At a public Q&A session in Benares, Arvind Kejriwal admitted that the manner in which he resigned from the Delhi Government was a mistake
Outside Cutting Memorial school grounds in Nadesar in the heart of Benares, a lady in a peach-colured sari and an AAP cap tries to convince commuters to attend an open Q and A session with Arvind Kejriwal.
Most drive past, some pull over out of curiosity. She hands them a slip of paper with details of the session, asking them to choose Kejriwal over
Narendra Modi. "Why would you vote for a man who can't protect citizens in his own state?" she asks. In one instance, an argument breaks out. "Why did Kejriwal run away from the Delhi government?" asks a man riding a scooter. "It is all explained in the pamphlet. Come and ask him if you want answers," says the AAP volunteer.
The AAP is anxious about the success of the session, meant to create a buzz around Kejriwal's entry into Benares. His first visit three weeks ago when he announced his decision to contest against Modi drew a sizeable crowd. The second visit to Benares has been muted. Only a few hundred people gather at the venue; the presence of security is large. (
Read: In Varanasi, Arvind Kejriwal faces a poster war)
As Kejriwal and the AAP leadership take the stage, perhaps it's these anxieties which leads them to adopt the quasi-religious vernacular of the city.
"
Har Har Mahadev," they chant with the crowd, arms raised in unison.
More than his other public speech, Kejriwal's opening address is laced with religious references. At one point, he quotes from the Gita. At another, he says, "When the cup of corruption is filled to the brim, God will wield a cleansing broom." In an interview to NDTV the next day, he said that his quoting from the Gita is not unusual, a practise he has adopted for the past three months.
Earlier, in another gesture to political convention, he met a prominent Muslim cleric. Muslims make up about 16 per cent of Benares' electorate, and are seen as crucial to electoral success.
He rejects the suggestion that it was an act of political tokenism, telling us that the meeting was simply to convey a message of peace and interfaith harmony.
But as the Q and A event got off the ground, for all the tokenism that Benares might require, Kejriwal's unique idiom took over, answering questions from the crowd with candour and hurling now-familiar barbs at the mainstream parties.
Several questioners asked about his decision to quit power in Delhi. "Resigning was not a mistake, but the manner in which we did it was," he said. "We should have consulted people." (
Watch: Thought public would praise us for quitting, Arvind Kejriwal to NDTV)
The session ended with an appeal to defeat his rival Narendra Modi. "If Modi loses in Benares, he cannot become Prime Minister. The BJP will be finished," said Kejriwal. "Vote him out in Benares, defeat Rahul in Amethi, and bring in a new politics."
For this to not be wishful thinking the AAP needs to make a genuine ground impact in Benares, not yet visible.
Its campaign is run by the same young man, Gopal Mohan, who ran Kejriwal's campaign for the New Delhi seat where he defeated Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, a miracle may not be easy to replicate.
The AAP's model of intense, door-to-door campaign built around electoral booths needs a large pool of volunteers. At the moment, Mohan says they have only about core team of 500-600, insufficient to adequately target Benares' 16 lakh voters, spread across a sprawling area that encompasses dense urban clusters and distant rural pockets. Last week, a team of AAP MLAs from Delhi have come to oversee each of the assembly segments that make up the Benares Lok Sabha seat.
One evening, we followed the AAP's door-to-door campaign in the Mahmoorganj area of Benares. A team of eight volunteers knocked on doors and handed over a slip which described the AAP philosophy as well as an AAP cap. This was a subdued effort; not much was said to potential voters.
As they passed a park, a small group of children taunted them with cries of 'Ab ki bar, Modi sarkar'. Rakesh Singh, one of the volunteers (and a former professor at Benares Hindu University), told us that this is only the first round and that they will engage with voters more vigorously in the next one.
Funds too are problem. The AAP website shows they only have about Rs 20 crore, hardly enough to support 400-odd candidates fighting across the country.
On the day he arrived in Benares, Kejriwal sent out a following tweet: "Reached Varanasi. Will go to Amethi on 20th. Need clean money to fight Modi and Rahul. Pl sms me if u wish to donate." (
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Within 24 hours,
their funding website registered a spike of Rs 80 lakh, an indication that the AAP and its leader still retain a degree public faith. Whether it will be enough to defeat Narendra Modi is an open question.