JOIN USElections are busy times for not just the candidates in Delhi but their family members who double up as their proxies in marches and door-to-door campaigns.
Many candidates, across political spectrum, in all the seven seats are relying on their sons, brothers or their better half to meet people and solicit support in the run-up to the April 10 Lok Sabha polls.
BJP’s candidate from Chandni Chowk, Harsh Vardhan, is getting help from his son Sachin, 26. So is the party’s South Delhi constituency candidate Ramesh Bidhuri who is banking upon his son Himanshu, 23.
“It is a learning experience. I am trying to put in as much physical effort as I can to share my father’s burden,” said Bidhuri’s son, who is pursuing a course in mass communication.
Rakhi Birla, former Delhi minister and the AAP candidate from North-West Delhi, is relying on her brother to coordinate her campaign schedule and arrangement. “He did the same for her during the Assembly election,” said a relative and campaign team member undertaking padyatras with Birla.
Her BJP rival Udit Raj too is depending upon his son Abhiraj, 20, for his social media messages. “Abhiraj, an IIT student, is adept at using the new communication tools,” said Abhishek Katiyar, who is assisting the BJP nominee in media coordination.
Jai Prakash Agarwal, the Congress nominee from the North-East Delhi seat, has support from wife Sarita, two sons and daughters-in-law. “My wife connects well with the elderly women while cautioning them against falling in the trap of false promises of the AAP,” said Agarwal.
The Agarwal family is quite used to hitting the street to optimise the veteran politicians’ reach during campaigns. “They have done it in earlier elections as well,” said a Congress leader.
Harsh Vardhan’s son Sachin, an accountancy student, is virtually managing phone calls of his busy father. “I take calls and feed information to mediapersons whenever my father cannot be reached,” said Sachin. A Delhi BJP leader said, “Sachin is the person with whom you need to leave a message if you want to convey something to Harsh Vardhan.”
“If Sachin commits to you that he will make you speak with him on the phone then he will surely do it, even if the telephonic conversation materialises past midnight,” the BJP leader based at the Delhi unit office said.