A sweeping drub of political stereotypes

The sweeping victory by AAP in Delhi assembly polls also facilitated a complete drub of the Congress—a party that was in power in that UT for three consecutive terms, led by Sheila Dixit. This is for the first time that the grand old party of India has failed to open an account in any assembly elections in the country. Overall this remarkable victory of the AAP signals a new beginning in the political spectrum of our country—creating a credible alternative to the common people who have been fed up of the stereotypes.

The success of AAP was actually scripted much earlier through some unconventional methodology and data analysis undertaken by some of its volunteers to design an electoral manifesto after the 49 day government it had had come to an end.

Called the Delhi Dialogue, the AAP started an initiative to conduct a comprehensive study of the problems that plague Delhi and take stock of the aspirations of its citizens. This was used to create a concrete, feasible and long-term roadmap and vision for Delhi. Their election manifesto thus became the synthesis of hundreds of expert interviews as well as thousands of citizen meetings and lakhs of feedback forms, online comments, email suggestions, project proposals which were mobilized with the new age apps like Whatsapp messages, Tweets and Facebook comments.

That way AAP’s Delhi manifesto was not a run-of-the-mill production of a few wise men, seen in other Indian political parties Their manifesto was a natural follow-up of Delhi Dialogue where they presented a detailed, structured, feasible and sustainable plan to solve the intractable problems of Delhi.

The AAP was very categorical since its inception—an urge to stand up for the common people and for their concerns, to provide bare necessities like water and electricity fairly and to end corruption in the public domain. During its momentary stay at the helm of affairs in Delhi, the AAP did provide free supply of water and electricity tariffs cut to fifty per cent for the Delhites. The Delhi Dialogue resulted in making the 70 point poll manifesto in which all its agendas of the earlier period were retained for the betterment of the common citizens.

Likewise AAP’s Delhi Jan Lokpal Bill to ensure a time-bound investigation in matters of corruption, its power to initiate investigations and prosecution against those charged with corruption, the provision of a Citizens’ Charter in all government offices in Delhi and protections for whistleblowers really attracted the public for this novice party as against the big national parties that had never cared for such provisions.

To build 2 lakh public toilets, five hundred government schools, two hundred colleges, quality drugs for all at affordable prices, formation of women security force, pro-farmer land reform, no FDI in retail, regularization of contractual posts, flats for slum dwellers at the same place, control of price rise and promotion of Punjabi, Urdu and Sanskrit were some of the points mentioned in AAP’s manifesto for which they were responded so overwhelmingly at the elections.

For the rest of the parties contesting the Delhi polls, the promises and manifestoes were too conventional and lacked new visions and ideas. For the BJP, which has been enjoying fairly spectacular electoral victories in many state assembly polls since coming to power at the Centre in 2014 on the popular development bandwagon, failed to hold to its juggernaut.

Over confidence, resorting to smear poll campaigns by mocking the Gotra of Arvind Kejriwal and brining in Kiran Bedi as the chief ministerial candidate to do a Sarah Palin by ignoring senior party aspirants cost the party dearly. The non-visibility of the development dream promised by Narendra Modi in the last eight months, his government’s pro-market policies and centralized structure failed to impress the Delhi voters as the anti-incumbency factor was absent this time. For the Congress, the party was completely out of the contention, never seemed to be in the fray. Thus the common men in Delhi have gone for an alternative.

By: Sazzad Hussain