By Indranil Banerjea
Indira Gandhi once said, “We don’t, in this country, want a nation of blind followers of anybody, no matter howsoever great and I know that every great man has deplored this attitude, every great man has said: think for yourselves, test each belief, test each saying before you decide whether it is right for you and for the people.” Today, with a month to go to the 2014 general elections, described in the media as probably the most important election since that of 1977, we find ourselves asking the people of the country to pay heed to this 40- year old quote.
At a time when it was clear that the ruling UPA would not win a third term and dark room talks began within the BJP about whether or not to project a PM candidate, Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi was the de facto candidate. He won the heart of the nation when, addressing students of Delhi’s Sri Ram College of Commerce on February 6, 2013, he laid out his vision for the country: “the path ahead is development, not vote bank politics.”
The official announcement came later in the year, despite stalwart L.K. Advani advocating a policy of announcing the prime minister after the elections. With hindsight one can see that the BJP campaign would not have got off the ground had this approach been followed?
Congress loyalists fear that the party may not touch the three digit figure. The attempts to patch up a third or fourth front have dissipated from their own lack of steam. Narendra Modi’s stature is that of a nationalistic leader whose prime focus is inclusive development, good governance and the genuine social and economic upliftment of all backwards, irrespective of caste, faith, and region.
Somewhere in the midst of this consolidation, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) emerged as a new and seemingly idealist player. Entering the fray in Delhi, AAP astoundingly, within a span of just a few months, formed the government (briefly, as it turned out) and today stakes claim to a share of the national pie with a goal to win 100 odd seats in the elections. The nationwide ambitions of this party left everyone dumbfounded.
It is undeniable Arvind Kejriwal & co. had planned their political moves well before the Anna-Lokpal movement was launched, and one finds it hard to believe that — with an ideology/ manifesto that is only anti-BJP — this party spread its wings without serious covert support.
Recall only how Kejriwal suddenly lost all focus on the Congress after having grabbed public eyeballs with his attack on Robert Vadra. Now former IAS officer Yudhvir Khayaliya is an AAP candidate from Hisar, the same officer who overturned Ashok Khemka’s decisions on Vadra’s questionable land deals. Kejriwal has declared the BJP and Narendra Modi as his principal target.
All this calls for a closer look at AAP. How this party led by a self-confessed Anarchist is actually only a fervidly radical leftist political cocktail. In its agenda for the forthcoming general elections, the AAP has inducted many whose names raise eyebrows — Maoist sympathisers Soni Sori, Binayak Sen and dreaded Maoist Sabyasachi Panda who carries a bounty of Rs. 5 lakh on his head. Senior AAP leader Prashant Bhushan has already called on Maoists to join their “movement”. This surely has serious electoral implications as conservative estimates put more than 80 Lok Sabha constituencies under Maoist influence in Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Bihar, West Bengal, Assam, Odisha, Andhra Pradesh and regions of Karnataka and Kerala where Maoists have slowly gained ground.
A founding member of the AAP, Ashwini Upadhyay, has revolted against the party and questioned its links with the CIA. The fear today is that a party of Anarchists with Maoist and secessionist backing and alleged dubious links to the CIA and other Western agencies could eventually be used to launch a destabilising Tahrir square type “revolution” in the country. Many thinking persons are apprehensive that the US quest for full spectrum dominance will compel it to plan a destabilisation/balkanisation agenda for India on the same lines as it did in Iraq and Libya, and now Ukraine; the AAP is increasingly being viewed as its points man.
The Aam Aadmi Party and Arvind Kejriwal’s politics have since day one been shoot and scoot, criticise and abuse. The party has no agenda for the economy or development and its record in the 49 day Delhi government is there for everyone to see. On national security, it is hard to imagine AAP ever raising its voice, especially with the Pakistan friendly Rajmohan Gandhi (who signed a leniency plea for Ghulam Nabi Fai) in its midst. Other stalwarts (sic) have asked for a referendum in Jammu and Kashmir. The AAP also includes the likes of Kamal Mitra Chenoy and Raja Muzaffar Bhat who condemned the hanging of Afzal Guru who was convicted in the attack on the Indian Parliament in 2001. Similarly, in the matter of internal security, only a fool would believe that a pro-Maoist AAP would ever formulate a formidable and acceptable internal security policy.
In the last decade, the UPA has failed on every front; the economy has come to a halt and security policies, both internal and external, have flopped. The Maoists have sneaked their way further south into Kerala and to the East with Assam being declared as a Maoist affected state. More dangerously, it is now becoming clear that Maoists have intermingled with the Indian Mujahideen.
The people must distinguish who or rather what they vote for. In the Delhi assembly elections, the electorate was mesmerised by the AAP which had no agenda, only a glittering blitzkrieg of a campaign. Now, wiser after the imposition of President’s rule, the nation must consider more rationally whether it wants more dispersion of political authority and economic failure, more Maoist violence, or to elevate a four time chief minister with an impressive track record of inclusive development and good governance and a credible promise to bolster internal and external security and re-brand India as a global and regional player in its own right.
AAP expects blind followers for a leader who makes unverifiable claims (he might even say, A for Buffalo) and expects his mind washed topi wearing brigade to repeat the same without looking into the merits of the claim. The Indian people must not waste their vote as the Delhi electorate did. Our own destiny is in our hands, rather our votes. INAV