Caste, community equations may influence outcome in S Delhi

The elite South Delhi constituency may see caste and community play an important role, even as rookie AAP volunteers are banking on door-to-door campaigns and BJP on the 'Modi wave' to wrest the seat from Congress.
Though South Delhi constituency had a large number of upscale areas, following the delimitation exercise in 2008, villages, slums and resettlement colonies dominate the landscape of the parliamentary seat that was secured by Congress in 2009.
Set for an electrifying fight, all the three prominent candidates -- Ramesh Bidhuri (BJP), incumbent MP Ramesh Kumar (Congress) and Devinder Singh Shehrawat (AAP) have dived in headlong into the campaign.

Once a BJP stronghold, the South Delhi Parliamentary seat contains 10 Assembly constituencies -- Bijwasan, Palam, Mehrauli, Chhatarpur, Deoli, Ambedkar Nagar, Sangam Vihar, Kalkaji, Tughlakabad and Badarpur. Seven of these were won by BJP and the remaining three had gone to Aam Aadmi Party in the December Assembly polls.
These constituencies face problems like lack of infrastructure development while water and sewerage issues dominate the non-regularised colonies.
A number of residents said local issues will weigh heavily on their minds while exercising their vote.

The delimitation exercise had changed the profile of the South Delhi seat to a great extent as most of the South Delhi areas had been included in New Delhi constituency.

In the 2009 polls, Kumar had won the seat by defeating Bidhuri by 90,000 votes. Kumar was nominated by Congress after his brother Sajjan Kumar was denied ticket in 2009 due to his alleged involvement in the 1984 anti-Sikh riots.
The constituency, which in 2004 Lok Sabha polls saw Dr Manmohan Singh losing to BJP's Vijay Kumar Malhotra, now has over 16 lakh voters. Out of this, around 1.4 lakh are urban voters.
The Gujjars and Jat voters dominate a number of Assembly segments in the seat. The constituency has a total of 42 villages out of which 18 are dominated by Jats and 12 by the Gujjar community.

Bidhuri is a prominent leader from the Gujjar community while Kumar represents the Jat community. AAP's Shehrawat is also from the Jat community.
Shehrawat, along with scores of AAP volunteers, is engaging in door-to-door campaigning to seek people's support.
Bidhuri has been holding almost 10 corner meetings daily and largely been highlighting BJP's prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi's "agenda" for the nation.
"The Sheila Dikshit government in the 15-year rule did nothing for South Delhi constituency. There has been zero development in this area, which is completely neglected. Considering that the International Airport also comes under this area, it's a shame that nothing has been done to even maintain the roads," claimed Shehrawat.