This
happened a few months ago, when “Modi wave” was at its peak. The BJP had just
won handsomely and the country was eagerly looking forward for some good
governance by the newly formed government alias “PM Modi” at the Center.
Meanwhile, I read a news report saying the CAG had slammed Modi and government
of Gujarat for “mismanagement of state’s financial resources” and unduly
favouring Ambani and Adani (Read the report here).
Then I asked a very good friend of mine, if this was Kejriwal’s “I told you so" moment. He in turn asked me “Who is Kejriwal!?”. This was my first personal
encounter of arrogance exhibited by a well-educated Modi supporter after the
elections. He went on to question the infighting and alleged lack of democracy
in AAP and he seemed to indicate that he was convinced of AAP’s decimation. The
alleged one-man-show in AAP, if true, was indeed a matter of concern, as much
as disenchantment among its workers and leaders. However, I thought it was
unfair to write them off and even worse to mock them for their poor performance
in general elections without even looking back at how the first timers had
performed earlier and forgetting that there was a huge wave which swept away
almost every single party that contested elections.
The arrogance of a lot of BJP
supporters only kept growing from there, with AAP not being the only victim. It
was fine though, but only until the folks in government too followed the same
path. Every time the opposition created ruckus in parliament over certain
issues, the minister for parliamentary affairs kept saying something like –
“The people have given us this huge mandate, we need not listen to you”, so did
a few BJP MPs, some of them repeatedly mentioning the number of seats the
congress had got in the election followed by a round of applause from their
friends. The PM, though initially did showed some signs of an intention to take
everyone along, hardly attended the parliament session even when he was in the
country. He was rarely present during debates and it wasn’t very easy for the
opposition to make him speak about the controversies that were making news
everywhere. In fact, the controversies
were very serious. A central minister had made a horrible remark in an election
rally, a MP was allegedly willing to preside over a mass conversion programme
in UP, another MP announced that Godse was a patriot and although these
controversies were impacting the functioning of Parliament, the government
didn’t seem to be bothered. The minister wasn’t asked to go and was instead
sent again to campaign for the party, the behaviour of those MPs was neither
strongly condemned nor were the MPs publicly warned. The Godse-admirer went on
to decide the number of children that each woman of this country should give
birth to. While some reports said the BJP did serve him a notice, he not only
dismissed them as untrue but also asked the reporters – “Ye hamaare ghar ka
maamla hai. Aap media waalon ko kya lena dena?” There have also been talks of
building temples for Godse. The Prime Minister who never misses an opportunity
to invoke Gandhi’s name to sell his ideas, didn’t find it necessary to openly
condemn this. All we heard is that the “internal sources” say that he is upset.
Does he or his party expect the people of this country to understand that their
PM is upset, even if he doesn’t utter a word? The HRD ministry headed by a TV actress
has been in news only for wrong reasons so far. Well educated and qualified
folks have been resigning from their posts, allegedly due to her display of high-handedness
and interference. The PM doesn’t seem to understand the importance of a good
HRD ministry in a country like India where people under 30 are in majority. The
government, with an exception of the Finance Minister probably, doesn’t seem to
entertain questions from media and public. The Prime Minister’s idea of connecting with people is to address them through radio and podium. I would put all these under one
umbrella – the arrogance.
As far as Delhi elections were
concerned, despite a strong “Modi wave”, the BJP kept running away and when the
elections were finally announced, right from day one of their campaigning, they
never failed to exhibit their arrogance. From abusive radio ads and posters to
the PM himself calling Kejriwal a “naxalite” and asking him to go to jungle,
their whole idea of campaigning was to make personal attacks. Their chief
ministerial candidate followed her party’s style by asking Kejriwal to join BJP
if he wanted an invitation for the Republic Day Celebrations. Yogendra Yadav,
when asked about AAP’s successful campaign replied that BJP helped them a lot.
He was probably right. The BJP underestimated people’s intolerance towards the
arrogance of those in power, the negative campaign and personal attacks on a
leader and a party to whom they gave 28 seats in the very first election the
party contested. Although it looks like AAP would have won Delhi elections
anyway, I think if the BJP government at the Centre and the party’s Delhi unit
hadn’t been so arrogant, the loss wouldn’t have been so bad. The party’s high
command was so blind-folded by its dictatorial tendency that it thought it was
absolutely fine to bring in an outsider and an opportunist at the last moment
and project her as a chief ministerial candidate. It failed to understand that
the loyal party workers and leaders could be silenced but not supressed. If
they decide, they can cause some real damage to their own party. I’m not
claiming that is what happened in Delhi. I’m only saying, that could have
happened.
AAP’s astounding victory has made
me nervous. To my relief, Kejriwal’s very first address to his volunteers
seemed to recognize the ill-effects of arrogance of power. However, I’m still
nervous. The country is going to watch Delhi closely. Hope “Janta Ka CM” will be careful not to
commit the same mistakes that his party convincingly defeated did. My personal
wish is that Yogendra Yadav should guide the party and Kejriwal and other MLAs
should listen to people like him. The BJP too should learn its lessons quickly.
Fortunately for them, the jolt has come quite early in their period. Hope they wake up soon!
