6 reasons Delhi dumped Aam Aadmi Party in MCD election
The Aam Aadmi Party's (AAP) crushing defeat in the MCD polls — right after its Punjab and Goa debacles — has dealt a huge blow to the morale of the party. From 67 out of 70 in 2015 (Assembly elections), in just two years, the AAP has been reduced to 48 of 270 in the civic body polls.
Here's how the AAP got the script horribly wrong:
1) National ambitions
The AAP and Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal’s haste to become the main face of opposition against PM Narendra Modi at national level cost the party heavily in Delhi. The AAP went all out in Punjab, Goa and announced plans to contest Gujarat and Himachal assembly elections as well. With Kejriwal as the only visible vote-catcher for the party in all states, the voters of Delhi saw their CM everywhere, but in the national capital. The perception that Kejriwal’s focus is outside Delhi, forced voters to teach the AAP a lesson in the MCD polls.
2) Negative campaign
From warning voters about the BJP by equating the party with "dengue" to blaming EVMs, the AAP campaign focused more on the negatives of opponents and less on projecting its own good work. Like demonetisation, allegations of EVM tampering at least for the time being didn't seem to resonate with the voters.
The middle class, which massively supported the AAP in 2015, saw Kejriwal’s campaign against the Election Commission and EVMs as a mere excuse for a party unable to digest its defeat.
3) Rift within AAP
In the run-up to the MCD elections, there were strong rumours of AAP MLAs being unhappy with the party leadership. As soon as its MLA from Bawana, Ved Prakash, quit the party to join the BJP, every day the speculation of more MLAs following suit hurt the party's credibility.
Another MLA, Rajesh Rishi, cautioned the party chief against "sycophants" and took to Twitter to run his campaign. The biggest blow to the party was dealt by senior leader Kumar Vishwas, who not only kept away from the party's campaign for the crucial MCD polls, but also posted a video slamming his own party on the issue of corruption. Till the last day, campaign stories about AAP MLAs jumping the ship only contributed to voters perception of implosion in Kejriwal's unit.
4) Inability to present a new narrative
The party — which fought and won the 2015 Assembly elections on bijli-paani promise coupled it with its main agenda of crusade against corruption — surprisingly failed to present any new narrative which may have caught voters imagination. Apart from removing property tax, the party did not talk of anything worth remembering. Even this agenda (property tax) took a back seat with its constant tirade against the EC and EVMs. The result: a division in AAP's lower strata vote bank and middle class's massive shift to the BJP.
5) Modi versus Kejriwal Comparison
The BJP has been fighting even the smallest of elections with PM Modi as its main face. BJP posters across the city had pictures of Modi and Amit Shah. Their campaign spoke about how the BJP will "realise the dreams of PM Modi in the national capital", they spoke about the achievements of the central government. The voters seem have to have reposed their faith in PM Modi, if not entirely on the BJP.
In contrast, the AAP too made it a presidential-style election, with votes being sought in Kejriwal's name. Though they didn't not pitch Kejriwal against Modi, that's the comparison the voters of Delhi saw. It came across as a comparison between a PM — who is winning elections after elections, who is projected as a man who works 18 hours a day and has a tight grip on governance — and a CM — who doesn't have any portfolio, his deputy is virtually running the government, his cabinet still has a vacancy and is a man in a hurry to expand in other states.
In the end, the BJP successed it making it a war between a 24x7 PM versus an absconding CM. And hence the scale tilted in the BJP's favour.
6) Rajouri bypoll result
The writing on the wall was very clear for the AAP after the humiliating defeat in the Rajouri Garden bypolls. Result of that election just days before the MCD voting had a massive effect on the voters' perception. The BJP had the momentum, the Congress looked like it was making a comeback and the AAP, which couldn't even save its deposit in Rajouri Garden, has now lost the advantage of being the only opponent to the BJP.
The voters seemed to have been nursing a grudge against the AAP for forcing a bypoll as the Rajouri Garden seat fell vacant earlier this year after AAP MLA Jarnail Singh resigned to contest Punjab Assembly elections.
Despite the Delhi CM claiming that the bypoll result won't have much impact on the civic polls, it seems voters, especially the middle class Punjabi community in West Delhi played a major role in tilting the scales in favour of the BJP.