New Delhi: The Congress romped to a thumping victory in Karnataka, defeating the BJP, and exulting in the party’s triumph is state unit chief D.K. Shivakumar, who was tasked to deliver in the state after the Congress-JD-S coalition government collapsed in 2019 due to defections.
Shivakumar, along with his dedicated team, which worked with him closely in the last two years, strove to ensure that the party gets a brute majority in the next polls with lot of work at the ground level.
Along with him was his “shadow” Naresh Arora, Director and Founder of the DesignBoxed, which managed the campaign, survey and assessment at the grassroot level for the Karnataka state unit chief.
Even when Shivakumar appeared before the Enforcement Directorate (ED) last year in connection with the money laundering probe, Arora was there along with the Congresss leader’s brother D.K. Suresh.
In an interview with IANS, Arora opened up on the Congress’ Karnataka success, saying that he was not surprised at the outcome “because we have been working in Karnataka for the last two years, we were having a regular touch and feedback and tracking service system which was telling us that Congress is performing well”.
“Seat analysis was with us and we could clearly see that the numbers should be somewhere in the range of 135 to 145. Some seats we lost by very small margins, otherwise the number would have been comfortably around 140.”
Amid internal fighting in the Congress camp, especially between Leader of Opposition in the outgoing Assembly and former CM Siddaramaiah and Shivakumar, which used to get most of the headlines, it was Arora who brought both together and showed them in chit chat and discussing issues of Karnataka.
Asked how did he managed to accomplish this image of the cooperation, not conflict, and what was its impact, Arora said: “See, first of all, these two leaders do not fight with each other. This is a wrong notion. This is propaganda.
“These two leaders have their own roles and responsibilities and own ambitions and that is nothing wrong. But when it comes to the party thing, they have a common trait and both of them discuss the strategies.”
Arora also highlighted the videos of the two leaders, which was released days before the voting in the state, where both were seen talking about the policies and plan and the programmes they want to implement once the government is formed in Karnataka.
“So this is a media creation, that they are fighting with each other. When they’re in politics, everyone wants to be ahead of others, but without a party, both of them believe that it is not possible. And they work very closely during these elections,” Arora added.
Asked about that he was involved in evolving the strategy of the party for last two years so which campaign or strategic move does he think has been the biggest contributor to this result, Arora said, “It will be unfair to give credit to one campaign because Congress in these last two years under the leadership of Shivakumar was running sustained campaigns one after the other in which there were various aspects involved in connecting with the people, connecting with their own party worker connecting with youth through social media on ground.
“So it is a culmination of multiple campaigns run one after the other, which Congress is generally not known for, little known for one campaign and then gets over and then everyone gets lost. And then they come back after a couple of months or a year.”
But here (in Karnataka) the consistency was there, the hard work was visible, he added.
“And people definitely appreciate and reward hard work when they see and this is what the results have conveyed with the kind of number that Congress have got,” he said.
About how much difference did the “Freedom March” organised and supervised by his team made to improve the Congress’ fortunes, the DesignBoxed Director said: “It was a very hugely successful event, for which the preparations started a month and a half before the event. It was on record the biggest congregation of people on a routine target in independent India, as three lakh people were walking on the streets of Bangalore, it was an unprecedented thing. And 80 per cent of them were under 35 years of age, which is huge.
“It was a hugely phenomenal successful program, but again, it cannot be attributed as just one single thing which got it it is the culmination of things.”
About why the word ‘guarantee’, which he coined for Congress in last year’s Assam Assembly elections and the party’s offer of monthly transfer of Rs 2,000 in accounts of every woman did not work in Assam but people of Karnataka accepted them, Arora contended that that the word guarantee was coined definitely in Assam campaign but could not result into the kind of vote which Congress was seeking because the party did not have time to implement those things.
“But here (in Karnataka) Congress has the time, Rs 2,000 was offered there (Assam) also and same was offered here and the people were sent to door to door, social media was used and it was delivered in the form of the guarantee card to the people. And people resonated with it, thinking that this is going to come to them because people need to be explained that what is in store for them when they are going to vote or before voting,” Arora stressed.
He felt that because the Congress started in time in Karnataka, it has the luxury of interacting with people convincing them telling them what is in store and what will be given, how will it be given and what the benefits should be?
“So I think that is why the word guarantee and Rs 2,000 worked in Karnataka, and I am pretty sure that Congress will learn the lesson that they should start in time and other states also so that their guarantees or their promises reach people in time and make its impact on their final outcome,” Arora asserted.
The Congress won 135 out of 224 seats in Karnataka where the voting was done on May 10. The ruling BJP was reduced to only 66 seats while the JD-S, which was dreaming of playing a ‘kingmaker’, was reduced to 19 seats.
(Anand Singh can be contacted at anand.s@ians.in)
