015 and 2020 even more comfortably.

As Delhi gears up for assembly elections next month, the AAP faces anti-incumbency, corruption allegations and an aggressive Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) as it seeks to assume power for a third successive term.

The Strengths

The AAP won 67 seats in the 70-member Delhi assembly in 2015. It won 62 seats in the 2020 elections. The party has a presence across Delhi and a strong volunteer-based cadre. The AAP had a 53.57 per cent voter share in the assembly elections in 2020.

The flagship schemes of AAP, including subsidies on electricity and drinking water, revamped government schools, Mohalla clinics, and free electricity, comprise what is known as the ‘Delhi Model’ of governance. So are the women's free bus rides and senior citizen pilgrimage grants.

Perhaps this “Delhi model” helped to capture the capital's poor and lower middle-class vote bank, which once supported the Congress party. The AAP, analysts say, has replaced the Congress of 15 years ago in Delhi.

The BJP has more or less maintained its vote bank – upper middle class, Punjabi and trading community, even as the number of seats has decreased from 32 in 2015 to just 8 in 2020 polls.

The Delhi Welfare Model

The party announced new schemes in the run-up to assembly elections 2025. Kejriwal has promised to give ₹2,100 a month to non-tax-paying women. AAP has been enjoying the support of women voters. The ₹2,100 a month cash scheme is expected to strengthen the support further.

Besides this, AAP has also promised free healthcare for the elderly, ₹10lakh insurance for auto drivers and ₹18,000 for Hindu and Sikh priests if it comes to power in Delhi again.

The AAP has roped in the political consultancy group I-PAC for the upcoming polls. The group, founded by poll strategist Prashant Kishor, also helped AAP register a landslide victory in the Delhi assembly polls in 2020.

In the last ten years, AAP emerged as what many call the ‘fastest-growing' political startup of the country. The AAP won 2022 assembly elections in Punjab too. It has presence beyond Delhi and Punjab in other states too earning it a national party status in 2022.

Through initiatives like 'Rewadi par Charcha', the AAP is reaching out to every household and reiterating its achievements and plans. This direct engagement with voters strengthens its grassroots connection.

The Weaknesses

The biggest challenge the Arvind Kejriwal-led AAP faces is the ten-year anti-incumbency.

Anti-incumbency aside, the last two years have been the toughest for AAP. Almost the entire top leadership found itself in the middle of investigations by central investigation agencies over corruption allegations, mostly around the alleged Delhi Liquor Policy scam.

The 'Sheesh Mahal' Row

Senior leaders, including Arvind Kejriwal, Manish Sisodia, Sanjay Singh, and Satyendar Jain, were arrested, jailed, and eventually released on bail, raising questions about the AAP's ‘anti-corrupt and clean' government image. BJP state unit chief Virendra Sachdeva called the AAP dispensation in Delhi the government of ‘criminals on bail.’

Among other issues, the BJP and Prime Minister Narendra Modi have highlighted the alleged ‘lavish spending’ in the construction of Arvind Kejriwal's 6 Flagstaff Road residence—'Sheesh Mahal'—when he was chief minister before stepping down in September last year.

The exit of leaders like Kailash Gahlot has dented AAP's chances, too.

So, will AAP's welfare model triumph over the anti-incumbency and corruption charges against it and win the elections? We will only know on February 8 when the results of Delhi Election 2025 will be announced.