metro india news  I new delhi

Of the 699 candidates in the 2025 Delhi assembly elections, 96 were women, including nine each from the BJP and the AAP, and seven from the Congress but only five-four from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and one from the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) - could emerge as winners, the lowest in the last 10 years.

Outgoing Chief Minister Atishi, the only woman candidate of the AAP who won this time, was among those five newly-elected women MLAs, who now constitute seven per cent of the 70-member assembly. This year, it was also the first time since the Delhi legislative assembly was reconstituted in 1993 that a higher turnout of women voters -- 60.9% against 60.2% of men exercising their franchise - was registered. About 44.08 lakh of 72.36 lakh registered women voters got their fingers inked in the single-phase election on February 5.

Rekha Gupta from the BJP won in Shalimar Bagh with 68,200 votes, defeating AAP's Bandana Kumari by a significant margin of 29,595 votes. In Wazirpur, Poonam Sharma (BJP) emerged victorious with 54,721 votes, defeating AAP's Rajesh Gupta by 11,425 votes. Neelam Pahalwan (BJP) claimed the Najafgarh seat with an impressive 101,708 votes, surpassing AAP's Tarun Kumar by a massive margin of 29,009 votes.

In Greater Kailash, Shikha Roy (BJP) secured the constituency with a slim margin of 3,188 votes, defeating AAP's Saurabh Bharadwaj. This decline in women’s representation is stark when compared to previous elections. In the 2020 Delhi Assembly elections, eight women were elected, while in 2015, six women won seats.