Clean India programme launched by central government or Narendra Modi. What they will identify with will be a broom wielding AAP worker cleaning their locality just like the Delhi voters did in 2013.
The Clean India mission has been launched.
The prime minister visited Valmiki colony on Thursday and cleaned the roads with others. He also paid homage to Mahatma Gandhi on his birth anniversary y spending some time at the Bapu Niwas, the one-room quarter in the temple premises where Gandhi stayed for 214 days – between April 1946 and September 1947.
When prime minister Narendra Modi was speaking at the podium of Red Fort on Independence Day, nobody would have thought that his simple idea of cleaning India would create a problem for many.
The Clean India mission looked like a normal campaign which a prime minister wished to start to make India really shine.
But behind this campaign was an unintentional benefit to the ruling party: claiming the Mahatma from Congress while practicing what he preached.
It was also an attack on the budding party, AAP, whose political symbol is broom.
When prime minister Narendra Modi wielded a broom in his hand and clean the colonies of Valmiki Nagar, his cabinet ministers and other MPs were doing their bits by cleaning the cities they came from. It received the usual response from Congress which called it a political gimmick.
But AAP succeeded in making its mark on this day.
Perhaps thrown away by the out of the box idea of PM Modi, AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal had made a silly statement that PM’s Clean India mission actually cannot clean India.
In the September 23 letter addressed to Kejriwal, urban development minister M Venkaiah Naidu had appealed to AAP to “actively contribute in this clean India drive and ensure people’s participation in full.”
In response to Naidu’s call, Kejriwal had said that while his party workers were already involved in cleanliness activities, “we cannot make India clean by such actions.”
But later, he realized the benefits that he could possibly reap out of this opportunity.
The party took to the drains (erm) with their jhadu and chose the area near PM’s house to make a symbolic gesture indicating that “cleaning starts from home”. Kejriwal went to BR Camp, which comes under his New Delhi constituency, and cleaned the clogged drains in the area.
It should be noted that AAP has always shown keen interest in the problems of safai karmcharis and other lower strata of the society. They have always made good use of their party symbol. When they were fighting against corruption, they had given a cry of cleaning India of corruption through their jhadu.
When the campaign kicked off, AAP did not join any government sponsored event. It went on its own and the party members and volunteers cleaned parts of countries.
The voters, who vote in assembly elections, won’t care whether it was a programme launched by central government or Narendra Modi. What they will identify with will be a broom wielding AAP worker cleaning their locality just like the Delhi voters did in 2013.
So the ultimate beneficiary, despite its whining, will be AAP and Kejriwal.
