While the aam aadmi and aurat wait

Visiting Delhi for a couple of days, a week after the spectacular win of Arvind Kejriwal’s Aam Aadmi Party was recorded and digested, it is fascinating to note the excitement Delhiites — elite and aam alike — still exude over the new political buzz they have created.

Right from my taxi driver to friends and a group of young executives I chat up, the underlying tone is of both excitement and pride. Excitement that they might well have ushered in a new reality in the Indian political space, and sent a message to established political parties that they can no longer be taken for granted. Amazingly, I heard about how many Congress and BJP workers urged voters: “ Jhadu pe button dabao (Press the broom symbol).”

Congress workers doing this can be understood; assured of defeat they wanted to drub the BJP candidates as well. But BJP workers, knowing too well how the party had swept all the seven Lok Sabha seats nine months ago, urging voters to support the AAP must have shaken the party leadership. “Had the elections been held two months ago the BJP would have swept Delhi. While Kiran Bedi, a turncoat, being brought in as the BJP’s chief ministerial candidate, angered its cadres, to Delhi’s voters, especially the young ones, the BJP has given several worrying signals,” said a young entrepreneur.

It is another matter that his support for Kejriwal and the AAP did not persuade him to vote for the party. After all, it was Somnath Bharti who contested from his constituency (“Who can forget the atrocious things he did last time; thank god he is not in Kejriwal’s Cabinet”). He says his entire family and circle of friends, mostly BJP supporters, are dismayed at the unchecked messages of communal hatred emanating from the BJP ranks.

The recent attacks on churches in Delhi, and the party’s top leadership not condemning them, were particularly mentioned. There is an all-knowing group out there on social media platforms like Twitter who’ll give you gyaan on how only “5 churches against 220 temples and 50 mosques were attacked in the same period”, but there is a larger community of Hindu voters in Delhi that is dismayed at the prospect of communal hatred and narrow and warped definitions of ‘bharatiya culture’ insidiously slipping into their lives.

Add to this Union Minister Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti’s acerbic “Ramzada or Haramzada” comments, the gems from BJP MPs Sakshi Maharaj and Adityanath on madrasas teaching terrorism and urging Hindus to have four or more kids, and ‘love jihad’ sermons — it’s not surprising the urban population of Delhi, particularly the youngsters, rejected the BJP. Both Muslim and Christian voters moved away from the Congress to the AAP. The BJP’s giving tickets to dissidents from the Congress and the AAP further demoralised local leaders.

Another big minus was the BJP’s negative campaign; instead of focusing on the language that has worked for it — that of development — BJP leaders called Kejriwal a bhagora , an anarchist, a chor . He was ridiculed on social media as the muffler man, constantly coughing, and worse.

It is now evident that the choice of Kiran Bedi as the BJP’s chief ministerial candidate was rejected not only by the BJP’s Delhi leadership, which waited for 15 long years get back its erstwhile political space, but also its cadres, and a majority of its voters. In hindsight, those who voted against her must be patting themselves on their backs after her atrocious statement blaming Muslims’ “ambush voting” which resulted in her being defeated from Krishna Nagar, a safe BJP bastion since 1993. In 2013 Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan, the BJP’s chief ministerial candidate on that occasion, had won by around 43,000 votes.

Justifying the massive verdict given to him, it was a transformed, subdued and introspective Kejriwal we saw on oath-taking day. In a simple and sincere-sounding speech he promised the Delhi electorate they wouldn’t see the arrogance he and other AAP leaders had displayed in the past and also promised to stick to Delhi and deliver results here without repeating the Lok Sabha mistake of contesting elections from all over the place.

He urged the media — and these were NOT snide remarks as many TV anchors immediately dubbed them — to leave him and his ministers alone for a while and not expect them to deliver results within hours. Yes, he would take government accommodation, his ministers would take cars, as these were essential tools of governance. Nobody in their right minds would grudge his team this. What we don't want to see is corruption, ostentation, dharnas and midnight raids!

But challenges abound. Water and power are two of Delhi’s biggest issues and there are no easy-fix solutions for these; attempts to slash rates or give freebies will run into legal and fiscal hurdles. Full statehood for Delhi is easier asked for then given, being intricately associated with many functions and responsibilities involving the Centre. Clever talk such as asking Prime Minister Narendra Modi — “such a busy person” — to concentrate on the country and leave Delhi to him will not cut ice.

Following the gangrape of a 23-year-old physiotherapy intern on December 16, 2012, the then chief minister Sheila Dikshit had claimed that with the Delhi Police being with the Centre, there wasn’t much she could do about women’s safety. It was an unacceptable and hollow excuse then, and will remain so were Kejriwal to make it. For Delhi’s women voters, young and old, this remains a major demand and they expect effective and immediate results

But Kejriwal’s biggest challenge will be taking on the monster of corruption that has engulfed and is devastating this country. If he can make a major dent on it and then continue to chip away this monster till it wastes away, he will become invincible for many elections.

Waiting patiently, and on the sidelines, is the largest electoral group in India — the poor, the illiterate, the deprived, the real aam aadmi/aurat who have given Kejriwal’s party its name. A Congress brat such as Robert Vadra once made fun of the AAP as the ‘mango people’ using one of the meanings of the word ‘ aam ’. See where the mango people left his party in Delhi — with zilch seats.

Arvind Kejriwal’s biggest and immediate priority is this constituency. They are the ones who really deserve the freebies; this country has progressed and developed for 68 years, leaving them where they were in 1947, perhaps even worse. Let’s see what Delhi’s new messiah does for them.

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