Mangolpuri Assembly Elections 2020: Rakhi Birla of the Aam Aadmi Party won the election from Mangolpuri against the Bharatiya Janata Party’s Karam Singh Karma with a margin of 30,116 votes.
A reserved constituency, Mangolpuri saw a straight contest between the AAP’s Rakhi Birla and the BJP’s Karam Singh Karma.
Birla, a social worker-turned-politician, became known as a giant killer after she defeated former Congress minister Raj Kumar Chauhan in the constituency. A former journalist, in 2013, she was the youngest minister in the Kejriwal cabinet. Birla has a Master’s Degree in journalism from the National Broadcasting Academy in Delhi’s Sarojini Nagar.
Interestingly, Chauhan, who had joined the BJP in 2019, rejoined the Congress just days before the first list came out.
Karma, a prominent Valmiki leader, defected from the AAP in 2019.
Ahead of the polling on 8 February, here is a look at the constituency:
Constituency Name: Mangolpuri
Constituency Number: 12
District Name: West Delhi
Total Electors: 1,78,940
Female Electors: 82,818
Male Electors: 96,113
Third Gender: 9
Reserved: For SC
Results in previous elections: Former minister Raj Kumar Chauhan was the MLA until 2014. In the 1998, 2003 and 2008 elections, Chauhan won his seat by securing over 50 percent of the votes polled in the constituency. However, in 2013 and 2015 polls, he was defeated by AAP’s Birla.
Demographics: Railway crossing across the densely-populated area is a major issue. People living in unauthorised colonies and Jhuggi Jhopdis (JJs) form a significant chunk of the electorate. The constituency covers the areas of Rohini and Mangolpuri.
Crime is a huge problem in Mangolpuri. If Delhi is known as the ‘crime capital’ of India, Mangolpuri must shoulder a lot of the blame, as per a report in Hindustan Times. In 2018, Mangolpuri recorded over 800 criminal cases — till October that year — compared to south Delhi’s Defence Colony registering 125 cases and Tughlaq Road recording fewer than 90 courses during the same period.