The Delhi Regional Committee of the Communist Ghadar Party of India organised a meeting on November 30, 2008 to sum up the experience of the party in the Delhi elections. It was attended largely by working class youth who had played an active role in the novel campaign of two people’s candidates in the Okhla and Tughlakabad constituencies.

These two candidates were selected in open mass meetings of people’s committees in the constituency. This was the first novel feature. Both the candidates, Bijju Nayak and Santosh Kumar, were well known in the local areas as they had played leading roles in numerous struggles, such as for water and sanitation, and against demolition of so-called unauthorised homes.

Initiating the discussion, Comrade Prakash Rao clarified that the aim of the party in backing these people’s candidates was to develop the alternative to bourgeois politics, to develop a new trend. Why do we fight for power to be vested in the samitis in every constituency? We do so because such a mechanism will open up space for workers to exercise power, to have a say in making decisions that affect our lives. To what extent have we succeeded in developing this new trend of working class politics?

In the open and frank discussion that followed, the candidates and other activists in the campaign recounted numerous anecdotes and incidents. To have reached over one lakh voters in each constituency is a tremendous achievement. Very little money was spent in these elections, with working class youth putting in their time for the cause, on a voluntary basis, and whatever was spent was collected from the people and supporting organisations. This was acknowledged by all the participants in the discussion.

“When we sat at the polling booths, many of the voters who came recognised us and greeted us warmly. Just imagine if we have 50 such candidates sitting in their respective booths, we will certainly establish an identity”, said one of the candidates. He emphasized the importance of building the party and youth organisations in the area, without which it would not have been possible to keep up the momentum and reach so many homes in such a short period.

“People are fed up with the two-timing nature of bourgeois parties. For instance, the BJP’s slogan was that Congress rule was costly for the people. But the BJP was in power when onion and mustard oil prices had hit the roof, ten years ago. We did not sling mud at any party. We went to the people with concrete solutions to their problems. We signed an affidavit declaring that we give the samiti the authority to recall us if we betray the interests of the people. This was widely accepted and welcomed by the people”, said the other candidate. “We have to break the stranglehold of the old politics with the politics of bringing the working class to power. The old style parties want to use youth as foot soldiers. We are grooming them to become leaders of the country.”

Many stressed the importance of the affidavit. Wherever the campaign caravan went, it was widely acknowledged as the “affidavit wallah”. At one of the localities, a person asked one of the candidates, “you say we can recall you but there is no legal provision for this in our electoral system”. To which he received the reply, “Yes indeed that is a flaw in the system, and we are fighting to change it”. The person wished the candidate and his campaigners good luck in this effort.

One of the activists pointed out that wherever our candidates and teams went, even those from the established political parties stood up and welcomed us with respect. They listened patiently to our views on what is the problem and how it is to be solved.

The election manifestos of most of the parties were full of criticism of rivals. None of them matched the manifesto of our people’s candidates, which listed “what I will do if elected”, as well as “what I have done so far” and “my ultimate goal”.

An observation heard in the street corner during the campaign was, “You cannot reach any MLA from a big party without some special connection, but you can reach Bijju or Santosh any time you want”.

Many asked our campaign activists, “When are you coming to our area to build a lok raj samiti here?”

Youth activists and supporters of the party also gained first hand experience of the tricks used by the bourgeois parties to capture booths, and the role that the police play in favour of the candidates of the big political parties of the establishment.

Some said their vote will be a waste if they support us, as we are not going to win against these big parties. We asked them if they don’t support this time, how will this new trend grow and become the winning trend in the future. The activists at the meeting agreed to further develop this argument, that to support Congress or BJP is to waste one’s vote.