People here want a local face, not a celebrity: Gugan Singh

A man with age over 70, clad in a yellow kurta is going door to door of every village house in North West Delhi. Once a BJP MLA, now AAP's Lok Sabha candidate for North West Delhi, Gugan Singh Ranga talks exclusively to Sayantan Ghosh on his poll journey.

North West Delhi this time has a tough fight like other seats, what are the issues you are focusing on?

This is one of the most underdeveloped and neglected areas in Delhi. After the AAP government was formed, many development works were started. Now work on water pipelines and roads are going on everywhere. But the government has limitations in terms of lands, law and order, these are very big issues. The people have very less access to public amenities, here we need new colleges, universities and also engineering college but the state government does not have the power to do that. I am addressing these issue and telling people about why the AAP raised the demand of the full statehood.

This is a schedule caste seat and you yourself come from Jatav caste, how will this caste factor work in your favour?

This is constitutionally an SC seat but the AAP is not doing any caste centric politics. I have a very good relationship with people of all the castes and even with upper caste people who live here. After the AAP came to power, we have worked for the development of every section of people. We have not done religious and caste-based politics, therefore, I have support from all the sections. It is bizarre that BJP has given the ticket to Hans Raj Hans who is not an SC but a Muslim. We have already put forward all the proofs of this illegal act by BJP.

Delhi dehat as this area is known as is always considered as a place where poor people stay and in mainstream people do not talk about these areas much, how will you deal with these issues?

This is the biggest pain of the people North West Delhi constituency. A person who resides in South Delhi is a resident of Delhi and a person from Narela is also a resident of Delhi but people call this area Delhi dehat which means rural Delhi or outer parts of Delhi. One of the major reasons for such perception is because these areas never got a leader who is connected to the ground. To represent the sentiment of these people, you need to walk through the villages of North West, you need to talk to the people, you should know what they are lacking and what they need. After AAP came to power, these areas started developing. I will represent this area to a larger platform and tell the people that this is as much Delhi as like any other section of the state.

This time BJP candidate is a celebrity and in comparison, you are just a local face, how is this fight of global vs local?

Here people want a face who understands their pain, their demands, their, struggle, their little emotions. These little emotions are very different from songs or cinema or limelight things. The emotions here are raw and connected to the ground, the only person who belongs to this place relate to these needs. Hans Raj Hans from BJP is a great singer and must be a great celebrity but people of this constituency know that he will never stay with them if he wins because his life is very different. But I stay here and always stayed here, served the people. I think that by giving the ticket to an outsider, BJP has made AAP's chances brighter to win this seat. People of this constituency understand the motive of BJP and these old tricks will not work here.