The Muslim-dominated pockets of Delhi, which recorded some the highest voter turnouts seen in the Lok Sabha elections, turned against the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and favoured the Congress, the results show.

Of the 70 assembly segments in the national capital, the BJP bagged the majority of its votes in 65. In the remaining five segments — Okhla, Seelampur, Chandni Chowk, Matia Mahal, and Ballimaran — all Muslim-dominated areas, the BJP stood second in the final tally. The Ballimaran assembly seat, which falls under the Chandni Chowk Lok Sabha constituency, favoured Congress’ JP Agarwal, giving him over 16,000 votes more than what it did to BJP’s Dr. Harsh Vardhan. However, the AAP nominee came a dismal third.

While Agarwal got 49,036 votes, Harsh Vardhan and AAP’s Pankaj Gupta bagged 33,723 and 8306 votes respectively.

After Shakur Basti, the Ballimaran assembly constituency, at 68.25%, recorded the second highest voter turnout in the national capital. The Matia Mahal assembly seat, which recorded a voter turnout of 66.94%, saw a similar trend. While the Congress nominee received 52,669 votes, the AAP candidate could only poll 6,787 votes. Even the BJP nominee lagged far behind the Congress with 20,224 votes.

In Chandni Chowk, where voting was less compared to other Muslim-dominated areas, the Congress topped the vote count with 33,440 votes, while the BJP and AAP bagged 28,754 and 9,152 votes respectively.

However, Sadar Bazar, which logged a voter turnout of 64.70%, was the only exception, as here, the BJP polled 60,691 votes, more than the Congress and AAP’s 34,185 and 18,116 votes respectively.

In Seelampur assembly segment, under North-East Delhi constituency, Sheila Dikshit got 64,382 votes, 27,000 and 50,000 votes more than what BJP’s Manoj Tiwari and AAP’s Dilip Pandey polled. Seelampur also saw a high voter turnout of 66.47%.

The only exception to the trend in the North-East Delhi constituency was the Seemapuri assembly segment, where BJP got 60,140 votes, while the Congress and AAP trailed at 39,982 and 21,615 votes respectively.

In East Delhi, however, AAP managed to draw decent votes in Muslim majority areas. In Okhla assembly segment, Congress remained on top with Arvinder Singh Lovely bagging 60,838 votes, followed by BJP’s Gautam Gambhir and AAP’s Atishi at 55,170 and 43,921 votes respectively.

Overall, the Congress fared better than AAP, polling more votes than the latter in 43 assembly constituencies. However, in 22 assembly seats, the Congress came third.

The Congress has also done better in assembly segments which are with senior AAP leaders and ministers. These include New Delhi, Babarpur, Seemapuri, Najafgarh, Ballimaran, and Greater Kailash. However, in Patparganj, currently held by deputy CM Manish Sisodia and Shakur Basti, which is with Satyendra Jain, the AAP fared better than the Congress.