Much has been made out of Delhi elections by a desperate
opposition, who perhaps see Arvind Kejriwal (AK) as their last hope of trying
to put down Narendra Modi. Modi is a juggernaut that will not be stopped as
easily, no matter if BJP wins or loses Delhi.
For AK, I personally turned against him when he refused to
target Congress in the Lok Sabha and virtually fought on an anti-Modi platform.
Plus his simplistic but effective rabble-rousing rhetoric, vote bank
politics, and confrontational style of operation seriously put me off to the
extent that I named him Kanjriwal. With every day he shifts a little more left
to the centre, which I think should set the alarm bells ringing for most
sensible people in India; especially given that India’s economy has suffered terribly
due to years of left leaning politics. Yet I am amazed, surprised, and
impressed by so many of my well-educated and well-meaning friends actively supporting AK. I don’t like AK
much, but I do admire his ability to command such a high level of loyalty in
such a short amount of time. I am not sure how much of that will stay, but it
is good while it lasts.
My assessment is that the only reason AK wants to win Delhi
elections is to use it as a grand stage to launch his next Lok Sabha (LS)
campaign. Now, that is not necessarily a bad aim. However, given his track
record so far, I have every reason to suspect that he would go about it in the
worst possible way for the country.
If AK wins the upcoming elections, I predict that he will do
everything he can to provoke NaMo. If this is about LS 5 years down the line,
we will see an AK obsessed with NaMo. He would take every opportunity to be
more than a little confrontational, which would seriously impact his ability to
get anything done in Delhi. If anything goes wrong, he will blame NaMo, but
will take all the credit for anything that goes right. I seriously expect to
see a lot of posturing and very little work happening if he becomes the CM. His
in-your-face, in-the-media, on dharna style of working will not work. We will
just hear conspiracy theories and see lot of nonsense on TV. All the money would
be wasted on populist freebies, with no investment for a permanent positive
change. The funny thing is that it will be another major strategic blunder by
AAP that may actually seal its fate, albeit at cost of 5 years to Delhi. So far
AAP has shown that they are good with tactics. However, I am yet to see a comprehensive sensible strategic decision.
However, if AK decides to listen to people outside his
comrades circle, he can take another trajectory as well. He can use the next 5 years
to actually do something positive for Delhi, to actually demonstrate his ability
to get things done. Sure, he can do his dramas and dharnas to get footage and
mileage for LS and irritate the hell out of NaMo. At the same time he needs to work
to deliver actual results on the ground. To get in businesses, create actual
jobs, reduce corruption, and prevent hooliganism from his own cadre.
I will be extremely happy to be proved wrong. After all even
Kejriwal’s assessment of not joining hands with Congress did prove to be wrong
in the last polls. You never know, sometimes even a leopard can change his
spots.
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