AAP's Victory in Punjab, Explained

It's a LANDSLIDE victory for Aam Aadmi Party in Punjab. In an assembly of 117 seats, the party has won 92 seats. Their victory is so huge that almost all the stalwarts of Punjab politics lost their seats. Whether or not you are a supporter of Aam Admi Party, this is a watershed moment in Indian political history Because after Congress, BJP and Communist Party of India, Aam Aadmi Party will be the forth surviving political party in India to have a Chief Minister in more than one state. While BJ

P has its roots in Hindutva ideology and CPI which believes in Communism, and Congress has a historical legacy, Aam Aadmi Party doesn't have any ideological or political history. It's a party that came into the picture only 9 years ago. In politics, 9 years is a very short time. So, in this video, we will tell you how the Aam Aadmi Party won the elections in Punjab "This time, the Aam Aadmi Party with form the government in Punjab- that too with an absolute majority." "The results are that th

e Aam Aadmi Party and Arvind Kejriwal have made head-roads into the country's politics via Delhi and Punjab." Before knowing why people voted for Aam Aadmi Party, let's first know why people didn't vote for other parties. Since 1969, power in Punjab has shifted between the Congress and Shiromani Akali Dal. Till 2020, BJP used to be a partner of Akali Dal, but due to disagreements on farm law, the coalition broke apart. "I told the Prime Minister that the black laws that have been passed have be

en rejected by the country's farmers and that he should not get these laws enforced. What we said has come to be true. -Can the Akali Dal be seen with the BJP now? -No!" BJP alone is not a significant player in the state of Punjab. It has been unable to woo Sikh and Dalit votes, Their support only comes from the non Dalit Hindus and that alone would not yield them the power to form the government. Now, Akali Dal was rooted out of power in 2017 The major reason behind this was its inability to c

urb the drug problem in the state. Now, you must already be aware that Punjab has had a massive drug problem A 2015 report had suggested that among every 1 lakh Punjabis, 836 were addicted to drugs. For comparison, the national average is only 250 per lakh people Many prominent leaders of the Akali Dal were found to be involved in the drug nexus This has led to a massive boycott of Akali Dal in the last few years. "Drug kingpin Jagdish Bhola has alleged that the Punjab Cabinet minister Bikr

amjit Singh Majhitia, was involved in the drug trade." Congress, the other player had ruled Punjab for the last 5 years. Out of that Captain, Amrinder Singh was the CM for 4.5 years. During his tenure, Captain had become quite unpopular, both amongst voters and Congress leaders. "Who is he to stop Navjot Singh Siddhu and closing doors on Navjot Singh Siddhu?" He was alleged to be inaccessible to people- It was very difficult to even talk to him Not only to the voters but even for Punjab's pol

itical cabinet. "He has his own system. He might be sleeping inside..." "-What are you saying? -The tasks get delegated..." "-You're talking about Captain sb, right? He keeps sleeping? -Yes, I am talking about him..." This is why Congress removed him from the post of the CM and amde Charanjit Singh Channi the CM. While the public image of Charanjit Singh Channi was not maligned, but there was so much in-fighting in the Congress that voters became fed up. "In my opinion, if someone deserves a ch

ance, it's the Aam Aadmi Party because both the Congress and the BJP have availed opportunities since so long so now, they too deserve one chance." Apart from that, the youth of Punjab was irked by unemployment about which we have talked in a previous video This was probably an indication that the voters of Punjab wanted a change. This is why the entry of a new political player in Punjab was essential In Indian politics, there's a saying that the route to Delhi is via Lucknow. which means tha

t if you want to win the seat of the PM, you will have to woo the voters of UP But it seems as if, for the Aam Aadmi Party, the route to Punjab was via Delhi When Arvind Kejriwal came to power in Delhi for the first time in 2013, he took some major decisions like subsidizing water and electricity. He took another major decision that a lot of you might not be aware of. That was setting up an investigation team to look into the 1984 Delhi riots in which over 3000 Sikhs were killed Now, the culp

rits of that violence were never brought to justice till 2013. It was believed that they were treated leniently by the Congress government ruling in Delhi because many who orchestrated the violence were Congress leaders But Kejriwal government tried to impart justice to victims. "Our government is taking initiatives to rehabilitate the victims of 1984 and will continue to do so..." This made AAP appeal more to the Sikhs in Punjab voters. And many Sikh volunteers and popular leaders started jo

ining the party. Like HS Phoolka, a human right activist who had helped fight court cases for several victims of the 1984 riot. This definitely helped Aam Aadmi Party achieve a certain push in Punjab, but what helped sustain it was its outreach towards two kind of voters: revolutionaries and religious. A major reason why Aam Aadmi Party had risen to power was its revolutionary outlook against corruption This agenda attracted the voters who had historically supported pro-revolution parties li

ke the Communist Party Now Communist Party was popular in Punjab till the 1990s, but their popularity had been diminishing in state after that and Aam Aadmi Party sensed an opportunity Apart from that, AAP also increased its outreach towards the religious Punjabis. Sometimes, they got accused of supporting some pro-Khalistan Sikh groups instead of religious groups Basically, because of these three reasons, AAP was able to mark its presence in Punjab But the story of elections is somewhat dif

ferent. To win the elections, AAP did three things which we want to tell you about Their first strategy was to target the Malwa region of Punjab Punjab can be divided into three regions- Malwa, Doab and Manja. Among these three, Malwa is politically the most important as it accounts for 69 out of 117 seats in the assembly. For winning elections in Punjab, it was a simple formula for all parties- If you win Malwa, you win Punjab. It'sOut of 17 CMs of Punjab, 15 have been from Malwa. And AAP tar

geted this very region How? Let us see. The Malwa region is home to the highest number of large landholding farmers in the state. A 2017 report noted that around 28% of farmers of Malwa has more than 10 acre of land. These farmers are mostly Jatt Sikhs, an influential community that has a lot of say in Punjab's politics The protest against the three farm laws had this community playing a major role In the last election, Congress had won over 2/3rd of seats in Malwa because of the popularity

of Captain Amrinder Singh himself a popular Jatt leader in the region. But this time around, the situation was different. Captain had joined hands with BJP and the people revolting against BJP's farm laws found non sense in supporting him. And Congress' new face, Charanjit Singh Channi came from the adjoining Doab region and thus didn't have enough popularity in Malwa. This created a political void in the region which gave an opportunity to Aam Aadmi Party Bhagwant Mann- Aam Aadmi Party's Ch

ief ministerial candidate , belonged to this region Aditya Menon, the political editor at the Quint, had written in his report in February that several voters in Malwa, didn't care who the candidate was. They were set to vote for Bhagwant Mann's party. When the final tally came, AAP had won 66 out of 69 seats in Malwa Second reason was that the people of Punjab wanted a change in two things- education and health care. Punjab does not fare very poorly in major education rankings as far as they

are concerned Infact, in the National Performance Grading Index of school education for 2020, Punjab topped the list. But, at the same time, private education still troubles a lot of Punjabi parents. Like one voter in an interview, said that he wants to send his daughter to a good private school, but it would cost him around 3000 Rupees a month. And for a lot of people, 3000 INR per month is unaffordable. And if we talk about healthcare, Punjab's situation is quite worse. In fact, there's a

train called Cancer Express which runs from Punjab to Jaisalmer and Bikaner in Rajasthan. It has got its name because cancer patients travel from Punjab to Rajasthan to avail cheap cancer treatment. And there are no such facilities for the people in the state Due to the poor health infrastructure of the state, Punjabis are forced to rely on other states or private health care, which is often unaffordable for many. NSSO data suggest that 70% of people in rural Punjab avail private health car

e. This is very high compared to the national average of 58%. Aam Aadmi Party asked voters to take the case of Delhi- where they fixed both education and healthcare And this is what they promised to do in Punjab It does not matter how much evidence there is to these claims What matters is that this was an alternative for many people- which they wanted to choose because they were fed up with the Akali Dal and Congress Like the same voter who said that he wanted to send his daughter to a priva

te school but wasn't able to afford it, added that Bhagwant Mann's party had done good work on healthcare and education in Delhi. So he was wondering to give them a chance. The third reason- about which we have talked about in a previous video- was how the Aam Aadmi Party and Arvind Kejriwal have transformed their image for the Hindu voters According to the 2011 census, Punjab has around 38% Hindus. Now, historically, Hindus in Punjab had voted for either BJP or Congress. Like in the 2014 gen

eral elections, Hindus voted for BJP in constituencies with high Hindu populations Whereas, in 2017 elections, Hindus voters opted for Congress. Even before those elections, the Aam Aadmi Party was considered a favorite But a lot of people say that since AAP's image got tainted for supporting Khalistanis, they were not able to secure the Hindu votes. But this time around, things have changed for AAP. It had rebranded its image as a pro-hindu party as well as a nationalist party For that, it

organized events like tiranga yatra, and used slogans like "Bharat Mata Ki Jai" "Bharat Mata Ki Jai" Apart from that, Kejriwal called for an anti-conversion law in the state These three factors were the major reasons why Aam Aadmi Party was able to win the state elections Veteran political scientist Rajni Kothari in his book Politics in India had divided the Indian democracy into 4 phases: From 1947-67, where Congress ruled as the dominant party. Then from 1967-89, when there was a rise of s

maller ideological or regional parties like BJP, BSP and DMK. Then from 1989 to 98 when these party became dominant and Congress became weaker.. The 4th phase is from 1998 to 2014, we saw coalition governments Some observers also say that since 2014 we are living in a 5th phase with BJP has become the dominant party in India And if you would like to know more about how BJP runs its election strategy, an audio book that I highlighly recommend is Prashant Jha's How BJP Wins. You can get this au

dio book on KuKu FM, who have sponsored this video In the audiobook, there are 8 different chapters that detail the strategy of the BJP Apart from this audiobook, you can find many other audiobooks and podcasts on KuKu FM in several Indian languages And KuKu FM is one medium which is promoting a learning environment amongst us You won't need to read 1000s of books- you can listen to their audiobooks which will save your time as well as money because it is extremely budget efficient. The an

nual plan of KuKu FM is INR 399. Because KuKu FM is supporting this video, there is an exclusive discount for you. You can get their annual plan at INR 199, if you use the coupon code HOLI50 So, do check out the KuKu FM app The link is in the description below Today, Rajni Kothari is not between us anymore. But his views would have been interesting on this issue of how should one categorize the Aam Aadmi Party. Because AAP does not have a history like the Congress Party Neither does it belon

g to a particular region And it does not represent an Indian region, caste or ideology either This means that this is a very interesting phase in the Indian politics And this is an interesting phase for AAP as well because unlike in the case of Delhi, they cannot blame the central government of not giving them enough control And while Delhi is a revenue surplus state, Punjab;s government does not have a lot of money It would be interesting to see how AAP fulfills its promises Apart from the Ind

ian politics and AAP, we can also hope that for the voters of Punjab, this will be a phase where they witness social and economic progress