The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) has quietly re-packaged itself, driving an appeal-all election agenda, building a proper organisation, bringing in new faces and running a campaign that is less bitter.
While AAP’s core principles remain the same, in many ways it’s not the same party that made a stunning electoral debut in the 2013 assembly elections.
The party is projecting its ‘governance potentials’ to show it is prepared to stay the course. By coming out with policy blueprints, it is fighting its image of an anti-corruption grouping of street fighters.
A mellowed Kejriwal
Aware of Modi’s popularity and how the AAP suffered when it ran into the BJP strongman during the Lok Sabha elections, Kejriwal has gone for a positive campaign, highlighting his own strengths. Even after Modi’s jibes at him during his speech at Ramlila Maidan on Saturday, Kejriwal has not been too harsh. “Even on FM radio, BJP is running propaganda, but we are responding positively,” said Raghav Chadha of AAP’s communication team.
Kejriwal himself is not doing or saying things that may get him media coverage but make him unpopular. Even on his party posters, images of his holding a broom, facing water canon have been replaced by those of a pleasantly smiling, reassuring leader, promising development. Unlike Modi, Kejriwal is holding small but many more meetings. Since December, he has held 50 and intends to do as many more.
Have things changed?
Talking to HT recently, Kejriwal confessed that things got terribly tough for him and the party after his resignation as Delhi chief minister. “But we are experiencing a treatment that we got in the run-up to the 2013 assembly elections. People are letting us in, offering us tea and snacks. These are the people who felt cheated because they loved us,” he said.
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