Kejriwal makes an impression, but fails to impress Mumbai

He came, travelled in auto rickshaws and local trains but could not conquer. Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) chief and former Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal failed to impress Mumbaikars with his attention-grabbing techniques.

For sure, Mumbai had other things to mind. For instance, on Wednesday, a group of 50-odd people standing in front of the imposing BSE Tower, only 10 minutes away from the Churchgate station in south Mumbai, had their eyes fixed on the giant screen showing the stock price and rupee movement. The screen flashed the news about Kejriwal’s arrival in a suburban train but hardly anybody looked enthused.

Karsan Shah, a 60-plus trader, said: “Kejriwal’s publicity stunts and jibes against a limited set of people won’t work in Mumbai, which is a cosmopolitan city.”

Political parties, too, took the opportunity to swipe at Kejriwal and the alleged violations of traffic norms by his party people. With campaigning for the Lok Sabha elections hotting up in the six constituencies here, parties are not giving up any opportunity to ridicule the “outsider”.

The ruling Congress and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), which together had won six seats in the 2009 elections, are in an upbeat mood thanks to the strong differences that have surfaced between Shiv Sena and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on the contentious issue of roping in the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena. The Congress and the NCP hope to cash in further on the deep divide in the saffron alliance. For them, Kejriwal and AAP are minor irritant.

Congress and NCP sources cite the recent decision to increase the cut-off date to January 1, 2000, for the nearly 325,000 slums in Mumbai, paving the way for redevelopment and mass housing. Besides, the state government has assured reduction in the power rates in Mumbai where Tata Power and Reliance Infrastructure service more than 2.9 million consumers.

AAP’s biggest problem is that it doesn’t have enough presence in the state to make any visible impact.

Mumbai-based economist C S Deshpande says, “It is too early to expect that AAP will have a significant dent this time. AAP candidates Meera Sanyal and Medha Patkar are diametrically opposite as far as economic ideology is concerned. On top of it, Mumbaikars are hardly moved by anybody’s public stunts anymore. They would like to know what AAP's vision for Mumbai is, especially on the speedy resolution to critical issues relating to water, housing and urban transport.”

Sushil Jiwarajka, a city industrialist, says the common man is yearning for a change. “While Mumbaikars will look for a change, the AAP style of activism will not go down well with the young voters as it is more disruptive in nature and less development-oriented. Also, AAP is an untested political entrant with a large number of social activists who have no experience of governance. So, voters will look for stable governance, rather than experimenting with an inexperienced party,” he notes.

However, not everyone wants to write off Kejriwal. A leading banker warns against underestimating Kejriwal who, he says, knows how to grab headlines. Besides, AAP’s core audience is the lower middle class and slum dwellers and Mumbai has a substantial chunk of them. “Kejriwal has captured their imagination in Delhi and I won’t be surprised if there is a repeat of that in Mumbai as well,” says the banker.