‘Politics has changed, focus now on performance’

ALWAR: He has been (and continues to be) a well-regarded backroom strategist. He has been a Rajya Sabha member for 12 years. He is a Union minister. Now, Bhupender Yadav (54) is contesting his maiden election from Rajasthan’s Alwar Lok Sabha constituency, and said he has found the experience “empowering”. He spoke to Smriti Kak Ramachandran about his promises to the people of Alwar, and the BJP’s developmental agenda. Edited excerpts:

From being one of the main strategists for the BJP, helping plan the elections and overseeing contests to fighting your maiden poll. What is the experience like?

That (strategy) was organisational work and this (contesting polls) means going to the people...When you contest polls, you have to focus on certain issues, answer people, and I thank the leadership for this opportunity. This election has been very empowering for me. Yeh ek takt ka chunav raha hai. I have received a lot of love, support and encouragement from all communities.

What are your priorities for the constituency?

As a member of the Union government, I have travelled across the country to carry out Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s development agenda. But after travelling across villages, I decided that if I get a chance to become a Lok Sabha MP, the first thing will be to fulfil a promise that has been made in our party’s ‘sankalp patra’ (manifesto) and is Modi ji’s promise, providing water through the Jal Jeevan Mission. It will be a challenge to meet this promise, but after witnessing the corruption that was prevalent during the Congress regime, and the struggles that women face to get water, I have resolved that there will be no discrimination in ensuring that amenities are provided to people. The second issue that needs to be addressed is the falling water table in this area. We have industries in Neemrana and Bhiwadi; we have the tiger reserve in Sariska; if we don’t take immediate measures, the situation will get worse. There are so many villages and old havelis that are lying vacant; when I asked why there are no people, I was told that they left because of salty water. We will ensure that the water sharing agreement signed between Haryana and Rajasthan is implemented and potable water will be provided.

Another priority area will be young people. During the Congress rule in the state, we saw corruption and paper leaks; the educated youth suffered when every second month, there used to be a paper leak (for a test for a government job). We have promised... that there will be a law against paper leaks and that we will make examinations a wholly transparent exercise in Rajasthan as well as the rest of the country.

The party has been in power for 10 years now at the Centre. How are you so confident that there will be no anti-incumbency?

If you go meet the people, you will see their support for Modi ji’s governance model. Earlier, people used to discuss which party would win and who would lose, now it is clear that Modi’s government will be back. The nature of politics has changed, it has now become politics of performance and governance. Congress’s politics is about apna aur paraya (us and them) and only oriented towards getting votes. The party conferred the Bharat Ratna to its own family members. When Baba Saheb (BR Ambedkar) was awarded the Bharat Ratna, the Congress was not in power.

The Opposition has criticised the BJP’s manifesto. They say there is nothing new or substantial in it.

This manifesto is about increasing the scope of the targets we have already met. Let’s take the case of the Jal Jeevan Mission. We have met certain targets, but we intend to do more. Similarly, we met the target of creating a certain number of Lakhpati Didis (millionaire sisters; this is a credit scheme aimed at boosting entrepreneurship among women in rural India) and building houses under the PM Awas Yojna. Now, we intend to increase that number and take the schemes further. It is wrong to say there is nothing new in our manifesto. There is consistency and continuity...

How do you see the BJP countering issues such as caste census being raised by opposition parties?

In Kerala’s Wayanad, the Communist Party is fighting against the Congress, but in Bihar, they are collaborating. There is no clarity on who is against whom and who is with whom. In such a scenario, how will these parties know what their mission is? Caste politics is not merely counting castes. The Congress has never been a party that believed in social justice.

There are allegations that BJP has not delivered on vows such as creating jobs?

People can feel the difference on the ground. Here in Alwar, there was a time when there were no government hospitals. Now, there are two medical colleges. There used to be a single highway, now Alwar is connected to the Delhi-Mumbai super highway. There used to be few colleges, now in Alwar Lok Sabha constituency alone there are eight and Neemrana has three universities. Industries used to struggle here, now this is an export-promotion zone, and all of this happened in the last 10 years. This is the biggest strength of the BJP.

Anti-corruption was a key poll plank of the BJP. The electoral bonds introduced by the BJP are seen as something contrary to that zerotolerance agenda.

No one has raised a question on the scheme per se. Today, people at least know who has taken how much money. Transparency means people should know money has been taken by political parties through bonds. In fact, the Congress should tell the people how much money was given and by whom in the last 70 years.