FIGHT FOR SURVIVAL

A BESIEGED ARVIND KEJRIWAL LAUNCHES A DESPERATE BATTLE TO REGAIN HIS CROWN AS DELHI CM IN THE FACE OF AN AGGRESSIVE BJP CAMPAIGN TARGETING HIS TARNISHED IMAGE AND THE FATIGUE OF AAP'S DECADE-LONG ANTI-INCUMBENCY

- By AVISHEK G. DASTIDAR

DUST COVERS THE PARTY'S ELECTION SYMBOL, THE BROOM, ON its election posters pasted on the walls, a testament to the weeks of political mobilisation. It's evening on a weekday. The location is charged with historical significance. Trilokpuri in East Delhi is where the 2014 communal riots took place, leaving 50 people injured. The venue, Block 27 market, overlooks a Mohalla Clinic, one of the key emblems of the welfarism model of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), the ruling dispensation in the national capital. It's mostly houses owned by Muslims that surround the venue, though the more than one-third Dalits in the constituency make it one reserved for Scheduled Castes. It's a caste, class and community mix that AAP considers its bastion. Arvind Kejriwal, chief minister of Delhi thrice and currently AAP's national convenor, takes the stage—the dais is draped in the party's trade-mark blue and yellow—surrounded by a sea of supporters. “We will form the government again,” he declares, his voice cutting through January's chilly winter. With a tone that is a mixture of assertion and subtle acknowledgment of the challenges ahead, he adds, “Haan seatein thodi si upar-neeche ho sakti hain (the number of seats may go up or down a bit).”