I must confess that much through the India Against Corruption movement and the initial period of the Aam Aadmi party, I was living outside the country. But watching those dramatic pictures coming through a video feed in our office in Beijing, looking at the swelling crowds at the Ram Lila maidan, gave one a sense of hope. All was not lost back in the motherland and our politics was not a hopeless abyss after all. Here was a man, a regular Joe, an aam aadmi just like you and me who wanted to rid the system off corruption promising a different kind of politics riding to power. Yes, there was a sense of disappointment after the 49 day ill-fated experiment, but the romanticism and the idealism still existed. My romanticism with Arvind Kejriwal died yesterday. And I suspect so did that of a lot of people.
Arvind Kejriwal's politics had two major planks: anti-corruption and anti-communal. Just 30 seconds of that audio clip and both those planks now lie exposed. In the first part Kejriwal is heard saying 'unkno tudva do, yeh Congress se nahi hogi, dedh mahine ho gaye, unko tudva do aur bahar se samarthan de hume.' And in the second half he is heard saying 'unme se teen Musalman hain toh BJP ke saath nahi jayenge.'
Here is a man who is openly asking one of his MLAs to break the Congress party and get its MLAs to support him. And the Aam Aadmi Party's defence is : this was not horse trading, it was simply 'political realignment'. I have worked with Ashish Khaitan the journalist, and he was one of the finest investigative reporters I have seen, but Ashish Khaitan the politician and the spokesman just ridiculed the intellect of the Delhi voter. Common, you think the people of Delhi will not see through this shambolic defence? And this conversation purportedly happened during the same time when the Aam Aadmi Party was knocking on every door from the Supreme Court to the Rashtrapati Bhavan asking for fresh elections in Delhi. That was for public consumption, behind the scenes, it's moral compass was openly encouraging horse trading.
The second bit about the Musalman MLAs is just as damaging. So Muslims have been in toto taken as a vote bank and are expected never to align with or vote for the BJP. What does this say of the Aam Aadmi Party's thinking about the intellect and choices of the average Muslim voter? Just like with the horse trading defence, in this one too, one gets a hint of political arrogance. And you know why that's ironic? When Arvind Kejriwal spoke to his supporters right after the historic Delhi win he said the following words 'rajniti mein zara sa bhi ahankaar mat karna. Aaj jo haal BJP ki aur Congress ki huyi hain, who unke ahankaar se huyi hain. Isiliye zara sa bhi ahankaar mat karna.'
Since it's inception this has been the worst fortnight for the Aam Aadmi Party. It's worse than the months after the disastrous general election drubbing where the party managed a mere 4 seats. Then, the threat was from outside namely the BJP. But now the threat is from within. The party is imploding from the inside. And yet Arvind Kejriwal doesn't think he owes an explanation to the people of Delhi who voted for him and the people of India who believed in him. CNN-IBN had exclusive pictures of Arvind Kejriwal at the naturopathy centre in Bangalore. From what I can tell he looks physically alright. His limbs and mouth seem fine, he is not infirm or incapacitated. Nothing that would stop him from making a statement or giving a soundbite. We have to wait till the 15th when His Highness returns.
There is a pattern in all this which is so jarring it's hard to miss. Arvind Kejriwal is very, very ambitious, sometimes ruthless politician, and there's nothing wrong with that. He uses people when it suits him and when their utility is over, he dumps them as though they were products past their sell by date. He did it with Aruna Roy, then Medha Patkar, then Anna Hazare, and now, Prashant Bhushan and Yogendra Yadav. It's time we acknowledged this without the rose-tinted prism through which Kejriwal was viewed all this while.
Last week, outside the farmhouse where AAP had its national executive which famously kicked out Yogendra Yadav and Prashant Bhushan from the PAC, I bumped into a few youngsters. Twenty somethings, straight out of college and with stars in their eyes holding placards with the hashtag #UnitedAAP. I asked them, you guys are young, why don't you go get a job, start a family, buy a car and a house and get ahead in life? One young girl told me we believe in Arvind Kejriwal. A young boy told me if we are not idealistic now, when will we ever be? All through yesterday I was hoping that someone would say the voice on the tape is not Arvind's. Even if they had to lie. Just for the sake of those kids and millions of other volunteers who gave their sweat, tears and toil for this party. Alas, they too will now grow cynical.
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