He has the formidable backing of 53 NGOs and can set a precedent by offering citizens a real alternative to career politicians and political parties if he wins. But on D-Day, while his fate was being sealed in the Andheri West constituency, the city’s first-ever ‘citizen’s consensus candidate’ for the Assembly polls — Hansel D’Souza — appeared in no mood to sit back and watch. The management professor chose to cast his vote early in the morning and then tour the constituency, meeting volunteers to gauge the mood among his voters.

“It’s not that people don’t want change, they want a credible alternative,” he said, after visiting booths in Amboli, Andheri West. The morning hours registered 10-12 per cent voting, with a few booths in Amboli registering as much as 16 per cent voting. Meera Sanyal and others who independently contested the Lok Sabha polls in April were great candidates, he said, pointing out his advantage vis a vis the poor showing of such candidates: “A track record of social service.”

Question him on the cliché ‘David vs. Goliath’ in his context since he takes on Congress heavyweight and legislator Ashok Jadhav, D’Souza finds refuge in his management theories. “Let the political parties fragment the slum vote. We’ve done just the opposite,” he said. “We have clinically carved out our ‘market segment’. The constituency has a population of approximately 2,66,000 that works out to be 266 electoral prospects (EPs), of which 144 are middle class EPs whom we’re targeting and urging to come out and vote.”

... contd.