Fifty-year-old Rekha Gupta is now the Chief Minister of Delhi – and poised against her is Atishi, 43, the new Leader of the Opposition who, from her initial remarks, is determined to keep the new CM on her toes. And that is as it should be. Holding the BJP to all its promises – that is the way Atishi, the previous CM, sees her new role. She has already questioned why the new government did not clear the Rs 2,500 per month-for-women scheme which Prime Minister Narendra Modi had himself “guaranteed”, after promising that it would be sanctioned in the very first meeting of the new Cabinet. At the meeting, the Gupta government discussed the scheme and said it would examine how it can be implemented. The Gupta versus Atishi face-off promises to be a battle that Dilliwallas - and many across India - will watch with interest. A Rhodes scholar, Atishi is credited with the ideas that led to reforms in Delhi government schools. She came into her own after senior AAP leaders, including CM Arvind Kejriwal and Deputy CM Manish Sisodia, were jailed and after Kejriwal, on his release, resigned and named her the CM. In comparison, Gupta rose through the ranks within the Sangh Parivar, starting with student politics. She has seen from close quarters the internal workings of the BJP and the Sangh, and has been associated with a string of their organisations, including the ABVP and Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha, and been a three-time municipal councillor. These were just the first Assembly elections Gupta contested. The fact that the BJP chose a first-time MLA to head its government in the Capital, after 27 years in the wilderness, is a huge prestige boost for Gupta. The backing of the PM, Union Home Minister Amit Shah, BJP chief J P Nadda and, most importantly, the RSS, is said to have tilted the balance in her favour. This again shows that the RSS is back at the high table where BJP decisions are taken. In Delhi too, RSS cadres held thousands of small “drawing room meetings” to seek support for the BJP – the same as they did in Haryana and Maharashtra. Besides her gender, the fact that Gupta belongs to the Vaishya (Bania) caste worked in her favour. And for this she may have to thank Kejriwal, a fellow Bania, whose hold in the Vaishya community the BJP would want to check – the Brahmin-Bania combination being the party’s original vote bank. Chosen over more senior leaders in the Delhi BJP, many of whom were eyeing the CM’s post, Gupta now faces the challenge of taking them along, without threatening them. Given the conventional logic that women are better at multitasking, she could manage the tightrope walk. Gupta will also be judged on the energy and drive she brings to the job in operationalising what the PMO wants her to do. The module that she has to navigate is different from the one that Kejriwal or Atishi had to work with. It’s the PMO – and not the Lieutenant Governor’s office – which will have a lot to do with Delhi’s governance now. In fact, the next days and weeks will show how LG V K Saxena, who played a proactive and aggressive role containing the AAP government, rewrites the equation between Raj Bhavan and the new CMO and Secretariat. Little Delhi also sets new trends for the rest of the country. With it being the Capital, not only does everything that happens here get amplified, but given that it is a city of migrants – a virtual “mini India” – the ripple effects are felt in the heartland and beyond. The Delhi results are another proof that political parties can ill-afford to ignore women, who are emerging as a powerful constituency. Parties are vying with each other to please women with goodies and direct cash transfers, which some studies show they are putting to good use. But Delhi – with the BJP opting for Gupta to counter Atishi, and the AAP selecting Atishi as LoP to counter Gupta - has shown that parties will have to do more than treat women as only labharthis (beneficiaries). Of the nine CMs Delhi has had, four have been women (Sushma Swaraj, Sheila Dikshit, Atishi and now Gupta). Apart from the fact that each of them, for however long they were in the post, brought something distinctive to the table, four women CMs is not something any other state can boast of. Delhi has also set what could be another new benchmark. That its voters, demanding as they have become, will now need more than just “freebies” to be satisfied. Clearly, this time they wanted nothing less than a “saaf-suthri Dilli” - clean air, clean water, clean streets, clean sewers, good affordable education for their children and healthcare for all, as their basic right. PM Modi vowed to make “Yamuna Maiyya” the “pride and identity of Delhi” and revive the river. It will be easy enough to find another Bimal Patel (the architect behind the new Parliament building and renovated Central Vista) and design a beautiful riverfront on the banks of the Yamuna, as on the banks of the Sabarmati in Ahmedabad and the Gomti in Lucknow. But reviving the Yamuna is a different ballgame, and may require the mobilisation of the country’s best resources – and, if needed, the world's – making possible what has so far eluded us with the Ganga. It will be as difficult to find a solution once and for all to Delhi’s air pollution. Needless to say, this will not happen unless our leaders, across parties, rise above their differences and put their best foot forward. The BJP has an opportunity to make Delhi a showpiece which makes India proud and the world take note. It has fallen on two women to ensure this: Rekha Gupta to formulate and execute the plan, and Atishi also to ideate - and to raise her voice if it does not happen.
