Talk to AK: Kejriwal Set to Take Questions From Public on July 17

The AAP government is aggressively marketing the 'Talk to AK' programme scheduled to be held on Sunday at 11 am, exactly the time Prime Minister Narendra Modi addresses his radio programme 'Mann ki Baat'.

With TV, radio and SMS advertisements along with campaigns on Twitter and Facebook, AAP's media managers are not leaving any stone unturned to make the programme a success.

To add to the celebrity quotient, the Aam Aadmi government has also roped in Vishal Dadlani, who has been part of they party's campaigns earlier. For the record, the singer-composer will not charge any fees for his services.

The question and answer session will be live simultaneously on various social media platforms - on www.TalkToAK.com, on Periscope from Kejriwal's Twitter handle, on the AAP government's youtube channel and, for the first time, on the CM's Facebook page.

Additionally, AAP's social media team will live-tweet from the session. Private TV channels are not allowed, but live feed will be given to news agency ANI. Clearly, mainstream media is not the medium here.

Kejriwal's personal Facebook page has 6.7 million likes and his twitter handle has more than 8.3 million followers.

In both instances, his personal handle and Facebook page have far more followers than the official AAP Twitter handle ( 2.62 million ) and FB page. Additionally, all social media influencers from AAP social media team, along with leaders will tweet to multiply impact.

The response to the initiative has been encouraging with the AAP government receiving more than 30,000 questions on web and SMSes. A landline number (011-23392999) was also circulated for those interested in asking questions.

The calls started coming in on Saturday, a day before the programme, as the media team went through the test drill. While the target is pan-India, Kejriwal is looking at more questions from Delhi, Punjab, Goa and Gujarat.

The Delhi chief minister is expected to take on a host of tough questions - whether it's on the '526' Crore ad budget of which Rs 86 Crore was actually spent, or the Office of Profit controversy, or the uneasy relationship between the Centre and the state government, on whether Kejriwal will shift to Punjab and on the allegations against the arrested AAP MLAs.

In a conspicuous shift from his earlier personal style, instead of Kejriwal's voice, a caller would hear a male voice saying, "On 17th July at 11 am log on to TalkToAK.com.

In May, when Kejriwal met Kejriwal met Mamata Banerjee in Kolkata at her swearing-in ceremony, one point of discussion was the role played by media during elections.

Both concluded that they needed to people's trust, and thereby elections, despite the "negative'role played by "agenda-driven" mainstream media. While 'TalkToAK' is Kejriwal's answer to Modi's 'Mann ki Baat', it is also a step in that direction.