Parliamentary Elections 2004
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After resignation, Shailendra Singh decided to contest the forthcoming Parliamentary Elections as an independent candidate. The aim was to present the public with a new direction of electoral politics which would be against the clout of money-power and muscle-power in politics and against criminalisation of politics. It was a huge call considering the facts that there was hardly one and a half month left for the elections, there was neither money nor any organizational strength and he did not have even a single vehicle nor a house to live in. He was offered party ticket of BJP from Chandauli, which he had outrightly refused. Still he decided to contest the election on following pretexts:
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There is no paucity of good people who still go out to vote at the call of their heart.
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If good people keep running away from Politics, the criminal elements are going to get a walkover.
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The criminal elements, wielding money-power and muscle-power have deliberately made the elections costly enough to alienate the common man from fighting elections. Since every party is fielding same type of candidate, the common man has also lost interest in voting. Thus under a well thought strategy, common man is being alienated from both processes of democracy - contesting elections and voting. So, what we are having today may better be called a pseudo-democracy. This process has to be reversed.
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Elections can be fought even without money, by small contributions from the voters themselves, if the candidate is good enough. And this needs to be shown. If the public chooses a candidate contesting without money, he will be the true representative of the public, working for the public and not for the financers of his election expenses.
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If the public elects good people contesting without money or muscle-power, the political parties will also, in time, understand what the public actually wants. Then they will also start giving tickets to good workers of the party, who today, in spite of all the efforts being put in, cannot even dream of getting party ticket without having money or muscle power. This trend may usher in a new direction in Indian politics, and then only we can have Democracy in true sense of the term.
Thus, he went to file his nomination papers, standing on a cycle-rickshaw, without a single vehicle, but surrounded by thousands of supporters. The election campaign was unprecedented. The people of Varanasi had never witnessed such a thing. Thousands of rupees got collected at every election meeting from the 1 rupee - 2 rupee contributions from the general public. Huge gatherings listened him speaking at public meetings with pin-drop silence. There was a large vehicle procession comprising about 50 four-wheelers and about 400 two wheelers, all of it brought in by self motivated people using there own petrol.
Though he lost the election, may be due to lack of expertise or lack of time or lack of poll management, he succeeded in showing a new way of contesting elections to the people of Varanasi. He secured record number of votes ever polled by an independent candidate in Varanasi.
After elections, he has embarked on the mission of presenting a Vikalp - an alternative to the existing system in political, social, economic and cultural fields. Also he felt the need of a common platform for all organizations working with similar objectives. Thus he constituted the Vikalp Manch to work towards these objectives.