The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) today registered a massive victory in the 2017 MCD polls, where it was believed to be locked in a bitter battle with the Aam Aadmi Party and the Congress. Following the big win, the saffron party leaders claimed that it is Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s charisma, that people have lost faith in everyone and only believe in him. As a result, their trust is converting into votes.
BJP is becoming popular across India, the recent Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand Assembly election results are a clear indicator of that. Almost everybody has an explanation to as to why the BJP is getting such extensive support, but the way Swaraj India founder and former AAP leader Yogendra Yadav has explained the reason via his conversation with an Ola driver is full of sense.
Here’s how Yogendra Yadav decodes BJP’s success after a conversation with Ola driver:
On the eve of MCD elections, Yadav took an Ola ride for getting back to his home. After dropping him, the driver asked the Swaraj India leader, if he was a politician. Dodging his question, Yadav asked him about his views on the MCD elections. It turned out that he was a traditional Congress voter who ditched the party in 2014 to vote for the BJP. In 2015, he, however, switched to Arvind Kejriwal. And this time? He couldn’t recall the names of local candidates in his ward but he was sure that he was going to vote for Modi.
A surprised Yadav then asked him about his view on the functioning of the MCD. He got an interesting reply – “Kaam to kuch kiya nahin” (The MCD hasn’t done anything). Yadav told him that for the last ten years, BJP has been ruling the MCD, however, the driver ignored to what he told. On asking him why he wasn’t voting for the jhaadu (AAP), the driver expressed his displeasure and said, “Kejriwal ne to dhoka diya hai” (Kejriwal has betrayed us) and now we only believe in Modi, hence we have pinned our hopes on him. The cab driver added that Modi has given a good CM (Yogi Adityanath) to Uttar Pradesh, and now he will ensure a good governance in Delhi too.
Yadav says that after this conversation, he was “speechless and horrified”. The Ola driver had taught him something about politics. The voting pattern followed by the Ola driver seems to have been replicated all over Delhi.
A massive yet silent shift of votes in the favour of BJP was quite evident towards the end of the campaign. Yogendra Yadav was fully involved in the campaign for his party and missed no opportunity to draw attention to BJP’s misdeeds in Delhi’s three municipalities. However, it is clear that the voters were not focusing on the performance of the MCD.
“Why did the people of Delhi vote for a non-performing ruling party? Clearly, the answer does not lie in EVM tampering. Instead of making such rash and irresponsible allegations, BJP’s political opponents like myself acknowledge the fact that BJP is winning because the people are voting for it,” says Yadav.
He also claims that the BJP managed to detach this election from the difficult municipal issues. He feels that the MCD polls became a simple popularity contest between Arvind Kejriwal and Narendra Modi and the people of Delhi appear to have chosen the PM over the CM.
Yadav says that the ‘magical Modi wave’ is nothing but the ‘failure of the AAP government”. He says that the Modi wave was in 2015 also, but the BJP lost to AAP. The Swaraj India leader feels that BJP is winning due to weaker opposition.
“The BJP won MCD because Delhi’s experience has not been good with AAP. Kejriwal’s over-reliance on this blame game has left the people of Delhi – like the Ola driver – sick and tired. The personality cult of Kejriwal is beginning to boomerang as he loses this personal referendum,” he said.
To conclude, Yogendra Yadav says that the MCD election in Delhi has completed one phase of BJP’s rise as the hegemon in Indian politics and warns the opposition parties to come to terms with reality, else it might be too late.
