With Delhi Assembly elections expected to be announced in the first week of January 2020 and polling in early February; Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal appears to be leading the perception battle in the city. Neither the Congress nor the BJP seems to be in a position to pose any challenge to his popularity at least for now. The question is why and how it is so?

 

Those who observe Delhi keenly say that a host of issues are dominating politics in Delhi:

 

AAP has maintained its perception of being ‘Aam Admi Party’ i.e. common people’s need for primary health, school education, water, electricity, safety-security (CCTV) et al. Unlike Congress, BJP, TMC, Shiv Sena and others, Kejriwal has hooked the party with purely pragmatic issues rather than ideological issues. AAP appears to have cleverly deployed its minority leaders against CAA protests but its key leadership is maintaining silence on the issue.

 

Probably, Delhi still looks at Modi for pan Indian aspirational issues but when it comes to peoples’ fight for leading their lives Kejriwal still looks ahead.

 

Further, as Maharashtra and Jharkhand exhibited regional issues dominating in Assembly elections, local leaders and alliances played decisive role instead of Modi’s pan India charisma. It is believed that Delhi may also behave the same way.

 

It is also said that state president Manoj Tiwari appears to be lagging behind in generating enthusiasm among people vis-à-vis party workers.

 

Party workers say that the BJP is committing the same mistake as it did in the last election by ignoring leaders like Dr Harshvardhan, Vijendra Gupta and Vijay Goel. Its an established fact that Kiren Bedi as CM candidate proved counterproductive for BJP. Party’s performance in Delhi in 2019 Lok Sabha results should not be misunderstood. It was Modi and not Manoj Tiwari who earned dividends in LS polls. Several party insiders say that Tiwari failed to give any counter narrative against AAP.

 

AAP was quick to respond by distributing certificate to ‘jhuggi dwellers’ that their jhuggi to be replaced with ‘pakka makan’ against BJP’s move of authorising colonies benefiting 40 lakh people.

 

Momentum of the Congress is broken with the demise of Sheila Dikshit and the efforts made by Congress are not concerted.

 

Aggressive campaigning by AAP has made the BJP and the Congress clueless about Delhi campaigning. But will the BJP be able to afford one more Assembly election loss?