Will AAP Be Able To Sweep Away The National Polls?

By Michelle Cherian

December 8^th, 2013- BIG 2 FAIL TO SEE WHATSAAP

This was the catchy, extremely conspicuous headline in the Times of India on the above mentioned date marking Aam Aadmi Party’s momentous and rather unprecedented win in Delhi. For a party which made its humble entry into the political arena barely a year ago and was touted as ‘a new fish in the sea’ or ‘the unelected and the unelectable’ or the ‘publicity grosser’, this rookie player was able upstage the Congress and rub some sheen off the BJP; thereby legitimising the TOI headline.

Amid the hoopla around the what, how and when of AAP’s ascendancy, one important question remains unanswered: the WHY. Why did the Aam Aadmi Party come to power?

The AAP is evidently a new player on the block formed by activists, students, entrepreneurs, IAS officers, journalists and people from you-name-it field. According to Arvind Kejriwal, the newly elected Chief Minister who successfully garnered the trust vote of the Delhi Assembly, “an Aam Aadmi is one who desires a proper house, food and clothing, good education for his children and a just law and order system. Anyone who is willing to obtain these the clean, non-corrupt way is an Aam Aadmi.” The discernable simplicity of his words depicts his clarity of thought and a new, fresh ideology. The people want to see their problems solved, their problems of poor governance, inadequate health care and education, hopelessly long waits to get ration cards or any identity proofs made, and who better to solve those problems than one among the people themselves, one who battles the Indian system, day-in and day-out just like his fellow Indians. Arvind Kejriwal’s magic potion is this simplicity. Simplicity spells out in all his and his party’s actions, their campaigning style, their direct involvement with the citizens when deciding whether to form government, his speeches and above all his promises. The AAP doesn’t aspire to reach the moon, but merely wants to reduce electricity and water tariffs, improve the living conditions of the slum-dwellers, and provide the residents of Delhi good education, good health care and good governance, good in the sense which would hopefully pan out to be better than the existing standards.

Other factors that have contributed to its success is the fact that the AAP is a no-identity party. Neither did it come into being nor does it function because of any one particular caste group or religious faction. It is all inclusive in its words and actions both. Also political analysts cite that the AAP has a reputation that is squeaky-clean and has no historical baggage to contend with in terms of periods of poor governance, anti-incumbency sentiments or innumerable scams. Moreover, AAP has a comparative advantage over its predecessor because it is taking over the governance of a state that has a rich budget surplus.

Disgruntled party leaders from the Congress and the BJP who now view the Common Man’s Party as a threat and have repeatedly lashed out against their populist measures like providing 700 litres of water every day to every metered household or building 45 additional night shelters, say that the AAP will eventually phase out because of its uneconomical measures. What the other parties fail to see or are making a deliberate attempt to ignore is that the AAP is pretty well-to-do, if not stinking rich. Their average daily donations before the Delhi assembly polls were Rs. 7 lacs which has increased to Rs. 17.5 lacs after the elections. Their party strength is noticeably on the rise too with 3 lakh people already having joined after the Delhi polls. Even eminent personalities like former Infosys board member, V Balakrishnan; former Royal Bank of Scotland India Chief, Meera Sanyal; Capt. Gopinath, pioneer of low-cost aviation among others have hopped onto the speedy bandwagon.

Above all, the AAP’s party ideology resonates a change, a refreshing change from the traditional two-party binary. It offers a choice to the hopeful hordes of voters, a choice which is again not limited to the Congress or the BJP. His party wants to eliminate the VIP culture and exterminate corruption which is every Indian’s sore enemy.

The only two possible reasons working against the AAP’s rise is the constraint of time and that AAP has formed a minority Government. The general election is less than 5 months away and there is always the chance that Congress might pull back its support. Well, the second is more of a distant possibility than the first, considering that Congress might not want to chalk one more on BJP’s victory list if it deserts the AAP.

The mango men of India seem to have taken a slow and steady dislike to the white kurta-pyjama, the traditional garb of Indian politicians. This is probably their way of rejecting the hypocrisy and corruption that tries to disguise itself with the whiteness of this uniform and their way of accepting one among their own, a non- pretentious change agent as their leader.

The naysayers and pretentious well-wishers should rest assured because the AAP IS HERE TO STAY!

The author is is currently pursuing Economics (first year bachelors program) at St. Stephens College, Delhi. She is passionate about singing, reading and writing. She has remained an integral part of her school editorial team and is an aspiring writor-editor in college too. Her greatest strength is that she believes in herself and that belief gets reflected as conviction towards her work. She wishes to pursue Economics as her field of study by specialising in the branch called Developmental Economics.