 "Kapil Mishra")
The buzz in Delhi Secretariat is that the post of law minister is jinxed; first it was Somnath Bharti's controversial tenure during the Aam Aadmi Party's 49-day stint in power, and now Jitender Singh Tomar has been engulfed in a fake degree scandal. So when the party battling a credibility crisis had to select a new minister, it went for enthusiasm and a clean track record over other attributes.
Unlike the previous incumbents, Delhi's new law minister, 34-year-old Kapil Mishra, does not hold a degree in law. Mishra, an MLA from Karawal Nagar and Delhi Jal Board's vice-chairman, instead has a Master's degree in social work from Delhi University. But the new minister does not perceive his lack of legal education as a drawback for the "challenging" assignment; "One needs an understanding of the subject and people skills," he says matter of factly.
In the three months as vice-chairman of the Delhi Jal Board, Mishra made a mark by winning the trust of Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal for whom ensuring steady water supply to households was a big election issue. With water woes topping the list of grievances of citizens in the capital, especially in peak summer, Mishra urged the Jal Board to install a system that would enable people to track water tankers. The tracking system was inaugurated last week.
An active user of social media, Mishra is vocal about his achievements. The Jal Board, under him, was one of the only departments to bring out a booklet of its achievements in the first 100 days of the government. To his delight, the hashtag #100daysofDJB trended on Twitter all day.
Mishra, who came into contact with Kejriwal when the latter's NGO, Parivartan, was spearheading the campaign for the Right to information, established himself as an activist while still in college. He started a youth forum "Youth for Justice" when he was a student at Delhi's Ambedkar College. The forum took up several social issues, including mobilising public support in the Jessica Lall murder case. Mishra has also written a book called It's Common versus Wealth on the allegations of corruption in the 2010 Commonwealth Games.
After a stint as policy officer in NGOs Greenpeace and Amnesty International in Delhi, Mishra gravitated towards political activism and the Aam Aadmi Party. Mishra's mother, Annapoorna Mishra, has been a loyal Bharatiya Janata Party worker for over two decades and a former mayor of the East Delhi Muncipal Corporation, but Mishra chose to strike out in a new direction. Asked why he did not follow in his mother's footsteps, he says, "I always found a lack of honesty in the traditional parties, the BJP and Congress. They are also out of touch with issues facing the common man; while the BJP uses the religious tag, Congress uses the emotional tag." The Aam Aadmi Party, he says, was the "natural choice" for the social activist in him.
Party leaders describe Mishra as a "committed and enthusiastic worker" who has been at the forefront of every protest organised by the Aam Aadmi Party so far. A familiar face on television, Mishra also spearheaded the signature campaign in support of Kejriwal when Yogendra Yadav and Prashant Bhushan objected to the party's "authoritarian" leadership.
While Mishra was not successful in his first outing as a candidate in 2013 from Karawal Nagar in north-east Delhi, in 2014 he won the same seat by a margin of 44,431 votes. A Kejriwal loyalist, his high visibility made him the constituency in-charge in Varanasi for Kejriwal during the 2014 Lok Sabha elections.
Mishra constantly keeps in touch with people through Facebook and Twitter and describes himself as a "social entrepreneur". He says the "ability to bring change" keeps him going. Appropriately enough, his Twitter handle is called @kapil_change.
