Time for retrospection

Now that canvassing has finished, it is time that we did a bit of introspection on the discussions we had with the citizens at the other end of the phone.

I started the calls from the 13 th October and in the initial stages did about 10 to 15 calls.

The first objection I received was on the 15th when one person informed that he wanted to vote for AAP but would not because of Deshraj Raghav. On the 21st October, I got the first information of duplicate calls being made. This complaint surfaced every few days. In future we should make some arrangement to reduce this problem as it is annoying to the people and may affect our votes.

On the 24th, I received the first shout down from a Modi supporter.

On the 30th, one of the called person stated although he would like to vote for AAP but Sanjay Singh of Congress was his friend and he would vote for Congress. This type statement occurred a number of times in the course of the campaign wherein the voter preferred the AAP but for personal reasons of friendship he would vote either for the Congress or the BJP. We can do nothing in this.

Disconnection was also a common problem. In such cases it is difficult to gauge whether the person has done so because she (mostly) is busy or she is annoyed with AAP’s pesky calls. Although it may mean a NO but it could also mean UNDECIDED.

On the 26th I received a request from a lady which almost wrenched my heart. She said, see we are voting for you but don’t let us down. We have been repeatedly let down by the present parties and if you too fail us, we will never believe anyone who promises to fight corruption.

This argument was repeated by a number of persons in the course of my daily calls. I think our leaders should heed these entreaties and not divert from the path we have set for ourselves.

On the 28th one enthusiastic lady teacher informed how they had discussed the elections in their school which was going to be used as a polling booth. They had all agreed to vote for AAP.

On the 29th November one person was definitely annoyed on Arvind’s statement of the Batala encounter and another was annoyed at his meeting the Moulvi, in spite of Arvind issuing a clarification.

On the 30th one person surprised me when he said he would use the NOTA button as he was dissatisfied with both the Congress and BJP and would not give AAP a chance, Another person told me that he had at least 300 votes under him and the BJP was throwing money to the people and asked me to meet him. I told him I was in Kolkata. He then asked me to ask someone from AAP to meet him, probably to negotiate. I ignored him, telling him we do not offer money.

Today, the 2nd. One chirpy lady was very enthusiastic in her support to us, She said her whole family would vote for us. We should give AAP a chance. This refrain was echoed by many many voters. They also asked if they could help us in any other way. Today there was a young lady who took a lot of convincing regarding the sting operation, source of funds etc. etc. But I was finally able to win her over. It took me about 10 minutes.

Since I noted down all the numbers I called in Excel, I have, as they say, all the raw data.

To complete the work, on the 8th, after the results declare us winners, as I expect they will, I propose to thank all those who promised to vote for us.

I suggest, we should all do that.