Kiran Choudhary woos Delhi Cantonment voters with onions

Having lost the assembly elections last time, Choudhary has planned her attack well this time. She begins her conversation with spiralling prices and dwindling cash resources in every household. And while she talks, her party workers distribute a small poster of her arch rival and sitting BJP MLA Karan Singh Tanwar’s “newly acquired property”.

The poster says it all. Tanwar’s house when he became an MLA, his multi-storeyed mansion and a massive house under construction for his mother. The line below asks: How can an MLA acquire such property with a meagre salary of Rs 2,000 per month? “You have been misled once. Don’t let it happen to you again,” she says at another meeting. The hectic campaigning that begins even before dawn and continues till late in the night is, however, taking its toll on her. She can barely speak without popping lozenges in her mouth every few minutes.

“My throat hurts,” she confesses. “But they say when a bride comes to her new home if her throat hurts, it is a good omen. I am your daughter-in-law,” she says and women cheer. Though their primary interest appears to be in the onions which they know they will get for free once Choudhary is through with the speech, they are impressed with her.

Choudhary also does not want to lose votes because of the new electronic voting machines. “Please remember you will have only 12 seconds. Press the blue button gently once. Do not press it again and again,” she says. She lays stress on her ties with the people of her constituency. “I have been coming here even though you did not send me to the assembly last time. I live here,” she says. “I will vote for her. She is a woman and lives in our area. She will improve our living conditions. I am certain she will try to bring down the prices,” says Lajwanti Jain, a resident of the predominantly Jain Mohalla where a corner meeting was held this evening.

“I understand your problems,” Choudhary tells those gathered. “I have been a housewife and even I used to keep some money aside for a rainy day. But now I know you have had to dig into the money you had set aside for emergencies for everyday expenses. Strengthen my hands, send me to the assembly and with a Congress majority we will bring down prices,” she assures them.

Playing the role of `being one of the voters’ to the hilt, Choudhary walks to the temple with a dupatta on her head and prays there. When she walks out of the colony, she has the people in her pocket. It starts all over again at another colony. Where she is not being weighed in onion, she is being weighed in coins and garlands of Rs 100 note are offered to her. She walks through markets talking to shopkeepers, picks up little children, hugs their mothers and seeks their blessings. A single armed guard walks a little distance away but wherever she goes she is mobbed by people. Rest is elusive and in corner meetings she slumps into easy chairs wherever she can. For now it’s just a matter of 10 days.