VIEW | Why Congress must thank AAP for its Karnataka election victory, AAP leader writes

>The top issues the electorate was hinging its vote on was economic distress and inflation.

> A welfare model of addressing economic anxieties through broad-based, but direct benefit programs that blunt the sharp edges of inflation has proved to be a winning formula, previously for Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in Delhi and Punjab and now for the Congress in Karnataka.

Claims of Congress supporters that Rahul Gandhi's Bharat Jodo Yatra had any impact on the election outcome have no basis in data or evidence. Even this Hindustan Times article that established a marginal vote share increase was merely a correlation with no evidence to suggest that the Yatra had anything to do with that vote share increase - as the authors themselves admit.

In fact, data from the C-Voter tracker conducted in the aftermath of the Yatra shows how little of an impact it had on the favorability rating of Rahul Gandhi. The CSDS-Lokniti exit poll shows us that only 37 percent of Congress voters had made up their minds to vote for the party before campaigning began.

The vast majority of Congress supporters, a staggering 63 percent, decided on the eve of the election. In addition, the Yatra passed through the Old Mysuru Region (OMR) where the Congress drew votes away from the Janata Dal (Secular), a factor that has a clear link with its better performance, as opposed to Gandhi’s Yatra.

According to the AxisMyIndia exit poll, 10 percent of all Congress voters identified the primary reason for their voting choice being that they wanted to change the BJP government. Nine percent of them said they were voting against inflation, and other nine percent said they were voting for the Congress' electoral promises.

What were the Congress’ promises? They were an unoriginal lift of the AAP’s manifesto for Delhi and Punjab, as Arvind Kejriwal claimed recently. Even the word ‘guarantees’ which AAP had used in place of the word ‘promises’ was adopted by the Congress. The promise of 200 units of free power, free transportation for women, monthly income for women, and unemployment allowances for the youth—this is the Kejriwal playbook that helped Congress win.

The reason that guarantees of direct benefits seem to go a long way with India’s electorate is that we are experiencing what economist Rathin Roy has characterised as a middle-income trap — where after India’s high-growth decade has given way to a low growth period, people at the bottom of the pyramid (and this is a very flat pyramid) are experiencing significant wage stagnation.

India’s masses are not reaping the benefits of its ongoing economic growth to the extent they may have in the past. As the country figures out its long-term economic direction, and finds new sources of growth, in the meanwhile people are hurting.

This is why they are responding very clearly to promises of “freebies” - not out of greed, but out of a survival instinct. Outside of the immediate benefits for political parties that make this case, expanding incomes of people at the base of the pyramid can also replicate some of the demand-driven growth effects, even if for the short term.

The Congress party's victory in Karnataka should not be misconstrued as an overwhelming mandate in support of Rahul Gandhi’s Bharat Jodo Yatra. Instead, it is a sign that AAP’s model of welfare has caught people’s imagination. Where AAP cannot capitalise on it, other parties may be able to.

It also provides a template for the Opposition for 2024. If at all the Opposition has to defeat the Modi juggernaut, they must develop the muscle to craft policies that address their urgent economic needs, and they will be rewarded. The unfortunate reality is that voters have not responded to ideology as a driver of elections - neither today, nor in the past. Ideology has always been top down, whether in Nehru’s India, or in Modi’s.