Is the Aam Aadmi Party losing its charm?

The Aam Aadmi Party started its journey from the scratch and showed a strong will to change the political scene and politics of the country. When Delhi elections took place, a common man showed his anger towards the Congress by supporting AAP. The Party stood boldly against the Congress and the BJP in Delhi. It came to power by taking an unconditional support from the Congress.

The AAP government ruled for 49 days in Delhi and during that time it gave 50 percent subsidy in electricity bills for consuming up to 400 units a month to every household, even 667 litres of water to a household with metered connection was made free, no red or blue beacons cars, the party set up help lines for nursery admission and anticorruption, 5,500 autos were given new permits, directed the audit of three power companies. Then suddenly the party chief and Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal resigned from his post for failing to pass the Jan Lokpal Bill.

Suddenly the sheen and magnetism of the AAP started to disappear and getting tarnished by the internal developments as well as certain decisions of the party. Even #QuitAAP started to trend on the twitter.

Internal clashes are mostly happening over the distribution of election tickets. Shazia Illmi and Kumar Vishwas do not seem to be satisfied over the allocation of election tickets. They blamed that power has now confined to few individuals of the party. Party wanted to project Illmi from Rae Bareilly against Congress president Sonia Gandhi but she has probably refused to accept this. She wanted a ticket from Delhi. Kumar Vishwas who like Illmi has been associated with the AAP since beginning is also showing concern over the selection of candidates.

Ashok Agarwal – A lawyer and educationalist by profession and a national executive member of the Aam Aadmi party left the party because he thought that the party became directionless. He even said that the party started working like a private limited company. Actually he was not given seat from Chandni Chowk to contest the Lok Sabha elections. The party gave that seat to former journalist Ashutosh.

Former AAP MLA Vinod Kumar Binny – Binny was not given a place in the cabinet of the party. Later he called Arvind Kejriwal a dictator. At the same time he put blame on the then Delhi Government of the AAP for not keeping the promises.

Madhu Bhaduri – He was the founder member of the Aam Aadmi Party and left the party. He said that party has no humanity and moving towards a dangerous direction. He was against the way the party supported Law Minister Somnath Bharti.

Tina Sharma – AAP leader accused the party for not fulfilling the promises it made on the issue of women security.

It looks as if for the certain members of the party, individual wish is more important than the objective of the party.

Since the day the party took unconditional external support from the Congress for creating the government in the Capital things started to change in the minds of the voters. This decision was taken as a double standard as on one side the party was against taking external help either from the BJP or the Congress but on the other side it formed government by taking an unconditional support. The party should have resisted the same. The Congress on the other hand gained because media was talking about party’s support to the AAP than its terrible defeat in Delhi Assembly elections.

Good governance needs stability and experience. But the legislators of the party showed none of these. Moreover the AAP was working with a fixation that what it was doing is right. With this feeling no one can run a successful government. Government runs with the consultation of different departments not on individual opinion. They tried to do things differently and paid less attention to the administration.

Certain remarks by the senior leaders were not proving their seniority in any way. Like Somnath Bharti asked media that how much money Modi had paid them. This is an absolutely wrong question and must not be asked. Kumar Vishwas at rally in Amethi made comments against nurses from Kerala and called them as Kali Peeli (dark skinned). He said that earlier hospitals had dark skin colored nurses from Kerala and people were forced to call them sisters. Now the hospitals have good looking nurses from north India and even the one who is not sick wants to get admitted to the hospital.

Their decisions also came under scrutiny. The AAP’s decision to reject FDI in retail had been criticized by many experts from the industry. Also the AAP must understand that agitation and sit in are not the solution to every problem in governance. The party must realize and say only those things which are feasible and can be completed within a set of rules.

So can we say that the AAP is losing its charm?

Objective of the Aam Aadmi Party and its stand against corruption is absolutely correct as India must be a corruption free country. Also the party is remarkably different from the other political parties in terms of transparency, intentions and crusade against corruption but its leader right from the top to bottom must learn to govern. They should speak and do what is required. People will support the party only if the party will stand by its words and act wisely because India cannot afford learning from mistakes.

Related Information

General Elections 2014

General Election Results

Arvind Kejriwal Biography

Delhi Election

Delhi Election Results