Vijay Goel eyes Poorvanchalis

Delhi BJP President Vijay Goel is eyeing the changing demographic profile of Delhi for achieving an upswing in BJP political fortunes in the Delhi Assembly elections later this year. Sensing growing presence of Poorvanchalis in Delhi, the BJP is trying to win them over. The BJP has promised to declare holiday for Chhath festivities, which falls on the sixth day after Diwali that is celebrated with great zest by Poorvanchalis. Normally Delhi is dominated by Punjabis. When Congress fielded Rajesh Khanna for the Lok Sabha polls in 1991, BJP picked up Bihari Babu Shatrughan Sinha, but he was defeated.

In Delhi Assembly polls in 1998, the BJP replaced Madan Lal Khurana, party’s Punjabi face and tried out non-Punjabi leaders like Sahib Singh Verma and Sushma Swaraj and finally lost out Delhi Assembly polls. Eversince, Sheila Dikshit, who is a Punjabi, married to the son of Uma Shankar Dikshit, outsmarted the BJP for 15 years. Even now, though Delhi BJP president Vijay Goel is a Punjabi, the party does not want to project him as BJP chief ministerial face. Instead, the saffron party wants to contest polls under collective leadership, without projecting anyone as chief ministerial hopeful.