Mumbai: Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) president Arvind Kejriwal’s recent visit to Mumbai, where he travelled by an autorickshaw and then on a local train, caught the critical eye of the electronic media while AAP’s massive meeting in a suburb barely got a mention anywhere.

The upbeat mood of the AAP rally in Vikhroli’s Kannamwarnagar went almost unreported by media even though social activist Medha Patkar, who is contesting on an AAP ticket from the Mumbai North-East Lok Sabha seat, gave a spirited speech that was well-received by both party workers and voters of the locality. They listened to her attentively on various issues. She spoke about the Maharashtra government letting the Hiranandani builders off the hook even though they used government land in Powai meant to build homes for the economically weaker sections and instead constructed luxury apartments and earned profits. At every pause in her speech, the crowd applauded, knowing fully well how she had been fighting for the rights of the down-trodden.

Patkar herself was very pleased that the rally went off well, but reticent of the controversy over Kejriwal’s trip on public transport and his comments that media was sold and would be put behind bars if AAP came to power. In an interview with Gulf News, Patkar said diplomatically: “A little more depth is needed in conveying our message to the media. The media has a right to criticise and no one can stop them.”

Talking about her own National Alliance of People’s Movements (NAPM) that she founded and fought for the rights of those displaced due to the Narmada project, she said: “We the people never depended on the media. With a mass base of several movements across the country, the struggle has been against such varied issues as slum demolition in Mumbai, Jaitapur nuclear plant, Adarsh housing society scam, Singur Tata plant and Lavasa. These agitations were meant to question the current model of development so as to work for a just alternative.”

And now that Patkar has plunged into politics, the question being asked time and again by everyone is why now and why support AAP? “For a long time, people have been telling me to join politics, but whenever we reviewed the situation, it was clear that people’s movements were far more effective than those who joined electoral politics as they could not do much as MPs. There were limitations in what an MP could do for his people,” she felt.

But the urgency of taking up this decision came about as activists like her saw the face of the state changing. “There was so much cheating, corruption and the government was not responding to the needs of people. Instead of taking up real issues like those related to women, water, power, contract labour and housing, parliament was taking up non-issues,” she says. That’s when the seniors in NAPM discussed on joining the electoral process, particularly since the youth in their movement was doing a good job and needed to be supported.

Anna Hazare’s India Against Corruption protests and “Kejriwal’s honesty, commitment and perspective” motivated many like her to take to politics, she says. She, however, does feel that Hazare’s presence “would have had some effect. It’s left to Anna who is an institution himself and takes his own decisions”.

Right now, her focus is on campaigning in the huge constituency where the rich, middle class and slum-dwellers live — all of them dealing with the common problems faced by Mumbaikars. She wants a dialogue among the various strata of society, promote decentralisation of local municipal ward committees, make the basti-level sabhas (slum-level meetings) stronger — by telling people how this could happen. “I don’t make any promises like a typical politician,” she says with a laugh. “And it’s not that people are only concerned about their immediate issues. National and international issues are also being raised by them.” People want their elected representative to play a role in policy-making, but many MPs do not utter a word in parliament, she says.