Delhi Assembly Elections: Prashant Kishor's swing management

Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal waited for seven hours to file his nomination papers from the New Delhi Assembly constituency. That was a day after his roadshow pulled in a large number of cheer crowd to make him skip filing the nomination papers. The simple filing of nomination papers hogged the limelight for two days. The BJP played along, first by floating the strategy to surprise Kejriwal with a heavyweight challenger, only to spring a tame script in Sunil Yadav, who in his only electoral experience has lost councilor's elections. The discourse surrounding the Delhi Assembly elections have so far stayed around Kejriwal, portrayed as an indomitable and sometimes as a victim of the "dirty tricks" of the BJP, in line with Prashant Kishor's election management text book.

THE BJP veteran in Jharkhand Saryu Rai had long been a critic of the party colleague and former chief minister Raghubar Das. Rai would often put down dissent note in the Cabinet decisions. He would even admit lapses in events of alleged hunger deaths in the state. Das had also long been nursing an opportunity to get rid of him and found emboldened with his Maharashtra counterpart Devendra Fadnavis, who had also purged his rivals within the party during ticket distribution. Rai knew his fate, yet patiently awaited the Central leadership to be wiser.

The BJP Central leadership thought of paying a smart game by delaying Rai's candidature from Jamshedpur (West) Assembly seat. The party would have given the nomination by making him seen begging for the ticket, which, in turn, would have pleased Das. Rai didn't play along the script, and drifted away.

An old hand in politics, Rai had rubbed shoulders with the socialists, and counted on Bihar chief

minister Nitish Kumar as his pal. Over the years, he had cultivated an image of an intellectual within the BJP. He was popularly seen honest. In the face of his party insulting him, Rai took flight to an audacious course. He decided to challenge the chief minister Das in his Jamshedpur (West) constituency, which was among the only seven seats in the state in 2014 where the winning candidate had a margin of more than 50,000 votes.

Rai hogged the limelight. He was a victim. People sympathised with an honest and educated man who was dumped by the BJP at the insistence of an arrogant chief minister. Das stayed in Ranchi. He was miser in mixing with the people in his constituency. He was seen distant and inaccessible. The stage was set for the script of a simple man taking on an arrogant drunk on power. 

The script needed an able direction to stage the act on a large canvas. The director flew in from Patna with an army of 300 assistants. He was Prashant Kishor. His army brought in posters, leaflets and wrote slogans. They knocked at the doors to tell stories of an honest man fighting a lonely battle against an arrogant chief minister. In a matter of a few days, Rai was the only topic of discussion. The ripple effect soon electrified the whole state. Das had emerged a villain. Prime Minister Narendra Modi sought to cut down the damage. He patted his Cabinet colleague Arjun Munda more frequently in his election rallies. But the damage was done beyond the limits of Modi. 

IN 2015 the Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar had turned a BJP foe in the state Assembly elections. The BJP brimmed with an all conquering passion to win elections. The saffron outfit was facing a grand alliance of Nitish Kumar in the company of the Congress and the RJD. Nitish Kumar and Lalu Prasad Yadav had become the best pals. Modi was on an error making spree. He sought to flow the river of funds from the Centre to Patna to turn Bihar into Gujarat. Worse, he hit out at Nitish Kumar, and Prashant Kishor grabbed that to run the campaign to send samples of hair for DNA testing. The BJP's well oiled electoral machinery slipped into the muddy waters of Bihar even before the people cast their votes in the first phase of elections. 

Kishor now has perfected text book to turn the victims in politicians to giant killers. His company I-Pac is currently the best political slogan writers. He in the course of a few months can apply smart touches to the images of his pay masters to the liking of the people. Kejriwal is no more seen an anarchist. The Delhi chief minister in the course of a few months, Kishor came on board unofficially with Aam Admi Party (AAP) around August, last year, has been smiling from thousands of his pictures dotting the national capital. 

Kishor has worked on the image makeover of Kejriwal. The I-Pac workers are knocking at the doors of the people to sell the story of governance. They are selling the dream that Delhi in another five years would become a place of their aspirations: free of toxic air, classrooms for all the children, and healthcare for patients.