NEW DELHI: In October 2011, replying to a prime time news anchor’s question, a skinny, barely 5-foot-5 inches tall anti-corruption crusader said: “I will never fight elections in my life. And I don’t want to hold any post in my life. I have no political ambitions”. Nearly two years later, on August 3, 2012, the man — one of the main voices of the Anna Hazare movement — announced that he will form a political party, creating a rift with Team Anna.
From his flip-flops to contesting the Delhi Assembly election for the first time in December 2013 to unsuccessfully taking on Narendra Modi next year in the Lok Sabha polls from Varanasi to repeating the stunning performance of 2015 in the 2020 Assembly polls, leaving the mighty BJP in single digits again, it has been a political roller-coaster ride for three-time Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and his Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in the last eight years.
Though its attempt to go national failed badly in the past, except for the Punjab Assembly election in 2017 where it is the main Opposition party, the AAP’s exceptional show in the 2020 Delhi polls, winning 62 out of 70 seats, renewed its desire to expand its footprints beyond the capital and Punjab. In the recent past, through multiple statements, the party has made it clear that it will fight local body and Assembly elections in several states, including Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Goa and latest being Gujarat, where it will contest all seats in the upcoming local bodies polls and announced the first list of 504 candidates. It has decided to contest the Assembly polls in UP, Punjab, Uttarakhand and Goa, while in Delhi, it will be fighting the civic body polls in 2022.
The “common man’s party” has also signalled Northeast aspirations and is aiming to contest the Assam elections. Banking on the development work under the AAP government in Delhi, Kejriwal’s strategy is to create a strong word-of-mouth campaign through the city’s populace, which represents the country.
People from almost every part of the country reside in the national capital, where the AAP government’s free electricity, education, health, public transport models have worked so far. Kejriwal wants the people living in Delhi to become his messengers — to spread the word.Kejriwal is also hoping to project itself as the foremost among the sympathisers of the farming community in Punjab. The CM, his party leaders and workers have been interacting with farmers agitating along the borders of Delhi for more than a month against the Centre’s three new agri laws.
On December 30, AAP MLA Raghav Chadha installed five hotspot devices at the Singhu border, providing internet access to the protesters. Chadha said many more WiFi devices would be installed in the coming days as per the requirement of the farmers, calling it, in Punjab parlance, seva for them. AAP strategists hope that the plan would help it in making inroads into rural areas of the country. In 2021, the party will contest four Assembly elections and a panchayat poll and two municipal elections.
“The AAP model has its resonance across the country.
People are talking about it and showing interest in its ideology which is honesty. People are sick of the misrule of the BJP and the Congress for decades and are looking for an alternative. We have got good feedbacks from the four states where we are preparing for the Assembly elections,” said AAP Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh, a member of national executive —party’s highest decision-making body. Singh, who is also the chief of AAP UP wing, has been touring the most populous state for the last few months eyeing to build the ground for the party’s expansion.
‘It does not stand anywhere near BJP, Congress in UP’
The party, which has won two consecutive terms in Delhi, might find UP a different-ball game when it takes the first serious plunge in 2022. Political analysts, who have followed the AAP’s trajectory since 2011 and its rise to power, say that any kind of instant success for a party which essentially has urban traction in the state-dominated by rural population would be premature. Besides, running a city-state’s government and one of India’s biggest states is as different as “chalk and cheese”.
When Kejriwal had announced on December 15 that his party will take a plunge into the UP elections in 2022, he attributed his decision as an attempt to end the “dirty politics and corrupt leaders” who were allegedly blocking the state’s development. He also promised a clean government and facilities like in Delhi, with an implied message that his party was now looking to go a notch up and vie for securing the status of the national party.
“True. They (AAP) also know that it is just a question of making existence in UP. Being a Delhi-based party, people in UP, especially rural pockets, hardly have any traction with the AAP. They may gain some recognition by bagging a few thousand votes in some pockets, but not much beyond that,” said SK Dwivedi, a prominent political scientist and former HOD of political science at Lucknow University. However, to get the national party status before 2024, the AAP has to be recognised as a state party in at least four states by securing a minimum of 6% votes in each.
At present, it already has a strong presence in Delhi and Punjab. In 2017, it had contested in Goa with a dismal show. As for Kejriwal’s image as an anti-graft crusader, Dwivedi says the AAP has lost that
credibility. “He had emerged from the Anna Hazare movement but has failed to retain that image over the years. Today’s voter is well aware of what the party is and what it was,” he said. Prof Ashutosh Mishra, another political expert, says the AAP has a narrow chance of making any mark in UP politics. “It is only a media bubble. There is no substance in the UP ambitions of the AAP,” he said, adding that even if the regional satraps — SP and BSP — fail to get seats, they still have a very substantial chunk of dedicated voters base in UP. “The AAP stands nowhere. It is not even a fringe player in the state. It is only enjoying some disproportionate media attention,” he said.
Similarly, JP Shukla, a senior political commentator, thinks that the AAP has no traction among the people in UP. “The rural voters, who make a considerably huge chunk of the electorate here, hardly recognise this party. They already have the regional parties and national parties as big as the BJP and the Congress,” said Shukla. Meanwhile, the flag bearer of AAP’s UP campaign is its Rajya Sabha member Sanjay Singh who is spending most of his time in the state while nestling the Chief ministerial ambition.The political experts believe that the party would focus more in urban areas than rural areas. It would look to expand its presence in Delhi’s bordering cities like Gautam Budh Nagar and Ghaziabad, besides Kanpur and Lucknow. The AAP would also try to make some traction among the upper-caste voters. All its prominent leaders, including Sanjay Singh, Dilip Pandey, Manish Sisodia and Kejriwal, come from upper castes.
‘Their leaders have come well prepared in Uttarakhand’
In December, Deputy CM Manish Sisodia visited Uttarakhand twice, promising free power, health and education facilities. Both the national parties, the Congress and the BJP, have mostly held the power in the state since its formation in November 2000. Avtar Singh Rawat, 79, a senior advocate of the Supreme Court and Uttarakhand High Court who had participated actively in the statehood agitation, says: “The people of Uttarakhand have a history of strong affiliation with the Centre. Though the statehood agitation was a great movement with large public participation, the people of Uttarakhand prefer more of an inclusive nationalist view than exclusive regionalism.
The Uttarakhand really can be referred to as the graveyard of the regional parties.” In the first state Assembly elections in 2002, the Uttarakhand Kranti Dal, which was formed in 1979 with an objective of a separate state, secured only four seats out of total 70, followed by three in 2007 and just one in 2012. In 2017, the party was electorally wiped out. The SP, BSP and a few others have also been trying to make their presence felt, but they have done anything significant so far. But with the AAP announcing to contest the state polls, with aggressive online and offline activities, it has become an electoral buzz, to say the least.
In one of his recent visits to the state, Sisodia had challenged the Trivendra Singh Rawat government to “list even one good thing it has done for the development of the state”. To which, state Urban Development Minister Madan Kaushik on Sunday said the AAP government works as a “seller of hope”. “In seven years of AAP government, the people of Delhi have seen that you are a seller of hope, you behave like a businessman selling hopes and dreams,” Kaushik wrote in a letter to Sisodia.
But according to Dinesh Mansera, a political analyst in Haldwani, the AAP has come fully prepared.
“They (AAP leaders) know who they are dealing with in Uttarakhand.
The AAP has learned its politics, it seems. Sisodia had visited Kumaon and then Garhwal in his two trips. The party also attacks the Congress and the BJP simultaneously projecting itself as a viable third option,” Mansera added. The Delhi deputy CM also held a discussion titled ‘Devbhoomi ki Baat, Manish Sisodia ke Sath’ and spoke to people over the party’s plans for the development of the state.
“Right from attending the Ganga arti at Har ki Pairi in Haridwar to promising Raam Rajya instead of Sting Rajya — the AAP is playing every card very carefully and strategically,” said Mansera.
According to party sources, the AAP is considering a CM candidate who is respected across sections. Recently, former Uttarakhand state election commissioner Suvardhan Shah and former inspector general (IG) of the Uttarakhand Police Anantram Chauhan joined the party in the presence of Kejriwal and party’s state in-charge Dinesh Mohaniya in Delhi. Choosing to ignore the criticism, AAP state president SS Kaler said: “We will make it in the 2022 Assembly elections. People are listening to us and the state government is not able to accept our leaders’ challenge for debates. They are too scared of accepting the fact that nothing significant has been done in Uttarakhand during their regime.”
The party has also launched several Twitter and Facebook pages and has been mocking the Congress and the BJP, and promising good work if it comes to power. The AAP has also launched a membership drive which saw a good response, claimed party leaders. However, both the Congress and the BJP have dismissed the AAP as “non-factor”. State president of the BJP Bansidhar Bhagat said: “AAP leaders are in a delusion as the people have seen what we have done for the state under the leadership of Prime Minister Modi. The AAP will meet the fate like it did in the 2014 General elections.”
In 2014, the AAP had fielded its candidates from all the five Lok Sabha seats but failed to make a mark. Following the electoral disaster, it had decided not to contest the 2017 Assembly polls, in which the BJP had recorded a landslide victory. In 2018, it had fielded a transgender candidate, Rajni Rawat, for the mayoral post of Dehradun who stood a distant third behind the BJP and Congress candidates.
Sumit Hridayesh, a member of the All India Congress Committee, also dismissed the AAP as a “non-player”. “The BJP government is corrupt and has done nothing for the people of the state. The people will vote for the Congress in 2022. The AAP is not even in the scene,” he said.
‘Most people not aware of AAP’s existence in Assam’
In Assam, the AAP hardly has any relevance in the state’s political theatre, but it is gearing up to contest the Assembly elections, expected to be held in April. The party’s state unit has sent a proposal to the central leadership regarding contesting the polls. A response is awaited. However, it’s not new the people of the state. The AAP had emerged in Assam in 2012. It had contested in seven of the state’s 14 seats in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections but drew a blank. The party claims that it has its presence in 80 of the state’s 126 Assembly segments.
“We have district committees across Assam, except in Dima Hasao and Bodoland Territorial Region. But we have supporters all over the state,” said AAP’s state coordinator Bhaben Choudhury.
He said the Asom Jatiya Parishad (AJP), floated jointly by two students’ bodies, and the Raijor Dal, formed by 70 organisations, were in touch with the Kejriwal-led party keeping in mind the polls.
“The AJP wants to have a meeting with us. We had one round of talks with the Raijor Dal. Another meeting is likely to be held soon. The state Congress president (Ripun Bora) had approached us and discussed if all the anti-Citizenship (Amendment) Act forces can be united,” Choudhury added.
The Congress, however, expressed ignorance over Bora’s meeting with the AAP’s state leadership.
“I know former CM late Tarun Gogoi spoke to various parties to discuss the formation of a grand alliance of the opposition parties. However, I am not aware of our party president’s meeting with AAP leaders,” said Congress spokesperson Rituparna Konwar. He added that the AAP hardly has any existence in the Northeastern state. He, however, admitted that if the party contests the polls, it could cause a split of anti-BJP votes, and the Congress could be affected.
The ruling BJP said most people in Assam are not aware of the AAP’s existence in the state. “The Congress had ruled the state before the BJP. So, people know about these two parties as many of them are beneficiaries of government schemes. The AAP has no base in Assam and as such, it has not become a subject of political discussions yet,” said BJP leader Dewan Dhrubajyoti Maral.
Political scientist Akhil Ranjan Dutta of the Gauhati University said the AAP does not have an organisational setup in Assam.
“Not only they do not have visible leadership. They are also not sure which sections of the society they should target for votes. If you want to build a party, you have to consistently work towards achieving that goal. That is not the case with the AAP here. Coupled with it, their old faces are leaving the party to join other parties,” Dutta said. Stating that Assam braces for a multi-polar contest this election, he said: “They (AAP) don’t have a base in Lower Assam and penetration in tea garden areas, where the BJP has monopolised through schemes.”
Dutta said the AAP’s only possible areas of penetration could be the urban and rural poor. “But as far as the rural poor is concerned, the AJP and the Raijor Dal have emerged as new alternatives. As in Delhi, they (AAP) could try to reach out to the urban poor but there is hardly any visible efforts by them so far. I don’t see any poll prospects for the AAP,” he added.
‘Will emerge as a strong alternative in Gujarat’
The AAP has expressed confidence that it will emerge as a strong alternative to the ruling BJP in the state. AAP’s Delhi MLA and party spokesperson Atishi released the first list of candidates for the elections to the local bodies in the state, such as municipalities, municipal corporations, district and taluka panchayats, likely to be held in February. “The AAP will contest elections on all seats in the local bodies polls in the state for the first time. Not just the local bodies polls, but the AAP will also contest the Vidhan Sabha elections in Gujarat as well as other polls,” she said.
(With inputs from - Vineet Upadhyay and Prasanta Mazumdar)