Aam Aadmi Party volunteers on Thursday afternoon were spotted outside their party office near Laxmi Nagar metro station here handing over cards to more than a dozen young men who were sporting the party caps. The card, the party said, was “Kejriwal’s guarantee card”.
The party volunteers, mostly school and college students, then hit a nearby market and started distributing the cards.
A “door-to-door” programme, through which the party claims to have reached lakhs of households in the city, has been one of the main outreach programmes by the party in the run-up to the Delhi Assembly election.
“Iss side mein calender hain, aur iss side mein sarkar kya kaam kiya hai aur kya karegi woh likha hai [This side of the card has a calendar and the other side has the details of the work done by the AAP government and their plans],” 19-year-old Rahul, a polytechnic student, explained as he handed over a card to a shopkeeper. Mr. Rahul was heading the team.
“We had sent 100-150 volunteers, divided into teams of 10 members, across constituencies every day,” said a volunteer who was overseeing the party’s door-to-door campaign.
In December, the AAP had brought Prashant Kishor’s Indian Political Action Committee (I-PAC) on board to work along with the party for the Delhi Assembly election.
The card in the form of a tabletop calendar bore 10 promises made by AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal to the people of Delhi printed on one side and a calendar of the current year printed on the other.
“We have trained the volunteers and asked them to talk about three things to the people while distributing the guarantee card — free water we have been giving, 200 units of free electricity and free bus rides for women in city buses,” an I-PAC volunteer told The Hindu .
As Mr. Rahul and his friends visited a number of shop to distribute the cards, some were happy at getting a free calendar, while some refused to take it saying they were BJP supporters.
“When you are free, read this,” Mr. Rahul said as he gave a card to a street vendor.
Nishand (17), a Class XI student of Government Boys Senior Secondary School in Shakarpur Block, said that he has been part of the door-to-door campaign for the past few days. “In Priyadarshini Vihar and Bank Enclave we are a little weak, but in Ramesh Park and Lalita Park area we are really strong,” he said and added that the party would, however, win.
“ Barabar takkar hoga AAP aur BJP ka [There will be neck-to-neck competition between AAP and the BJP],” his 18-year-old friend, Abhishek Kumar, a BSE first year student, quipped. “ BJP ka banda bhi strong hai [The BJP candidate is also strong],” he added.
