Six months after Arvind Kejriwal stepped down as the Chief Minister of Delhi in a hysterical manner, the political scenario in the National Capital Territory has remained in turmoil. Delhi is under Lt. Governor Najeeb Jung’s rule since February 14, 2014. And the political situation has all the masala of a typical Bollywood film – be it the recent speculation of the Lt. Governor calling on the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to form the government in Delhi; BJP MLA Sher Singh Dagar being caught red-handed in a sting operation or the Aam Aadmi Party’s (AAP) Kumar Vishwas praising Prime Minister Narendra Modi openly.
After making a series of wild allegations against the BJP and the Lt. Governor in the last couple of weeks, has AAP’s Arvind Kejriwal forgotten whom he is fighting for – the people of Delhi?
When Arvind Kejriwal resigned as the Chief Minister of Delhi, the actual reason behind it was for AAP’s national expansion and that’s not a hidden fact. India witnessed a historical 2014 Lok Sabha Elections and the AAP failed miserably as its top leaders and many candidates lost deposits in as many as 414 seats out of 432 seats. This was a big setback. The party that was formed ‘for the people’ got 96% negative results.
The only highlight for AAP in the elections was winning 4 seats in Punjab, but the victory was short lived as the people of Punjab rejected the party in the recently concluded by-polls in the state. AAP lost on both seats, which they won during the Lok Sabha elections, because of the lesser or no impact post-Lok Sabha. The party needed introspection and they did well avoiding the Gujarat, Maharashtra, Haryana, Jammu and Kashmir, and Jharkhand by-elections; concentrating on Delhi.
After the Lok Sabha debacle, senior AAP leader Shazia Ilmi and Captain Gopinath quit the party citing reasons of internal conflict and also alleged that AAP lacked internal democracy. Arvind Kejriwal was also pulled-up recently by another senior leader Shanti Bhushan who said, “He (Arvind) is a great leader and a great campaigner but in my opinion he lacks the ability to organise party affairs. AAP under him has failed to expand across India”.
There have been instances of dissent in AAP in the past also, when rebel MLA Vinod Kumar Binny and Ashwini Upadhyay slammed the party in open and criticised its decision making policy.
Kumar Vishwas in an interview to a news channel openly praised the Narendra Modi government’s swift and efficient work in Jammu and Kashmir’s natural calamity rescue operations. Not only did he praise Modi but also couldn’t hold back questioning his own party’s decision of quitting the Delhi government or hurling stones at the BJP office.
With so much infighting or as they say democratic behaviour in the party, is Arvind Kejriwal actually fighting for the survival of his political party? Or is he actually doing it for what his party was formed for? Or better still, is the former Delhi Chief Minister fooling himself in the name of the people of Delhi after the 7-0 rout in the Lok Sabha elections?
The only weapon in AAP’s armour now is the sting operation video of BJP Delhi unit’s vice president – offering a bribe to an AAP MLA. But as we all know, such videos surface only when elections are due. Just before the Lok Sabha Elections were to be held, AAP were themselves guilty of being caught in a couple of sting videos. Not to demean the recent sting video of Dagar, the AAP has little solace to contest the Delhi Assembly Elections, if they were to happen.
The present chaotic atmosphere in the political rounds in Delhi is nothing but harming the people of Delhi. Those who voted for change and to end the political paralysis of the Sheila Dikshit government are being the real victims now. The Supreme Court of India directed the central government to end the ongoing political stalemate in Delhi and the deadline is set for October 10, 2014.
Will Kejriwal or his one-and-a-half year party AAP survive? Or will the people of Delhi finally get a government?