In true blue election spirit, last year’s election manifesto has been dusted off and traditional vote-banks are being rewarded for votes they cast four years ago.

Congress MLA Mukesh Sharma has an enviable record as a politician. At his office in Uttam Nagar, a constituency in West Delhi he has represented since 1993 – winning four elections in a row, a mass of people are waiting their turn to meet him. If anyone is in danger of being unseated because of an anti-incumbency wave, it should be Sharma.

It is a predicament he shares with his government led by Sheila Dikshit which won its third consecutive victory in the 2008 election and is bracing itself for the next round of assembly elections scheduled in November.

Sitting behind a large desk in his office with people milling around him, signing their documents with a speed and abandon that has endeared him to members of his constituency, Sharma says Congress will win Assembly 2013 by ‘comfortable majority’.

Comforted perhaps by an election arithmetic that has seen him through the last four elections, there seems to be no question in his mind that this time too the numbers will stack up in favour of the Congress party. In true blue election spirit, last year’s election manifesto has been dusted off and traditional vote-banks are being rewarded for votes they cast four years ago.

Representing one such crucial vote-bank for the Congress are Delhi’s teeming unauthorised colonies, which predictably are seeing hectic government activity of late. The carrot of authorisation of these colonies – which means regular supply of electricity, clean drinking water, a sewage system, bank loans against property, sale and purchase of houses – has worked like a charm in the past with voters.

Ahead of the last assembly election, Sheila Dikshit had issued provisional regularisation certificates to 1,639 unauthorised colonies — a move that did her and her party well. With an eye on Assembly 2013, Dikshit made good her promise by regularising over half of those colonies (895) in September last year.

A high value move, given that population in the 800-odd colonies is estimated at about 35 lakh. (Number of electors in Delhi is little over 1 crore, of which 61 lakh voted in the last assembly election).

In more good news for residents of newly regularised colonies, the Dikshit government in May passed another order allowing sale and purchase of property in those colonies which have come up on private land.

By getting the ball rolling on regularisation, Dikshit has in effect handed Congress candidates the winning mantra for their election campaign 2013.

Sharma gives us a sample of what Delhi’s residents will hear a lot of come campaign season.“We have regularised 895 unauthorised colonies. We have started development work in 400 of those colonies. Surveys are on. Since we have regularised so many, they now trust us to regularise the remaining soon,” says Sharma.

Sharma has every reason to rejoice. His constituency tops the number of unauthorised colonies that have been regularised in the West Delhi district. Ask Sharma how many unauthorised colonies have been regularised in Uttam Nagar, he replies, “Ask me how many haven’t.”

With this trump card in hand, the four-time MLA seems convinced that anti-incumbency and the corruption scandals of his government will fade into the background of public memory.

“Uttam Nagar is the first assembly constituency where all unauthorised colonies will have a sewage system. Within 36 months sewage work will be completed in all unauthorised colonies in Mohan Garden,” says Sharma. (Mohan Garden is home to largest chunk of unauthorised colonies in Uttam Nagar).

With five months to go for elections, residents of Mohan Garden’s unauthorised colonies for the first time in the decades they have lived there are seeing the beginning of a sewage system being laid. Heavy machinery is digging up roads, drain pipes are stacked along roadsides and it is quite plain to see that election campaigning has well and truly begun in this crowded sub-urban neighbourhood of Delhi.

Built on private land, Mohan Garden’s unauthorised colonies are among the 312 regularised colonies that have been allowed the sale and purchase of land. One such colony is Zaildar Enclave, home to about 120 houses.

Former secretary the Resident Welfare Association (RWA) of Zaildar Enclave, Ram Kishen has been a resident since 1999. Kishen, who retired from the Air Force, says electricity and water supply were big problems back in the days when they had to depend on private suppliers.

“In 2004, we registered our RWA and applied to the government for electricity and water supply. Our colony was the first colony in Mohan Garden to get government electricity supply,” say Kishen. And now with regularisation, a sewage system is finally being laid.

He says, “The work has started but it doesn’t look like it will be a 100 percent successful. The size of pipes being laid is not sufficient to carry sewage that is generated from these colonies...These politicians want to get the publicity but at the same they see to it that the public doesn’t get the full benefit. This is how they function. They seem to think that if in the first instance they deliver quality work, they will lose their value and that the public will forget about them.”

Asked if the move to regularise the unauthorised colonies would ensure votes for the Congress party in the next election, former president of Zaildar Enclave’s RWA Gian Chand answers indirectly. “People have spent so much money on building their homes. At least now, they don’t have to worry about their homes being demolished. For us it the basic necessities of life that are important. We are not connected with the big corruption scandals. We want water, electricity. We want our roads to be paved. And that has been done,” he says.

But there are residents who feel the move is too little too late. Jai Bhagwan is former president of another unauthorised colony in Mohan Garden that was regularised in September.

“This is merely an election stunt. The government has issued certificates of regularisation, but what is the use. The banks are still not willing to give us loans. It will still be some time before the regularisation process is complete....We have waited ten years to come this far. It looks like we will have to wait a couple more before the process is complete. This announcement is a mere political stunt,” says Bhagwan.

Listing the problems in his colony which is houses about 1500 families, he says, “There are multiple problems here. We have to 5-6 hour long power cuts. The drinking water is contaminated. The roads are broken.”

Delhi’s unauthorised colonies are considered traditional strongholds of the Congress. Sharma is frank about the Congress strategy when it comes to cornering votes. “Delhi has a population of about 1.6 crore. In my assessment, unauthorised colonies, slum quarters, resettlement colonies, JJ colonies and janta flats represent about 63-64 percent of the population. And it is for this population that the Congress has concentrated on. It is in these colonies that schemes such as Annashree Yojagana, pensions schemes for widows, the elderly, the minorities are happening,” he says.

He should know. He defeated the BJP candidate by 7000 votes in the last election – his fourth straight victory. The Uttam Nagar assembly constituency is among the biggest beneficiaries of the regularisation.

It has a population of 1.5 lakh and recorded a voter turn-out of 62 percent last time around.

Sharma adds, “Just as a student works harder for his final exam, we as politicians are working harder ahead of our final exam. Why shouldn’t we. We are not pujaris. We are politicians. And we work for votes, this is part of democracy.”

It is a numbers game that the Congress government has succeeded in mastering in the last three years. But can Sheila Dikshit do it a fourth time?

Of the 312 colonies that have been regularised with added benefit of allowing sale and purchase of property, the maximum number of colonies are situated in the West Delhi district, which is represented by Congress candidate Mahabal Mishra in Parliament.

Majority of the regularised colonies fall in assembly constituencies won by the Congress, also because Congress won 43 of the 70 assembly seats in 2008 compared BJP’s 23 (BSP won 2, LJP 1 and one independent candidate)

Some of opposition (BJP) strongholds where colonies have been regularised include constituencies such as Burari in North Delhi, Palam and Bijwasan in South West, Sangam Vihar in the South, Rithala, Mundka and Kirari in the North West, Karawal Nagar and Ghonda in the North East.

A huge chunk of colonies have been regularised in Najafgarh, where an independent candidate defeated the Congress candidate by 11,000 votes in 2008. Constituencies from the where the BSP won – Badarpur in the South and Gokulpuri in the North East – too have benefitted from the regularisation drive.

Overall, the potential vote winning strategy of regularisation seems directed at consolidating the traditional vote-base of the Congress. It has worked before, will it work again?