When the election date for the Delhi Assembly was announced three weeks ago, Arvind Kejriwal-led Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) did not expect any serious threat from the BJP in its bid to seek a second term. The reason: AAP’s pro-poor and populist schemes like subsidised water and power, mohalla clinics, free bus rides for women and better-run government schools were more than the needed ammunition to keep the rivals out of reckoning.
But the seriousness with which Home Minister Amit Shah has plunged into the BJP’s campaign has had the AAP leaders sit up. Shah’s entry into the poll arena as the chief campaigner has taken even many Delhi BJP leaders by surprise and raised their stakes. Without a chief minister’s face, these leaders had merely hoped thought the party would seek votes in the name of Prime Minister Narendra Modi just for securing a decent number of seats. Previously, they had not visualised any fighting chance for their party to upset Kejriwal since 2015, when AAP won 67 of the 70 assembly seats in Delhi.
Also, till Shah emerged as BJP’s chief campaigner, the AAP appeared to be in complete control of the narrative by not allowing the focus to shift from Delhi to any other emotive issue. However, Shah’s foray has meant that the BJP will fight with all its might on its pet themes like revocation of Article 370 in Jammu and Kashmir and even the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) without being defensive about it to consolidate the Hindu vote.
With over 10,000 interactions and hundreds of small roadside meetings by the BJP, Shah has ensured the attack is also kept on the AAP government’s five-year record in office, forcing Kejriwal to respond to each of his charge － be it on schools, wifi scheme, cleaning drinking water or upgradation of slums. More than a Kejriwal-versus-Narendra Modi battle, it has gradually turned out to be a Kejriwal-versus-Shah bout.
Without mincing any words, Shah has chosen to make an issue of the 47 day-long protest by largely Muslim women against CAA at Delhi’s Shaheen Bagh has raised the AAP hackles. The sit-in has led to huge traffic snarls in many parts of the Capital and caused detours on arterial roads even though it has been romanticised by Modi’s critics as the Indian version of the Tahir Square of the Arab Spring fame.
The local resentment has begun to build up even as some have held it up as a symbolic resistance in-the-making against discrimination against Muslims and in support of the secular principles of the Constitution.
Shah’s varying observations on the protests have added to the poll pitch, calling it as a handiwork of haters of Modi with the backing of those against a united India. “Voters should press the button (on the voting machine) with such anger that its current is felt at Shaheen Bagh and makes the protesters leave Shaheen Bagh on February 8.” Shah has even gone to say that "your vote to the BJP candidate will make Delhi and the country safe and prevent thousands of incidents like Shaheen Bagh.”
In response, Kejriwal has blamed Shah for the hundreds of women and children braving Delhi's cold winter for becoming the face of countrywide protests against CAA, which was enacted in December to fast track Indian citizenship for non-Muslims who fled from religious persecution in Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan. Other BJP campaigners have added to the grist for the mill by pointing at allegations of women protestors taking turns and being paid and fed by local politicians, when extreme distress is faced by residents commuting from other parts of Delhi.
Shah and his strategists know that this narrative alone cannot easily upset Kejriwal whose trump card is freebies in the name of development. But they are confident that playing the Hindu card can at least ensure that its traditional vote of 30 to 32% will not be swayed by AAP’s pro-poor charms.
Kejriwal is keen to avoid a Hindu-Muslim binary though he has been forced to respond to Shah’s aggressive approach to the issues — without appearing to be siding with those fully against the CAA and removal of Article 370.
Nevertheless, AAP is finding itself in a tight corner because it faces the Congress in the battle for Muslim votes. The Congress has been upfront in supporting the Shaheen Bagh protest to corner Kejriwal who has remained mild in his criticism of the CAA. Kejriwal cannot ignore the fact that the Congress had come second in the Lok Sabha polls of 2019, securing 22.5% of votes as against 15% in 2014. The AAP had got only 8.1%. The BJP won all the seven Lok Sabha seats in Delhi, securing 56.6 % of the votes.
But the Congress is no match for AAP’s hold on poor and marginally poor voters who remain glued to its influence because of the freebies. Besides, in the absence of the Gandhi family members in the campaign, the Congress machinery has shown no sign of revival as yet. If the Congress underperforms again as it did in 2015, the BJP’s chances of winning even a decent number of seats will be in question.
Shah’s ultimate weapon could be organising rallies by Modi in the first week of February after the party manifesto is released. But it would also risk Modi’s stature if Kejriwal emerges unscathed in what will be billed as David versus Goliath match.
The writer is a former Senior Associate Editor of Hindustan Times and Political Editor of Deccan Herald, New Delhi.
