The wild allegations about attempts to destabilise its minority Government suggest that the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) may have reached its precipice moment and fears that an inglorious fall could nip its national ambitions in the bud even before the schedule for the 2014 general election is announced. The Congress is extending outside support to the AAP, and could always bring down its Government if it sees political advantage in doing so.
Arvind Kejriwal and key AAP leaders like Prashant Bhushan and Yogendra Yadav had always decided that Delhi was not their destination but a passage to the general election where their goal was to capture enough seats to deny victory to Narendra Modi and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Although Arvind Kejriwal won the vote of confidence in the Delhi Assembly on January 2 and can remain in office for six months (up to July 2), the fly in the ointment is the Budget Session where an adverse vote could see him out of office before he settles into his new home! That is why Kejriwal was always sanguine about his Government falling after six months, for by then the decisive war would have been fought. But he needed the Delhi stage to grab national eyeballs for his theatrics; its premature loss could spell doom for AAP’s parliamentary debut.
In this context, MLA Madan Lal’s unsubstantiated wild charge that an alleged emissary of the Gujarat Chief Minister offered him Rs 20 crore to split the AAP by luring away nine MLAs, who would be separately compensated to the tune of Rs 10 crore each, reflects panic in the AAP. Party leader Sanjay Singh also addressed a press conference on Monday and bizarrely accused the BJP of being hand-in-glove with the power discoms and acting at their behest. Both Sanjay Singh and Ashutosh accused BJP leaders of fearing the rise of the AAP, slammed Narendra Modi for raising the issue of the murder of an Arunachal student in Delhi at his Meerut rally on Sunday, and countered that he should take up the issue of Nigerians in Goa.
The baseless allegations levelled by Madan Lal, Sanjay Singh and Ashutosh come close on the heels of expelled AAP MLA Vinod Kumar Binny’s press conference on Sunday where, flanked by Janata Dal (United) MLA Shoaib Iqbal and Independent Rambir Shokeen, he threatened to meet the Lt Governor and withdraw support from the Kejriwal Government if their demands were not fulfilled in the next 48 hours. Binny claimed the support of two other AAP MLAs and said he could form a new political front. His demands include subsidy on the increase in power surcharge; women squads to provide security for women; unconditional free water per household up to 700 litres; waiving of the “inflated” power bills of over one lakh people who did not pay their bills at the instance of Kejriwal and above all, a proper enquiry into the scams associated with the 2010 Commonwealth Games.
Although Shoaib Iqbal subsequently clarified that he still supported the Government, this could be the result of a backdoor appeal to Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, or a temporary reprieve till the simmering opposition to Kejriwal’s style of governance firms up. It remains pertinent that Binny claimed to have the support of 4 MLAs (two as yet unknown) and this could yet bring the fledgling AAP regime to its knees, as his expulsion has already reduced its strength to 27. If further reduced by even two members, Kejriwal will be reduced to a minority even with the unflinching support of all 8 Congress MLAs. He may opt to remain in office up to July 2 if he clears the Budget Session, but he would have lost his moral authority. Having failed to deliver any tangible results in Delhi, he would find it difficult to extend his appeal on a national platform.
The AAP’s woes have begun to mount with citizens losing patience over the government’s inability to deliver on its tall promises, particularly the issue of water supply. Party MLA Dinesh Mohania was reportedly slapped by an irate woman in his Sangam Vihar constituency on Sunday; he claimed she was a front for the water mafia. The fact, however, is that Kejriwal and the AAP have simply failed to seriously address any of the issues that catapulted them to power. They gained the sympathy of the Delhi voter by pointing out that the then chief minister Sheila Dikshit had favoured the discoms in 2010 by preventing the then Delhi Electricity Regulatory Commission (DERC) chairperson Brijender Singh from announcing a 23 per cent reduction in tariff; thereafter the new DERC chairman increased tariffs by 22 per cent in 2011 and 32 per cent in 2012. The AAP had promised a blanket relief of 23 per cent in electricity; instead DERC has imposed an 8 per cent surcharge.
Then, there is the Chief Minister’s totally unnecessary two day reckless dharna at Rail Bhawan on January 20 and 21, defying prohibitory orders and threatening to disrupt the Republic Day celebrations, to defend the indefensible vigilantism of his Law Minister Somnath Bharti. With Narendra Modi also flagging the maltreatment of Ugandan women by the AAP at the Meerut rally, and calling upon Delhi to have a more cosmopolitan character in keeping with its status as the National Capital, the AAP’s Raj Narain-style antics are beginning to invite more critical scrutiny from its national audience. Even the Supreme Court was not amused at a lawmaker acting as a lawbreaker and issued notice to the Delhi Government on January 24.
Of course, Kejriwal will fight to stay on and execute his Congress-sponsored ‘Project Derail Narendra Modi’. But in future he will have to be more circumspect – the days of “I am an anarchist” are over. Only time will tell how he reconfigures his game plan to establish a presence in the next Lok Sabha. By flagging the death of Nido Taniam, the harassment of Manipur women, and the mistreatment of African women by an AAP Minister before a national audience, Narendra Modi has put its supporting party in the dock with considerable élan. Congress president Sonia Gandhi can no longer maintain silence; she will have to take a call on whether her party can afford the odium of remaining attached to the Aam Aadmi Party.
Niticentral.com, 4 February 2014
http://www.niticentral.com/2014/02/04/has-aap-reached-its-precipice-moment-186428.html