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AAP gives jitters to major parties in Gujarat

In a symbolic campaign to ‘clean the system’, the party with broomstick as its symbol has identified squalid areas in various towns and cities before launching its cleanliness drive from January 1 to sweep the streets off the garbage left behind by careless hawkers, traders and shopkeepers.

AAP’s Gujarat media coordinator Harshil Nayak told Khaleej Times that instead of celebrating their party’s victory by eating, drinking and dancing, the dyed-in-the-wool workers of the party would undertake activities that would bring relief to the man on the street.

He said small meetings would be organised at all these unclean places not only to stress importance of cleanliness but to make people aware of a new political alternative other than Gujarat’s two main parties--the Congress and the BJP.

“It is not just aimed at cleaning streets but cleaning the system. We will also raise the issues of sanitation workers and highlight other inefficiencies of the state government,” said Sukhdev Patel, state AAP convener, adding that fast-growing support for his party had given the jitters to the BJP and the Congress in the state.

Indeed, thanks to its door-to-door membership campaign, the party has enrolled 16,000 members in Ahmedabad alone, and has set up units in 20 of Gujarat’s 32 districts.

What’s more, senior AAP leaders are travelling extensively in central Gujarat to rope in more selfless workers for the party which has announced plans to contest all 26 Lok Sabha seats in the state.

They include former minister and retired honest-to-boot IPS officer Jaspal Singh, former mayor of Vadodara Ratilal Desai and other former BJP and Congress leaders.

Again, the AAP has started attracting budding managers from the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad (IIMA) who have not only been visiting the party headquarters in Ahmedabad but are also contributing funds.

“AAP’s clout among IIMA students and professors is growing after its success in Delhi,” Patel told Khaleej Times.

AAP sourcess aid while the first phase of the ‘broom yatra’ starting from the New Year will raise the curtain on Chief Minister Narendra Modi’s ‘divisive’ politics and the Congress’s ‘money power’, the second phase of the public awareness drive beginning January 26 will target ‘corruption’ and ‘weak lokayukta (anti-graft ombudsman)’ in Gujarat.

mahesh@khaleejtimes.com