NEW DELHI: Rekha Gupta, appointed as Delhi Chief Minister on Wednesday, is a first-time MLA but has been in politics for a long and consistent period of time.
Being chosen ahead of bigger guns like Parvesh Verma, the BJP MLA who won over AAP leader Arvind Kejriwal, is indicative of the party's plan to accomplish several things through this appointment.
Gupta, 50, won a decisive victory from the Shalimar Bagh constituency in the latest Delhi Assembly polls by a margin of almost 30,000 votes. She has constructed her political identity based on the catchphrase "Kaam hi Pehchaan" (My work is my identity), a slogan that denotes her ground-level connect and focus on governance.
The political career of Rekha Gupta started during her college days when she became the President of the Delhi University Students' Union (DUSU) in the year 1996-97.
A Daulat Ram College alumna, she soon moved into mainstream politics and was elected first as a municipal councillor from North Pitampura in 2007. She was a three-term councillor and also served as the Mayor of the South Delhi Municipal Corporation (SDMC).
In 2022, the BJP fielded her as its candidate for the mayoral election of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD), where she contested against AAP’s Shelly Oberoi. Her progression in BJP ranks has been gradual, and she is now the BJP Mahila Morcha's National Vice President, the party's women's wing. She has also been a general secretary with the Delhi BJP, marking her intense engagement with party politics and leadership roles.
The selection of Rekha Gupta as the Chief Minister of Delhi by the BJP appears to be a calculated move for political gains on several fronts.
One such aspect is the BJP's effort to strengthen the tradition of women chief ministers in Delhi. The country's capital has had a few women chief ministers, most notably Congress's Sheila Dikshit, who was in office for 15 years.
Other women CMs are Atishi of AAP and BJP's own Sushma Swaraj, who held office in 1998 for a short time. In appointing Gupta, the BJP seems to be trying to posture as a gender-sensitive party when pitting its model of governance against Kejriwal's ten-year long reign.
A big reason that underpins this decision is how important women voters have become to the 2025 Delhi Assembly polls. Women voters also turned out at 60.92%, beating the 60.21% of men voters.
Not only did the BJP nominate nine women candidates, but four of them also won their seats. As AAP's overdependence on women voters did not work in this election, the BJP is now taking advantage of this group by nominating a woman leader to further enhance its appeal.
BJP's Delhi election manifesto had some women-focused policies, which were probably responsible for garnering female votes. The party declared the Mahila Samridhi Yojana, where Rs 2,500 per month is given to women, apart from reiterating its pledge to give free bus rides to women.
It also assured monetary benefits of Rs 21,000 and six nutritive kits per pregnant woman as well as cancer screening free in government hospitals through the Ayushman Bharat Yojana.
In choosing Rekha Gupta, the BJP has also opted for a relatively fresh face—someone who has not been entangled in major controversies and has not contested a parliamentary election. Unlike senior BJP leaders such as Ramesh Bidhuri and Parvesh Verma, she brings a new chapter to Delhi’s political narrative while still being a seasoned politician with over three decades of association with the party.
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