Kejariwal Struggles with AAP and Credibility Gap

Arjun Dave
27 Apr, 2014
New York City

The latest Lok Sabha election debate in India has centered on infrastructure development and corruption in the central government. Arvind Kejriwal, leader of the AAP, has attention of urban voters. AAP is driven by good ideals but his young party lacks organization to translate this to results.

Parliament elections are in full swings in India where 60% of eligible voters are expected to cast ballots in a month long election that is scheduled to end on May 14.

This is the last in a three-article series created with the help of staff at 123jump.com and Ticker.com.

India’s national elections always draw worldwide media attention simply because of the sheer complexity but these time three leading candidates are also making headlines.

India has 81.5 crore or 815 million registered voters and nearly 10 crore or 100 million are eligible to vote for the first time.

For more than six decades people in India cast their votes but rarely managed to get much in return when it came to governance, development and access to basic utilities.

Though India remains one of the poorest nations in the world, voters in India are not shy in throwing out governments when they fail to deliver. India has gone through several change of governments in the last three decades and all brought about through peaceful election process.

Voters appear to be in a mood for another change this time in Lok Sabha election.

Analysts have been quick to link the current voter mood to the slowing economy and on the growing dysfunction in the ruling coalition led by the Congress Party. However, there are other reasons that are bubbling up in the maturing democracy that is now sixty seven years old.

For decades, people in India were told that the vast and diverse nation’s economy can’t grow faster than 3% and its large population is a burden to economic development. Voters accepted for decades the slow infrastructure development and virtually no support for healthcare, education and high unemployment rates.

But in the current election three distinct group of leaders are offering different visions of India - village development, rapid urbanization and anti-corruption.

AAP Vision of Corruption and Big Business Influence

India may be poor but its democracy has a rich tradition of surprises.

Arvind Kejriwal was one of the surprises that fascinated voters in Delhi local elections in December 2013.

The former civil servant won attention of many for his grassroots movement to fight against corruption using right-to-information legislation.

Kejriwal launched the Aam Admi Party in 2012 and caused a national uproar after he successfully defeated long entrenched Congress Party leader Sheila Dixit in the 2013 Delhi Legislative Assembly election.

Kejriwal promised to resign if his government failed to pass anti-corruption bill. His minority government did not succeed in the passage of the anti-graft bill and he resigned as Chief Minister of Delhi only after 49 days. Kejriwal remains popular in Delhi but after the resignation his national appeal has taken a dive.

Kejriwal attracts attention of voters who are fed up with ingrained corruption at all levels in India and managed to accomplish several small but key victories during his brief administration overshadowing lethargic Congress Party rule in the capital city.

Kejriwal and his AAP hopes to score big and build on short-lived success in Delhi government by focusing on eradicating corruption at the highest level of governments.

Kejriwal after resigning from Delhi alleged Congress Party cut a sweetheart deal with Mukesh Ambani, India’s richest man, to purchase natural gas from his country at four times the cost of production at the energy block owned by the government. He has also alleged that part of this absurd annual profit of $2 billion a year is rerouted to Congress Party and finances campaigns.

Kejriwal also alleged that Modi sold land well below market price to Adani Group, fast growing conglomerate and port operator. Rahul Gandhi and Kejriwal contend that 4,500 hectare of land was sold to Adani at a mere price of $5 million or Rs 30 crore.

The Adani land sale allegation found to be untrue after Gautam Adani chairman of the Adani Group clarified that his company had acquired land from three chief ministers between 1993 and 2007.

“When we started acquiring land at Mundra in 1993, Chief Minister Chimanbhai Patel sold land for 10 paisa per square meter. In 1995, BJP government led by Keshubhai Patel charged one rupee and Rashtriya Janata Party led by Shankarsinh Vaghela in subsequent years charged rupees 1.50.

Chief Minister Modi approved only 5,000 acre of the requested 10,000 acres land for rupees 15 per square meter,” Adani said in an interview with the Press Trust of India.

He also added that of the 15,946 acres acquired in Gujarat, not a single acre was acquire from farmers. The land Adani Group acquired was barren land in dessert region of Kutch.

Adani contradicted what Kejriwal and Rahul Gandhi claimed the sale of 4,500 hectare and also said he has worked with state governments in Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Odisha and Chattisgarh.

Kejriwal also promised to reveal land transactions worth several thousand crore rupees that catapulted Sharad Pawar, the political strongman in Maharashtra aligned with Congress, to one of the richest men in the nation.

Pawar is known to hide most of his land deals in the name of family members and has struggled to answer his former ties with Dawood Ibrahim, the most wanted man in India.

Also, the dairy industry in Maharashtra is a huge contributor to Pawar election campaigns and the industry has financed his regional party elections with the help of price increases in milk in the state in the last four years.

Milk prices have doubled in the period in Mumbai and Maharashtra.

After resigning in February, Kejriwal, immediately changed his focus to winning the Parliamentary election and became the person with the most prime time media coverage in the last month.

Aam Admi Party has attracted several young technocrats, environmentalists, anti-corruption activists and the party has fielded candidates in many states across the nation.

However, voters across the nation do not know the party, candidates and Kejriwal well.

Voters are indeed attracted to his rhetoric but Kejriwal falls short in voters’ estimate because he failed to complete his term and resigned under pressure in less than two month.

AAP and Kejriwal want to change how India is governed but for now the party is struggling to govern itself. The party has no chain of command, and at least nine candidates of the 70 proposed have left the party. In addition, a substantial minority of candidates fielded by the AAP also have criminal records.

Kejriwal offers lot of hope for India’s democracy but he appears to have erred in estimating voters’ mood. Kejriwal has attacked BJP and Congress Party for corruption and blamed both parties for aligning with big businesses.

However, Kejriwal may be surprised with the election results. He may win far less seats than AAP anticipates and most independent polls anticipate him to lose all seats except in Delhi. Voters prefer Kejriwal to build a track record of governance in one state before staking a claim on the national office.

Neither Keriwal nor AAP has a track record that voters can rely upon.

Today Kejriwal is where Narendra Modi was in 2002 and AAP is where BJP was in 1988. It took Modi twelve years to build a track record and win three state elections and overcome intense national media scrutiny before he contested the national election. And, Modi’s future is still uncertain.

Kejriwal has no track record to support his claims of governance, and the only claim people can identify is with his decision to resign under pressure in less than 50 days.

Ministers are elected to govern and operate under intense pressure. If Kejriwal resigned in less than two months while running a local government, how he will cope with domestic and international pressure.

Most voters feel Kejriwal and AAP has lot to offer but are not skilled enough or ready to run a national government. The party also has no grass-root organization across the nation and lacks funding.

If Kejriwal does not listen to voters, he may be relegated to the periphery as once rising stars of India’s politics like Chandra Babu Naidu, Subramanian Swamy and Shashi Tharoor have been.

Kejriwal’s vision for India is to lead a government that runs on public referendum similar to Switzerland and eradicate corruption and big business influence.

AAP’s vision heavily leans on bureaucrats to run efficient but small government and tow a tough line with big businesses. The government hopes to seek public views before taking any major decision. AAP views that the government is in place only to implement people’s preference and not impose its decision on people.

Voters have no idea what is AAP’s position on economic policy, national debt, defense and national security, and trade and commerce. How education and healthcare will be provided and what the government will do to eradicate poverty and improve shoddy infrastructure and increase urbanization.

Kejriwal and AAP are driven by good principles but lack organization on the ground and the young party needs to focus on the arduous process of building an organization that works, before focusing on governing India.

If Kejriwal does not know how to build a party, how AAP will govern a diverse nation where voters are getting impatient and demanding more services and attract investment for infrastructure.


Note: This is the last article in a three-part series covering 2014 Lok Sabha election in India.