MCD results a wake-up call for Arvind Kejriwal; AAP need introspection

New Delhi: Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) may declare itself victorious after trouncing Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) in the Municipal Council of Delhi (MCD) elections but it seems it is time for introspection for the party.

AAP could get only 134 seats (in a house of 250) and BJP managed to get 104 seats despite claims of a ‘hawa’ in favour of the Arvind Kejriwal-led outfit in the national capital.

The razor-thin majority of AAP is a wake-up call for the party as it could not capitalise on the 15-year-long anti-incumbency against the BJP in the local body elections.

AAP leaders were hoping for a performance at par with their victories in the 2015 and 2020 assembly elections in Delhi where they totally decimated the BJP by winning 67 and 62 seats respectively. But the BJP put up a spirited fight and not only crossed the three-figure mark but also managed to increase its vote share by three per cent in comparison to its performance in the 2017 civic polls.

There have been many reasons for the underwhelming performance of AAP.

Almost all political parties face allegations of selling tickets at the time of elections and most of the time, these allegations come from those aspirants who had not been chosen as candidates.

AAP never faced such widespread allegations during earlier elections. But this time during the civic polls, allegations of selling tickets to the highest bidder were hurled freely. It dented the AAP’s image as a “party with a difference”.

Though Kejriwal is still seen as an honest politician and probes against Satyendar Jain and Manish Sisodia are considered “politically motivated, " many AAP sympathisers say electoral “compulsions” have started corrupting, at least morally if not financially, the party.

The second reason was Kejriwal’s less-than-required availability in Delhi during the campaigning as he was busy in Gujarat, the home state of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, where AAP has tried to put up a fight against the BJP.

This shows that AAP is a one-man show like many regional parties and despite being in power for over seven years in Delhi and being on the verge of becoming a national party, the party is totally dependent on Kejriwal. Besides the Delhi chief minister, there is a dearth of big crowd-pullers in the party.

Political observers say Punjab chief minister Bhagwant Mann is an equally popular leader and also has the stature as he is the chief minister of a full state - Punjab - but he remains under the hawk-eye of AAP’s Delhi leadership.

People are already talking about AAP’s Rajya Sabha member from Punjab and Kejriwal-confidant Raghav Chaddha as super-CM of Punjab.

What should worry more about the AAP is its less than satisfactory performance in some of the Muslim-dominated areas in Delhi. Muslims seem to have preferred Congress over AAP in areas like Okhla.

AAP began as a movement (anti-corruption) and later transformed into a political entity in 2012. It was a party for people of all faiths who had come together to fight corruption in the political system. But it can no longer be said about AAP after its decade-long political journey.

Arvind Kejriwal has never shied away from brandishing his Hindu identity as he increasingly positions himself as a credible challenger to Prime Minister Narendra Modi. But still, Muslims were not uneasy with him. But after the February 2020 riots in Delhi, there is a sense of unease among Muslims with regard to AAP.

But in order to remain a credible option to Modi in Gujarat and elsewhere, Kejriwal can never afford to cede even an inch to the BJP on the plank of Nationalism and Hindutva but this again shows political compulsions are governing Kejriwal. A political observer with knowledge of Kejriwal's functioning said, "Do you think he cares about all this.”

In the beginning, AAP was an unorthodox party and Kejriwal was an unorthodox leader. In his initial years as a politician, Kejriwal was unconventional in many ways. His opponents found it hard to pin him down, which led to AAP’s stupendous success in the electoral arena. But MCD election results show that AAP is turning into or has already turned into a conventional political party and that’s why maybe it's time to introspect for the party and its leadership.