Dear Arvind,
Hope you are doing well. Hope you have had a good start (or restart) in Delhi and hope your government will live upto the expectations of the people of Delhi who have given you and your party, such a massive mandate. Obviously, they expect you to do exceedingly well. As a well-wisher and supporter of AAP, I wish you and your government the very best.
This letter of mine has nothing to do with your government in Delhi. I write this as someone who is not from Delhi, but an admirer and supporter of AAP. When AAP was founded, like any other newly formed party, it had nothing to showcase. It only had some things to offer and a lot of us who believed cleaning up of politics is important, who thought we need leaders who are incorruptible, who thought that there is a need for greater transparency in the functioning of governments, who lamented at the lack of transparency in funding of political parties were impressed by AAP's ideology. I personally believe that until recently, AAP stood up to most of our expectations when it comes to sticking to its ideology. However, unfortunately, during the fight to win Delhi elections, I started noticing a gradual dilution of the principles on which AAP was formed.
There were several allegations. To name a few, there were allegations regarding stocking of liquor by one of your candidates, some reports raised doubts on the background of some of your candidates, there has been an allegation that one of your candidates who is now a minister has a fake law degree and there was also a question of funding from 'shell companies'. Unfortunately, except in the case of allegations regarding funding, where your leaders did give a reasonable explanation, AAP's leaders seemed to be showing strange reluctance to come up with convincing answers to these allegations. Since the focus was more on elections back then and the other parties seemed to be facing bigger problems, these issues and the gradual deviation from the AAP's founding ideology didn't seem to draw too much attention.
While I was hoping that at least after the elections, you all would ponder over the dilution of principles, you didn't seem to bother. It looked like just because you won handsomely, you believed that there's no need to look back at your mistakes. However, it was slightly relieving to notice that a couple of senior leaders in the party seemed to realize that there is a need to fix certain things. In the letters that came out, there was clearly an admission of loopholes and rightly so, there were concerns raised on the functioning of the party. Unfortunately, this is being projected only as "rift" within the party. Yes, there could be personal ego, political ambitions and insecurity involved which only you all can find solutions for between yourselves. As an AAP supporter, I'm not particularly bothered about the infighting, but I'm definitely bothered about the questions that have been raised by Yogendra Yadav and Prashant Bhushan.
Let us assume that these two leaders do have some personal enmity against you as your supporters seem to be suggesting. Let us also assume, though it's hard to believe, that these two worked against your party in the Delhi elections. How does it have anything to do with the concerns they have raised? In the most recent letter whose authenticity isn't being questioned by anyone (here is the letter), the demands of Yogendra Yadav and Prashant Bhushan have been quite reasonable. What's alarming is that none of the leaders who are supporting you have been agreeing that these are valid demands. The demands, if met, will try to bring more opinions on board while important decisions are taken in the party and will thus help encouraging internal democracy, will help the party to be more vigilant so that unethical behaviour is prevented and the code of conduct of office bearers is monitored, will help bring in greater transparency in the functioning of the party and will try to bring back the party to its core ideology which the party seems to be deviating from recently.
Shouldn't all these concerns have been your concerns too? You might agree or not agree on the solutions that have been proposed in the letter, but as the national convener of the party, do you agree that the issues raised deserve attention? If you think you should be more worried about governing Delhi now, isn't it your responsibility to instruct or assist others to address these issues? It is shocking that you are trying to stay away from this and the leaders who are unconditionally supporting you and want the dissent voices out of the party have reduced this to a personal fight and are conveniently ignoring the issues that have been raised.
Like I said earlier, as a party, AAP had nothing to showcase as its achievements. Yet, the people trusted you. They believed that your intentions were good. They believed that you would stick to your ideology. They gave you 28 seats in the very first election you contested. Even after you were badly defeated in the general elections and it was so easy to get demotivated, the volunteers stood by you. Now by behaving as if the governance in Delhi is all that matters, you are letting down all those volunteers and supporters who stood with AAP because of the principles it claimed to stick to. Please understand that it is your duty to address the issues that have been raised. You have always claimed that AAP is not like any other party. Unfortunately, now it looks like all that matters to you is the victory in elections.
The issues that have been raised by Yogendra Yadav and Prashant Bhushan are the issues that have also been bothering thousands of volunteers who worked for your party. These are not baseless accusitions by a rival group. These are issues that have been raised by AAP's own leaders who have had high credibility so far. Can we please expect you to shed your arrogance and address these issues? If the allegations aren't true, can you please come up with convincing explanations? Would you please stop letting the volunteers down? Will you please speak?
With Regards,
An AAP supporter
Hope you are doing well. Hope you have had a good start (or restart) in Delhi and hope your government will live upto the expectations of the people of Delhi who have given you and your party, such a massive mandate. Obviously, they expect you to do exceedingly well. As a well-wisher and supporter of AAP, I wish you and your government the very best.
This letter of mine has nothing to do with your government in Delhi. I write this as someone who is not from Delhi, but an admirer and supporter of AAP. When AAP was founded, like any other newly formed party, it had nothing to showcase. It only had some things to offer and a lot of us who believed cleaning up of politics is important, who thought we need leaders who are incorruptible, who thought that there is a need for greater transparency in the functioning of governments, who lamented at the lack of transparency in funding of political parties were impressed by AAP's ideology. I personally believe that until recently, AAP stood up to most of our expectations when it comes to sticking to its ideology. However, unfortunately, during the fight to win Delhi elections, I started noticing a gradual dilution of the principles on which AAP was formed.
There were several allegations. To name a few, there were allegations regarding stocking of liquor by one of your candidates, some reports raised doubts on the background of some of your candidates, there has been an allegation that one of your candidates who is now a minister has a fake law degree and there was also a question of funding from 'shell companies'. Unfortunately, except in the case of allegations regarding funding, where your leaders did give a reasonable explanation, AAP's leaders seemed to be showing strange reluctance to come up with convincing answers to these allegations. Since the focus was more on elections back then and the other parties seemed to be facing bigger problems, these issues and the gradual deviation from the AAP's founding ideology didn't seem to draw too much attention.
While I was hoping that at least after the elections, you all would ponder over the dilution of principles, you didn't seem to bother. It looked like just because you won handsomely, you believed that there's no need to look back at your mistakes. However, it was slightly relieving to notice that a couple of senior leaders in the party seemed to realize that there is a need to fix certain things. In the letters that came out, there was clearly an admission of loopholes and rightly so, there were concerns raised on the functioning of the party. Unfortunately, this is being projected only as "rift" within the party. Yes, there could be personal ego, political ambitions and insecurity involved which only you all can find solutions for between yourselves. As an AAP supporter, I'm not particularly bothered about the infighting, but I'm definitely bothered about the questions that have been raised by Yogendra Yadav and Prashant Bhushan.
Let us assume that these two leaders do have some personal enmity against you as your supporters seem to be suggesting. Let us also assume, though it's hard to believe, that these two worked against your party in the Delhi elections. How does it have anything to do with the concerns they have raised? In the most recent letter whose authenticity isn't being questioned by anyone (here is the letter), the demands of Yogendra Yadav and Prashant Bhushan have been quite reasonable. What's alarming is that none of the leaders who are supporting you have been agreeing that these are valid demands. The demands, if met, will try to bring more opinions on board while important decisions are taken in the party and will thus help encouraging internal democracy, will help the party to be more vigilant so that unethical behaviour is prevented and the code of conduct of office bearers is monitored, will help bring in greater transparency in the functioning of the party and will try to bring back the party to its core ideology which the party seems to be deviating from recently.
Shouldn't all these concerns have been your concerns too? You might agree or not agree on the solutions that have been proposed in the letter, but as the national convener of the party, do you agree that the issues raised deserve attention? If you think you should be more worried about governing Delhi now, isn't it your responsibility to instruct or assist others to address these issues? It is shocking that you are trying to stay away from this and the leaders who are unconditionally supporting you and want the dissent voices out of the party have reduced this to a personal fight and are conveniently ignoring the issues that have been raised.
Like I said earlier, as a party, AAP had nothing to showcase as its achievements. Yet, the people trusted you. They believed that your intentions were good. They believed that you would stick to your ideology. They gave you 28 seats in the very first election you contested. Even after you were badly defeated in the general elections and it was so easy to get demotivated, the volunteers stood by you. Now by behaving as if the governance in Delhi is all that matters, you are letting down all those volunteers and supporters who stood with AAP because of the principles it claimed to stick to. Please understand that it is your duty to address the issues that have been raised. You have always claimed that AAP is not like any other party. Unfortunately, now it looks like all that matters to you is the victory in elections.
The issues that have been raised by Yogendra Yadav and Prashant Bhushan are the issues that have also been bothering thousands of volunteers who worked for your party. These are not baseless accusitions by a rival group. These are issues that have been raised by AAP's own leaders who have had high credibility so far. Can we please expect you to shed your arrogance and address these issues? If the allegations aren't true, can you please come up with convincing explanations? Would you please stop letting the volunteers down? Will you please speak?
With Regards,
An AAP supporter
