Benito Z. Swu
[dropcap]T[/dropcap]he coming together of like minded people gave birth to the Aam Admi Party (APP). Arvind Kejriwal played what he preached and the people of Delhi gave Kejriwal and his Aam Admi Party a verdict in the Delhi assembly election held in the later part of the 2013 which catapulted the AAP as the close second largest political party in terms of numbers to the legislative assembly. It was by no means was a very huge achievement for a nascent first timer political party and the individuals that constituted the party.Inorder to keep the BJP out, the Congress offered unconditional outside support to Kejriwal and thus the AAP’s government was formed in Delhi. But to let things settle in the right perspective, when was there ever a political party and that too the Congress whose meaning of the ‘unconditional support’ was without of that Shylock’s pound of flesh? Any whatever reason, but that 49 days of power enabled Arvind Kejriwal to exactly know where Delhi stood, what can be done, and what cannot. As it is, it is not for nothing that Arvind Kejriwal had earlier in 1995 joined the Indian Revenue Service (IRS) as Joint Commissioner in the income tax department, and resigned from the said post only in 2006. More importantly, Arvind Kejriwal most probably was very aware that Anna Hazare, his mentor in their Anti-corruption movement was not agreeable in the first place of him joining electoral politics, and as such, the easiest and the fastest way to commit political Hara Kiri was to be the head of a henpecked government and hence resigned in Feb. 2014. That 49 days in power however enabled Arvind Kejriwal to read the minds of his close disciples. In the formation of his cabinet, the allocation of portfolios and its aftermath, was the opportunity for Arvind Kejriwal to peep into and see the true colors of his party men and women. After his resignation, Arvind Kejriwal was hounded as the runaway man from his responsibility to and for the people, a great betrayal of the people’s trust and someone who was selfish with too big a foot for his boots.
Out of power and with only, if at all, favorable public opinion at its lowest ebb, hammered down all the more with the well thought over “did I not tell you so?” public siding statement after statements of both the BJP and the Congress, that the AAP is not even worth the effort of the criticisms that was coming its way, that the AAP of a Kejriwal was nothing but just a flash in the frying pan. That all these was bound to happen, and that politics is a different ball game not for everybody. The rhetoric against the AAP and its chief architect was indeed unforgiving. All these hammering down of nails in the coffin of the Kejri AAP was more than enough for the black sheeps and the wolves in the sheep’s clothings within the AAP to muster up the courage to expose their true colors. That the AAP was a big mistake, that Kejriwal was nothing but an opportunistic dictator and a maverick with a hooping cough and a tie around semi woolen muffler which would sooner and not later get tighter and choke him to death.
Then came the Lok-Sabha election with Narendra Modi the all conquering Alexander, sweeping away India with nothing but Kejriwal’s broom including all the seven in Delhi. The unspoken message but clear as daylight to even the dim-eyed, and again that unspoken message but very much audible as that roar of a thunder storm to even the dim-eared, was that the pretender was dead. The conventional wisdom and saying is that “the King is dead, long live the king.” The explanation was that Kejriwal is and was never a king, but a pretender. And a pretender dies and gets buried just for once and forgotten.
Anyway it is always better to be on the safer side and as such the last nail in the coffin of KejriAAP would be the time period extended for the calling of election to the Delhi assembly. That extended time period would be for all those good disgruntled people in the AAP, those blacksheeps, those future minding ambitious people still in the AAP, those returnees of the AAP misadventure, those intelligent leaders in the AAP waking up to reality. Infact all of AAP to the BJP. Even Kejri himself. Optimism was the key. Or so Amit Shah thought. Unfortunately, overconfidence, arrogance, and taking people for granted attitude, rode thoroughshed over this optimism. The most probable thinking that minority bashing would consolidate the majority moderate Hindu vote all but backfired. It is but another story that in many ways the demise of the 49 days old AAP government, in its very dead, had insured a new life of assured survival and victory. Much like our own Rio who in his defeat was successful in bringing about victory by uniting all the constituents of the NPF party of which he is the pioneer and infact his baby, with the visionary motto which reads “Unity”.
Had the BJP led NDA government called for the Delhi Assembly election soon in the aftermath of the Lok Sabha elections, the 67 that is AAP today would have been 67 if not 70 in BJP’s kitty. Yes, so many incidents of minority bashing in words and deeds did BJP no good. However it is not as if the discontent of the minorities against the BJP leaderships silence and inaction to the various atrocities had resulted in the BJP’s ignonimous defeat in Delhi. It was very much the majority Hindu vote that is responsible for the AAP’s victory and the BJP’s defeat. Hindus by nature are peace and nature loving, always secular leaning, always for development, and even more concerned about corruption and the Indian nation’s pride. Hindus by nature are very accommodative with the spirit of camaraderie and brotherhood. Hindus by nature are sensitive to others sensitivity. They definitely lives up to the Amar, Akbar, Anthony spirit and its image and inclination. Indians of the Hindu faith joyfully participates in the religious events and celebrations of every other faith, and this which no other faith can come to par with.
The Delhi election result is a clear indicator of what damage the extreme fringe constituents of the Hindu faith can cause not just to any particular political party, but the nation as a whole. The BJP leadership will be doing not for anybody but for itself a very big favor by reining in and nipping in the bud such extremes because ultimately it will not be the minorities but the much majority moderate common people of the Hindu faith that will bring down the BJP just as they have elevated the BJP to where it is today. And all the more reason for the BJP to be careful is to unknowingly play into the hands of her adversaries both at home and beyond the geographical borders who always loves to provoke even when not provoked, the tit for tat attitude of India’s not exactly friendly neighbors be it in the north, the north-west, the north-east and also the south irrespective of the size. As it is, we are today living in the time where a gunpowder pack does not need some big fire. It is just that careless cigarette butt. And it is not those fringe rhetoric sounding extremes in the BJP, but the common Indian civilian people irrespective of faith to which they belong to, who suffers, gets maimed or gets killed.
We can see parallels in Kejriwal’s roller coaster ride of a political fairy tale with the times and political turmoil in our homeland here in Nagaland, and have all the very good reasons to keep our chins up for keeping on living in defeat and in death.
