Kejriwal's Twin Formula For State Election Campaigns

The states of Himachal Pradesh and Gujarat are due for polling later this year. Delhi Chief Minister, Arvind Kejriwal is on the ground, aggressively campaigning in both the states.

Kejriwal abides by a set formula during the campaign period for every state election. For example, in the case of Punjab he went on to highlight that it contributes the most personnel to the national defence services, however, then went to make the same claim during Uttarakhand elections as well.

Further, he goes on to leverage Delhi and Punjab State Governments’ advertisement budget and social media handles. He enjoys questionable support from a multitude of media houses, who in return are awarded significant advertisement budgets. Nonetheless, the perceptive citizens of Goa, Uttarakhand, Karnataka , and Uttar Pradesh have not allowed him to gain many inroads into their states.

Kejriwal sits upon two state election victories, namely, Delhi and Punjab Assembly. In the former, the MCD and 7 MP seats are under BJP’s governance. Though, in both the cases Congress was completely decimated and a calculated vote transfer to AAP cannot be ruled out.

Additionally, it should be noted that in the case of Punjab elections alleged and controversial support was provided to separatist elements.

‘Kejriwal ki Guarantee’

Goa assembly elections : (2 Seats & 6.8% Vote Share)

The Delhi CM, Mr. Arvind Kejriwal has so far visited Goa a total of four times for to campaign for his party’s victory. On every visit AAP promoted false promises in the form of ‘Kejriwal ki Guarantee’ across social media platforms. These so-called guarantees offered the following:

1. AAP promised free electricity up to 300 units, free power to farmers and uninterrupted power supply in Goa.

2. The party pledged to reserve 80% of all jobs, including those in the private sector, for local citizens of the state.

3. Moreover, Kejriwal promised to give at least one unemployed member of each family a government job, along with a monthly allowance of Rs. 3,000 for unemployed youth until they a source of livelihood.

4. AAP also pledged to resume iron ore mining within six months, and until then provide a monthly allowance to those dependent on the mining industry.

5. Additionally, the party has said it would set up a corporation comprising auto rickshaw and taxi drivers as office-bearers to decide on all matters which concern them.

6. Another promise is the ‘Teerth Yatra Scheme’, under which the party has pledged to sponsor pilgrimages for all Hindus to Ayodhya, Catholics to Velankanni in Tamil Nadu and Muslims to the Ajmer Sharif in Rajasthan.

7. The party also made the promise that its chief ministerial candidate will be a leader from the Bhandari caste, which falls under the Other Backward Classes (OBC), and to make a Catholic face its candidate for position of the deputy Chief Minister.

During the course of his miniscule visits to Goa, he also visited the temples in the state.

Despite all the fictitious propaganda, Arvind Kejriwal-led AAP, which had entered the electoral fray in Goa with all its might, registered a slight gain in the vote share – from 6.3 per cent in 2017 to 6.8 per cent this time.

Uttarakhand : (0 Seats & 3.31% Vote Share)

Arvind Kejriwal gave 4 guarantees in poll-bound Uttarakhand

Guarantee 1: The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) will provide 300 units of electricity free of cost to every family of Uttarakhand if the party comes into power.

Guarantee 2: All old electricity bills will be forgiven.

“For the past few months, our party workers have been going from home to home. There have been several instances where people have received wrong electricity bills, which at times is done intentionally. For example, a person receives a wrong bill of ₹60,000. Now when the person goes to correct it, he/she is told to pay ₹10,000 and the bill will be forgiven. And then the person is running from pillar to post.” said Kejriwal. He argues that adding the high number of wrong bills will be beyond the capacity of the government machinery to correct.

Guarantee 3: There will be no power cuts in Uttarakhand and electricity will be available 24x7. Kejriwal pointed out that free electricity does not mean that it would be provided in decreased quantities.

Guarantee 4: All farmers in Uttarakhand will get electricity for free.

The Delhi CM made the promise of one lakh jobs within six months, a monthly allowance of Rs 5,000, 80% of government and private jobs will reserved for the youth of Uttarakhand and will also launch a job portal for them. During his last visit, Arvind Kejriwal had also announced that he would establish Uttarakhand as the spiritual capital of India.

In Uttarakhand AAP got 0 Seats and 3.31 % Votes

‘BJP, AAP se Darti hai’

The repetitive twin formulas of offering guarantees as bait to the citizens and creating an imagery of BJP being fearful of AAP is now being employed in Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh.

The truth behind such false claims and promises is already out in the open. AAP will have to try harder than the ‘revari culture’ and clamour because the Indian voter is much more mature.

People of the country are observing these trends. In fact, within two months since AAP came to power in Punjab with 92 seats, the party failed to retain the Sangrur Lok Sabha seat, which Bhagwant Mann had won twice.

It is apparent that the situation across key departments such as law and order, education, health, and industries in Punjab is already in shambles. People residing in the poll-bound states are lending a watchful eye to these instances.