The Balance of Power

“Shakti ka santulan chahiye sansar mein. Aag ke liye paani ka dar hona chahiye”

-        From the movie Maqbool

That goes so true for Indian politics. And last 12 months provide a stark proof of the importance of balance of power in the Indian politics. It all started with Kejriwal challenging the power lying in the hands of a few corrupt politicians and capitalists. He shifted the balance of power towards common people by making the whole system answerable and accountable to public. Before that neither the people nor the media dared to ask one month, six months or one year report card from the government. Post that BJP came into power dethroning Manmohan regime. And as the power got shifted to different hands, Robert Vadra’s land deals were cancelled, Sunanda’s murder files were reopened, minority appeasement was put to an end and the economic development agenda was back on track by killing the subsidies, increasing railway fares and making it easier to do business. Country was lagging behind in terms of economic development and a balancing act was required to put the development agenda back on track by ending the policy paralysis.

But unfortunately it proved not to be a ''balance of power but a ‘shift of power’ and that’s why all the economic reforms came along with the power getting concentrated again in just ‘two’ hands, rise of right wing fanaticism and corruption money just shifting hands. Acts like the recent land ordinance will definitely take a toll on environmental safety and social thread & thus it’s necessary that this blind economic development agenda is introduced in short bursts of 5-7 years and not 10-15 years. Today all the BJP-led state governments and central government is run by PMO and there is no one to question internally. Major opposition party Congress has been decimated and there is no one to question the government externally also.

Shift of power in just a couple of hands can never produce optimum results. It can just produce results that lead to imbalance in the long run - economic development with an adverse impact on environment & agriculture; end of appeasement politics with the rise of right wing fanaticism; a check on terrorism with fake encounter killings; booking Robert Vadra for corruption but dropping case against Amit Shah.  The only hope of somewhat balancing the power in the near horizon is an AAP victory in Delhi. While the whole country is running behind wealth and economic development at any expense (which is necessary after so many years of poverty); there has to be someone who can raise a ‘populist voice’ against crony capitalism, communalism and corruption. I supported AAP in the previous Delhi Assembly elections for its agenda against corruption & power politics. Then I supported BJP for LS for ending the policy paralysis of Congress. But now I again support AAP not only for its agenda but to maintain that elusive ‘Shakti ka santulan’- Modi ke liye Kejriwal ka dar hona chahiye.

...still I don't support AAP for LS polls

Today, one of my friends asked me “Hey, how much have you donated to your dear party AAP for LS polls?” I said “nil”. He was thinking that it’s a joke but I was serious. My change of stance looks illogical but let’s travel back in time a little bit to put some logic behind it.

So, the story began in August 2011. It was an important time in the history of Indian democracy. There was this old man who decided to fast at Ram Leela Maidan to nail the biggest menace of Indian society, i.e., corruption. It not only stirred the whole nation but also awakened the otherwise indifferent Indian youth towards social and political issues. Though Anna was the face of this protest but it was the battery of educated social activists like Kiran Bedi, Prashant Bhushan and Arvind Kejriwal who masterminded this protest and ensured that it gains enough momentum to shake up the deaf political system of India. But after a lot of drama, the fast ended without any result leaving us again in the state of ‘iss desh ka kuch nahi ho sakta’.

But one person had the vision to craft a new future for the country. He decided to clean the muck of Indian politics by entering into it. He formed a party based on the philosophy of ‘common man’ written by Congress leaders long back but never practiced. The Aam Aadmi Party founded by Arvind Kejriwal gave people an alternative to the dirty politics of the BJP and the Congress driven by corruption and the abuse of power and position. The party struck a chord with the educated class of India and against all the set norms and predictions fared surprisingly well in the Delhi Assembly elections. Despite being in minority, they managed to form the government because of the pressure that they had created on the political system in India. For the first time in the recent political history of India, a party gave unconditional outside support to enable the other party to form a government without any apparent money exchange, ministry portfolios or fear of probe into their scams (read BSP and SP’s support to Congress).

AAP’s emergence was like a breeze of fresh air into the rotten Indian political system. First time a party raised election money entirely by public donations and published the names of the donors on its site. The 11% increase in the voter turnout for the assembly elections in Delhi was an indication of the ‘new hope’ given by the AAP. For the first time people had a voice in deciding government even after the elections. Traveling by Auto rickshaws and easy accessibility to the government became more fashionable than the naked dance of power in the form of red beacons and black cat commando body guards. People and media who never dared to raise their voice on the chief ministers’ bungalows worth hundreds of crores had guts to question a chief minister for a 5-BHK accommodation. Suddenly a CM taking a chartered flight for attending an urgent meeting became headlines while the news of excessive needless foreign travels (Meira Kumar took 29 foreign trips in 3 years worth 10 crs) and fleet of chartered planes (Modi & Rahul are using a fleet of around 30-50 chartered planes and helicopters spending Rs 80k-3L per hour) could never find any place in the media. The people who never asked the report card of their government’s performance in last 49 years questioned the performance of a 49-day government. Apart from all these firsts, the biggest influence was that AAP had made cynicism passé. You no longer need to grin about the corrupt system but take steps to change the system. If you have vision then fight elections,  if you have time then be on field to make people aware, if you have got money then donate for the cause and if you are good with expressing yourself then start with social media activism.

Thus, it won’t be wrong to say that AAP has been one of the most welcome changes in the recent Indian political arena. And that’s why I had actively supported AAP with donations and social media activism in Delhi Assembly polls but still I don’t support AAP ‘as a party’ for the LS polls and there are three key reasons for that:

Firstly, when a person applies for a higher role, he should prove his mettle in the lower roles. And somewhere AAP’s Delhi tenure failed to impress me. The government remained in power for just 49 days and during that small window of time, AAP had clearly shown right intent. But despite all that, they clearly failed to deliver the right results. And intent without results is an abstract concept which animals made of flesh and blood hardly realize. The perfect parallel from my field of marketing would be that of a good salesman who has shown lots of efforts and intent but failed miserably to achieve his sales target. Any employer would like to give him more time to deliver in the same role but they will never promote him to a higher role just based on the intent. I don’t say that AAP should have continued to remain in a ‘falling alliance’ in Delhi but they should have definitely tried to take one step at a time. They should have focused on re-elections in Delhi Assembly and the coming assembly elections in different states like Haryana, UP etc to prove their ability at a regional level before hurrying up to acquire the national stage.

Secondly for a successful start-up, one has to craft his strategy very cautiously and then show resilience to stick to it despite all the hurdles or even if the grass looks greener on the other side. I believe that based on AAP’s strengths (ideology) and weaknesses (lack of resources), Arvind Kejriwal had crafted a very convincing strategy to pitch AAP candidates against the list of some corrupt candidates and stop them from reaching Parliament. Given the lack of resources both in terms of money and time, Kejriwal designed this very focused ‘niche’ strategy. He read out a list of such 30 corrupt candidates. Even if they would have pitched 70-100 candidates and achieved 20% success rate that would have sent very strong signals across the nation. But then a little greed of achieving bigger success made them deviate from their strategy and AAP ended up pitching more than 400 candidates without any strong reason and proper resources to support them. This is like adopting a niche target and then splurging resources on the mass media. As an investor in the bright future of India, I refuse to support such confused venture.

Lastly, it’s common behavior that only bigger purposes in our lives have the intensity to move us. For Delhi elections, there was a strong possibility that AAP could move in to the power with Arvind Kejriwal as Chief Minister and people like me who were having a vision of a corruption-free, safer and better Delhi came in flocks to support AAP. But I fail to see any such big purpose to support AAP at the national level. Even the most optimistic projections from AAP itself peg them at 100 seats. As per AAP’s ideology, they will neither support any party nor they will seek support from anyone. So, it means if AAP is successful (achieve 100 seats) then we will have a hung assembly and the same story will be repeated. Sorry to say that but this doesn’t excite me at all.

Now let’s see what happens if AAP is partially successful (around 50-70 seats). This will result in the biggest projected party (Read NDA) getting stuck around 200 seats. This is not the recent Delhi elections where parties will extend unconditional support to the biggest party for gaining sympathy in the future polls. Such result will just spark the ‘bunderbaat’ of buying and manipulating regional parties and independent candidates in order to form the government. More the scope of manipulations in forming the government, more will be the subsequent corruption. Total scams value in the UPA regime is approximately pegged at 8 lac crores and it’s necessary to avoid the same mistake. Moreover, such government would be running on the corrupt crutches of the 10 other parties lacking any decision making power and we will continue with the policy paralysis of UPA government and a stagnant economy.

As of now I see best happening if AAP performs lower than the expectations. Then AAP will be limiting itself on 20-30 seats and NDA will need only a couple of parties for the alliance. This will at least give government a fair chance to perform and not blame their ‘alliance’ parties for their failures. At least all the Modi bhakts will get a clarity on the capability of their God. There are pessimists who think that Modi and his supporters can do irreparable damage to the Indian democracy because they believe in curbing the freedom of people & spreading communal hatred. People had similar feelings for the Bajpayee government but it performed way better than the UPA governments. Yes, Modi is different from Atal but he also knows that he will have to face elections after 5 years and how the Indian democracy treats the people who show dictatorial tendencies.

So am I saying that AAP has no other role to play in 16^th LS polls apart from being a spoil sport? Definitely No’. AAP has a two- fold role. The first role is to stick to its core strategy and present a formidable option to keep corrupt, communalist and criminal politicians out. AAP is the right option to keep corrupt candidates like Yeddyurappa, Gadkari, Paswan etc out; AAP is the right option to keep criminals like Sarabanand Sonowal, Pappu Yadav, Raja Bhaiyaa etc out; AAP is the right option to keep communalist people like Sangeet Som and Subramanyam Swami out of parliament. (Add Modi to the list if you believe that he is one of them despite the clean chit) The other role for the AAP would be that of a real ‘chaukidaar’. It’s imperative to have at least 20-30 MPs from AAP to keep government on its toes and be the watch dog. The presence of AAP in the parliament will send a strong message to the other MPs about their probable fate in the next elections in case they don’t fall in line.

People have seen tens of Congress governments and an NDA government crippled by alliances in the last 67 years; and is expected to see an NDA government this time. A good majority in the government is always better for the stability and help people judge the performance of a government more rationally. At least the government won’t have a benefit of doubt in next elections. My only suggestion to AAP is to stick to their strategy, work on strengthening their foundation, win assemblies in states like UP, Haryana and Maharashtra which are reeling under corruption and crime, perform well there and be a serious contender next time with a bigger purpose.