Come to think of it, Kejriwal’s new and improved approach to politics and elections is not much different from that of Naveen Patnaik
By SUNJOY HANS
Editor-in-Chief
With the proliferation of media happening at an ever-faster rate and so much information available with a simple click of a button, the Bharatiya Janata Party’s embarrassing defeat at the hands of the Aam Aadmi Party in the recently held Delhi assembly elections hardly came as a big surprise to anyone who was following it.
Apart from pre-poll surveys and exit polls in the national capital, which indicated the AAP as the indisputable favourite and the BJP as the clear underdog, there were numerous factors and scenes during the runup to polling day that portended a sealed fate once again for the saffron party.
There is a famous quote, often wrongly attributed exclusively to the great Albert Einstein, which goes something like this: “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again but expecting different results.”
But that is exactly what the BJP seemed to be doing throughout the campaign period. From not having a face to give popular chief minister Arvind Kejriwal a run for his money, to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah stepping in with their usual Hindu-nationalist pitch that had not only misfired in many states that the BJP has lost over the past year but also reaped little dividends in the national capital back in 2015.
In sharp contrast was Kejriwal’s superbly finetuned campaign, which was devoid of his traditionally shrill rhetoric, and steadfastly stuck to the development agenda and sought votes from Delhiites on the plank of his performance over the past five years.
Come to think of it, Kejriwal’s new and improved approach towards politics and elections is not much different from that of Biju Janata Dal boss Naveen Patnaik, who is serving his fifth consecutive term as Chief Minister of Odisha after crushing the BJP time and again in one assembly election after another.
After losing so many state assembly polls over the past few months, the Delhi elections should in the very least serve as a wake-up call for the BJP leadership and make it realise once for all that the brand of politics that once again worked wonderfully for the Lok Sabha polls last year will simply not work in the assembly elections. Certainly not when the economy is in the doldrums and unemployment continues to be on the rise.
Speaking of a wake-up call, many political analysts are wondering whether the Congress, which ruled the national capital for a decade and a half not so long ago, is beyond one. Even after the party drew a blank once again, it seems to be in no urgency yet to make the necessary sweeping changes that it must usher in sooner rather than later to prevent its obliteration in the national political landscape.
The BJP must also remember that its stupendous electoral success last year may also have something to do with the precarious position of Congress, thanks in no small part to the grand old party’s chronic leadership problem that is showing no signs of going away anytime soon.
Meanwhile, the Delhi election results must have given a fresh lease of hope to the AAP leadership about its prospects of emerging as a national player. But it is early days yet.
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