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.     

The gust

"Kitna vote se jeete (by how much votes they won)," asked a man sitting on stairs leading to Hanuman temple near Connaught Place. After giving him a short reply, we hurried past, only to stop to ask ourselves, who the man was. Running back to him, I asked for his name. "Gulshan," he said. "I sit here during day and evening, and sleep in a nearby hospital," he added. Next, I asked "did you vote" to which he said "no, don't have vote". 

He was a beggar. And he was asking about the performance of Aam Admi Party (AAP). 

Quite admittedly, we were shell-shocked. A beggar was curious to know the electoral fate of Arvind Kejriwal's AAP. Looking closely, Gulshan's eyes were yellow. He was wrapped in a torn quilt. There was no hope for life in his eyes. He was one of thousands who eke out their livings at Hanuman temple on the largess of devotees. 

Dance and drum at AAP office

The thought wave went fast back in past and recalled reporting Sheila Dikshit led Delhi government's determined efforts to make the national capital beggar free. That was in the run up to the Commonwealth Games. Then she even wanted to make Delhi a digital city. Also, Delhi a smoking free city. And so many others, all ideas borrowed from European countries, Hong Kong and Singapore. None materialized but left many thinking Dikshit as an apathetic leader.    

In her efforts to make Delhi a world class city, Dikshit forgot that a lot of people lived in the national capital, who were struggling to make their ends meet. And most of them were least bothered about Europe, Hong Kong and Singapore.   

And a lot of youth and women were least bothered about the garland of flyovers too. Because, the man who gave them to Delhi -- Ashok Kumar Walia (a doctor and a bachelor) -- was humbled by a rookie AAP greenhorn Vinod Kumar Binni from Luxmi Nagar Assembly seat. 

Dr Walia was hurt, for his people in the constituency were all that he had in his life. So, he shut in a room for three hours and was seen with tears led swollen eyes by his close aides.

On the way to Hanuman temple, the Connaught Circus was full of broom held by people, who looked hailing from the lower income groups. "These are all BSP men and women," I could not resist quipping. The BSP had polled 14 per cent votes in 2008 Delhi elections and five years later the rank and cadre were swept away by the Kejriwal magic. 

The broom that swept away the Congress in Delhi.

Clearly, a hell lot of people sensed that they did not figure in the scheme of things of Dikshit and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. Price rise had finally broken all the prides of the middle and lower middle class.

But the Congress' slide from 43 seats to eight is quite a journey worth examination. As it appears, only the Muslims were unimpressed with Kejriwal's broom. So, not only JD (U)'s floater Shoib Iqbal but four Muslim candidates of the Congress too won. 

The Mughal Shah Alam's empire had famously shrunken from Chandni Chowl to Palam in the freezing winter of the dynasty founded by Babur and spread by Akbar. Dikshit, despite enjoying popular support, had shrunken her Delhi to the Lutyen's zone. And it was there that she tried to work her developments.

Shah Alam had seen a gust of Afghan and Maratha invaders in his shrunken Delhi. History revisits many a times, and, later we will know if Dikshit was the last Congress leader to rule Delhi.  

If not for Narendra Modi, Kejriwal would have been sworn in as the chief minister of Delhi. Undoubtedly, Modi blocked the Kejriwal gust to throw the BJP too with the Congress into the political abyss.  

Arguably, the Sunday gust intoxicated the Kejriwal gang. And, on the day of the people's mandate, they began talking of another elections. In their verbal jugglery, they had dished out sweeping comments and generalizations. To bow before the people's mandate is the duty of all political parties and rejecting the mandate by seeking another elections amounts to doubt people's will.   

Is it a French monarchy/. From the window, Kumar Viswas tells crowd updates and then shuts.

In a few days from now the magical debut of AAP in electoral politics will be researched word over. There are hardly any parallel. In 1980s, N T Rama Rao decimated the Congress in just six months. But then he was a popular film star and had cult following. There is no other parallel anywhere in the world. 

But take away Kejriwal, will AAP have any future. None, I guess. AAP is least a political party and more of a carry over of gust released by the powerful lungs of Anna Hazare. Alas, Hazare is a lonely man today. But life is like that. Ideas outgrow minds who birth them. Kejriwal is an idea, which was seeded by Anna, and nourished by anger of teeming millions of people. 

The gust by nature is short-lived. And that's the challenge before Kejriwal. He may recall W B Yeats' those lovely words: "I have spread my dreams under your feet, tread softly because you tread on my dreams".  

New Delhi spring

Former Income Tax officer Arvind Kejriwal must have seen with wide eyes the 2004 Mani Ratnam flick Yuva. The Ajay Devgan starrer was high on idea and inspiration. Even the most politically fortified state could allow intoxicated youth to put their feet on the doorway and Kejriwal took the screen fantasy to ground in Delhi in quite earnest. That his fate would be known on December 8 is not so important, as he has been able to open up Delhi's bipolar politics already. 

The 2012 was a year of spring and the jasmine flavour swept through the Arab world, first taking flight

from Tunisia, a country of olive oil. Tahrir Square happened a little afterwards. Soon, Kejriwal began pleading at Jantar Mantar with media, with Anna Hazare on the day one of his iconic fast for Jan Lokpal, for coverage. "It's not a Tahrir Square but a movement in the making," he would plead then. Later, crowd gave him enough "high" to take off into the world of politics.

Anna movement had assured Kejriwal, that crowd and money in India could come easily and he just had to keep banging the well fortified political wall. He was right. Money flowed and with that people too, many convinced that this was the man for the change of the system.

But he probably did not watch Yuva too closely. There the Devgan led former student politicians had made entry into the state Assembly in a small way. Just a few of them were there. And here Kejriwal tells each office-goers in their cars through the FM, that he would be forming a government in Delhi with 47 seats. His ambition has taken a fantasy flight. But politics, historically, has been very harsh to dreamers. 

In Andhra Pradesh, a former Babu Jai Prakash Narayan had formed Lok Satta party and wanted to change the system. He contested all the Assembly seats in AP. In the end, his party won one seat and that was him only. Union minister Jairam Ramesh recalls Andhra too had witnessed a similar sympathy wave for Narayan. But politics turned out to be too harsh for his flight of dream.

Nonetheless, Kejriwal should be happy that it was none other than the BJP's PM candidate Narendra Modi who had to focus on Aam Admi Party in his speeches. From an NGO man, Kejriwal is a politician and making his presence felt. 

The BJP should in fact thank him for committing another suicide by not going ahead with Vijay Goel as it face. That Dr Harsh Vardhan had to be named as BJP's CM candidate is Kejriwal's significant contribution.  

Furthermore, Kejriwal has thrown up ideas, taken from his book Swaraj, for local manifesto and they have all been grabbed by the BJP. Even the Congress is gearing up to come up with state specific manifesto in the upcoming Lok Sabha elections.   

Delhi has been the political capital even before Babur discovered India. The pulse of Indian politic is easily felt in Delhi. From the capture of Delhi by Muslims first to the British rule to the last 67 years of post-Independence India, the national capital has shown the way to the trend across the country.

This was evident in 2008 when Sheila Dikshit was pleasantly shocked to know that she had been re-elected third time despite the back-breaking price rise even then. That was Manmohan Singh undercurrent, not seen till then, which came out in full force in 2004 Lok Sabha elections. 

But not all are blessed with the sense of time and Manmohan Singh is the last to leave the seat of power under any circumstances. Had he retired in 2004, he would have been the most successful Prime Minister of India. But this was not to happen and in the next five years he took dive into the mud. And now the feet of the Congress is stuck in the mud collected all these five years.

The sense of resignation among the Congress leaders in Delhi is hard to be ignored. The fatigue in the campaign is too visible. Sheila Dikshit looks tired. The impregnable forte of the Congress in Delhi awaits December 8 verdict with dread. And hence there are no new ideas from Congress in Delhi but only a promise for continuation of the past and that makes people more dreadful.

In contrast, Sheila Dikshit had come out with magical ideas in 2008 -- regularization of unauthorized

colonies, home to one-third of Delhi's population, and five lakh flats for the poor at Rs 50,000 each only. The people lapped those ideas and left the BJP looking a fool with an old man V K Malhotra as the challenger.

Now the ideas are coming from Dr Harsh Vardhan and coming in plenty. Those ideas are taking wings with the big crowd puller Modi. And finally, the price rise appears becoming an election issue. 

Though Kejriwal is seen hurting the BJP by cutting into the negative vote base, trend in the last decade has been of decisive mandates, with Uttarakhand being the only exception. This began from Bihar and spread to Uttar Pradesh, Odisha, West Bengal and other states. Therefore, Delhi heading for a fractured mandate would be against the established trend.

If the Congress loses Delhi, the grand old party would be shaken. And that would also confirm that the change is in the air -- a much awaited one.