BackArvind Kejriwal or Narendra Modi | Which idea will India choose?
The polls offer voters a choice between two distinct ideas represented by Narendra Modi, the BJP's PM candidate, and Arvind Kejriwal of the Aam Aadmi Party
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New Delhi: India’s 16th general election is drawing closer—it will likely happen in April and May—and, at this point in time, the fight for mindspace would appear to be a direct contest between Narendra Modi, the popular prime ministerial candidate of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), and Arvind Kejriwal and the political upstart he heads, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP).
The Congress party, if anything, will be the collateral beneficiary if indeed AAP manages to check the Modi juggernaut in its tracks.
Ironically, both the BJP and the AAP draw their political ballast from the anti-Congress wave that seems to have seized the nation. Yet, they find themselves on opposing sides—not entirely surprising, given that both are competing to occupy the political space that the Congress abdicated. Curiously, both even have political footprints that overlap, especially in urban India, and narratives that have evolved around the message against graft, passionate, committed cadres willing to go the last mile, and a groundswell of support among the youth.
Yet they couldn’t be more different. While the BJP derives its strength from social identity, the AAP thrived in Delhi despite transcending this. While one boasts of enormous experience, both in government and outside, the other is a novice—as evident in its stumbling efforts in its first two weeks in office in Delhi—with promise, albeit one equipped with a tremendous capacity to disrupt organized politics.
Regardless they represent the two ideas that India will choose from—not so much in terms of electing the AAP or even giving it a significant presence in what promises to be a fragmented house, but empowering it to disrupt the BJP’s campaign.
Things could change by March. After all, till 8 December, with the continuing implosion of the Congress and the traction that Modi was drawing in his rallies, this was an election for the BJP to lose. All that changed after the AAP played a part in the decimation of the Congress in Delhi. It still trailed the BJP in the assembly in terms of the number of seats, but after the latter declined to form the government, it did so.
Though a sleeper hit—no one but the AAP itself predicted a spectacular performance for it in the Delhi assembly polls—the party has been rapidly gaining momentum in urban India. Not only has it managed to form a minority government in Delhi, it has begun to spread to neighbouring Haryana and Uttar Pradesh. And much like the Congress, several high-profile liberal candidates, not all with a mass base, have thrown in their lot with the party—posing a problem for the BJP.
It is true that Delhi, ground zero of the anti-graft movement and a city whose electorate is made up mostly of migrants, provided an ideal launchpad for the AAP. Not only was there a governance vacuum created by the non-performance of the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) in its second tenure, the raft of high-profile graft cases projected the cynical side of organized politics as a self-serving, incestuous cabal. This was precisely why the BJP, even after an extraordinary effort, did not succeed completely in benefiting from the growing disaffection of a disenchanted electorate.
“In such conditions," explained Homi K. Bhabha, Anne F. Rothenberg professor of the humanities at Harvard University, in a recent interview to Outlook magazine, “you have political and social movements that focus on single issues and use the social media to voice their protest and organize their political programmes. The protest against anti-democratic, totalitarian governance became the singular issue in the Arab Spring; anti-corruption is the central issue for the Aam Aadmi Party."
Even before the AAP could become a movement and define itself, it became a political party that defined itself around anti-corruption. Its success has only stoked the optimism around the party.
The AAP’s decision to take up the reins of the Delhi state government, even as a minority regime, has acted as a force multiplier, demonstrating that its brand of politics—built around crowdsourcing of funding and political support—can actually pay dividends. The result: the party has attracted more funds and followers in the days since its victory in Delhi.
Still, the AAP’s meteoric rise means that it starts its political career without a core ideology that extends beyond being anti-Congress and anti-graft. At the same time, it has had to deal with the transition from activism to governance—not the easiest of tasks, especially when you have to scale up your act in the next two months.
In an interview, Yogendra Yadav, AAP’s chief strategist, defended his party’s stance: “What AAP does not do is to begin by saying we believe in this “ism" or that “ism" of the 20th century—No certainly, we don’t."
Implicit in his remark is the promise that the party’s ideology will evolve. But a journey through trial and error is not something the AAP can afford in the few months to the run-up to the election. From the outcome of the Delhi assembly election it is obvious that the Congress has more to fear from the AAP. Its ability to do damage to the BJP rests on its ability to address the issue of social identity—without which no political party has achieved a pan-India presence so far—and expand its appeal from just being a party that works against corruption. Presumably, the AAP will bear in mind that any campaign built on negative energy (read anti-Congress) can only go that far.
This weakness of the AAP may well be what the BJP will exploit. Good governance is at the core of Modi’s message. Still, the BJP’s script had, until early December, assumed that the only opponent it had to beat was a demoralized Congress party. The emergence of the AAP has rattled the BJP, with the party’s response ranging from denial to grudging acknowledgment.
Until December, the Modi wave impressed most observers as it rolled across the country. Not since Rajiv Gandhi had India seen an individual who could capture the imagination of people as well as Modi did (and still does).
The momentum seems to have eased, though, especially as the campaign slips into its sixth month. That’s exactly why the challenge by the AAP is a test of character for the BJP and Modi—already, critics within and outside the BJP are betting on the party falling short, forcing a reordering that would eject Modi from the leadership of the party.
The buzz is that early next week the BJP will shift gears when it launches its “big ideas" campaign. From the generic message of good governance, the campaign is likely to shift to specifics; we have already had a whiff of it with the buzz created by a (ill advised) direct tax reform idea that some sections of the party put out in the public domain.
There are some clear advantages that the BJP enjoys over the AAP when the campaign goes national, apart from obvious ones such as number of workers and the funds available. Outside of Delhi, social identity becomes critical, especially in a state like Uttar Pradesh. For Modi to have a realistic shot at power, the BJP has to wrap up North India—which accounts for most of the party’s electoral footprint.
The key states are Uttar Pradesh and Bihar that elect 120 representatives to Parliament. In both states, social identity—whether defined by caste and religion—is a key to swinging votes (precisely why the Congress, the Rashtriya Janata Dal, the Janata Dal (United), or JD(U), and the Samajwadi Party (SP) have spent so much of their energy in targeting the Muslim votes). The reverse polarization ordained by the SP and the recent riots in Muzaffarnagar—which broke a historical social compact between Jats and Muslims—have polarized the votebank in Uttar Pradesh.
The Jat vote, which dominates Uttar Pradesh, is now up for grabs and is veering towards the BJP; the implosion of the SP has only accelerated this process. Similarly, in Bihar, the breaking of its alliance with the JD(U) has galvanized the BJP’s cadre and like in the neighbouring state, the polity is fractured along communal lines.
Anecdotally, Modi is a big hit with young voters. It is a fact that 65% of India is less than 35 years of age and, significantly, about 150 million people aged between 18-23 years will be first-time voters in this election. The BJP’s outreach focused significantly on this demography.
In the final analysis, it is clear that as of now the politicians of India are offering its electorate two choices. One which is represented by an upstart that has ignored the conventional rules of politics, and the other a refurbished political party that promises to shepherd the country into a new era. In the process, both are threatening to squeeze out the Congress party, which some believe may end up with a double-digit presence in the House, its lowest ever.
So, which idea will India choose?
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