Ganesh Kendale
NEW DELHI: Tuesday’s poll outcome was a significant loss for AAP in Haryana, as it not only failed to open its account in the state but also ended up with a vote share of less than 2%.
This was despite national convener Arvind Kejriwal, who hails from Siwani in Bhiwani district, leading over a dozen roadshows and outreach programmes on his home turf after being released on bail and seeking votes for ‘Haryana ka Lal’ (son of the soil).
Kejriwal’s call to vote for him if he was honest and AAP’s emotive campaign failed to stir voters. AAP carried out a high-voltage campaign, with all its leaders — from Manish Sisodia to MPs Sanjay Singh and Raghav Chadha, along with Kejriwal — hitting the trail to intensify their attacks on BJP. They focused on issues ranging from corruption and misuse of central agencies to unemployment, but their efforts failed to resonate with voters.
Also AAP’s slew of “guarantees” like free electricity up to a certain number of units, quality education, free healthcare for all along with mohalla clinics and solutions to address unemployment did not have impact on people’s mindset. Except AAP candidate Adarsh Pal Singh who ended up third with 43,813 votes in Jagadhri constituency all its 87 candidates are set to forfeit their security deposit.
After alliance talks with Congress failed, AAP decided to contest 88 out of 90 seats in Haryana exuding confidence that it will be “key player”. In his campaigns, Kejriwal had also asserted that no party can form govt in Haryana without AAP’s support.
But the results tell another story. AAP got 2.48 lakh (1.8% ). AAP’s vote share was 0.5% in 2019 when it had contested 46 seats. In the Lok Sabha polls in May, AAP contested from Haryana in alliance with Congress but failed to win the Kurukshetra seat from where it fielded its state unit chief Sushil Kumar Gupta. The party managed a vote share of 3.9%.
Given that Congress snubbed AAP when it sought to ally with it in Haryana after numerous rounds of talks on seat-sharing, the result day saw AAP despite its poor performance send out a strong message to Congress with Kejriwal at a meeting with his party’s municipal councillors in Delhi on how the results show that no one should be over-confident.
Without naming anyone, Kejriwal said, “The (Delhi assembly) elections are around the corner. The first thing to keep in mind is to not take any election lightly. Today’s election results show that one should never be overconfident.”
Both Congress and AAP though part of the INDIA alliance nationally are opponents in Delhi. With the Congress party not winning in neighbouring Haryana, AAP will now not have to contend with the narrative of a resurgent Congress that can defeat BJP without INDIA allies.
Meanwhile, the AAP’s Haryana leadership too harped on Congress party’s arrogance and overconfidence affecting the outcome. Party’s state president Sushil Gupta claimed that in a highly polarised election where the jat and non-jat votes played a decisive role and contributed to the BJP getting an edge, an alliance between Congress and AAP would have helped consolidate votes. The results show that the voteshare of both BJP and Congress is almost similar at 39.94% and 39.09% respectively.
Meanwhile, even as AAP drew a blank in Haryana, the party opened its account in Jammu and Kashmir where its candidate Mehraj Malik won from Doda assembly constituency.
This takes AAP’s presence in legislatures to five states. Besides being the ruling party in Delhi and Punjab, AAP has five MLAs in Gujarat and 2 in Goa. Congratulating Malik over video call, Kejriwal accepted his invitation to participate in a programme at Doda on October 10.
Malik, a District Development Council (DDC) member, polled 23,228 votes against BJP’s Gajay Singh Rana’s 18,690 votes in Doda.
“Many congratulations on the grand victory of AAP candidate from Doda, Mehraj Malik against the BJP. You fought the election very well. Congratulations to the entire party for having an MLA in the fifth state,” Kejriwal said in a Hindi post on X.
AAP contested seven seats out of 90 in J&K. After news of Malik’s win came, AAP headquarters in Delhi saw party leaders and workers celebrate distributing sweets and dancing to drum beats.
