Rahul Gandhi is undoubtedly the Abhishek Bachchan of Indian politics, a lobotomized Duffer blessed enough to be born into the right Indian family.
Narendra Modi, the business-friendly leader of Gujarat, justly earned the title Hitler of Indian Politics when he turned a blind eye to the massacre and pogrom of Muslims in his state.
And these two Prime Ministers in waiting are leaders of two highly corrupt entities, the Congress and BJP, whose rotten cores made the Indian soil fertile for birth of the Aam Aadmi Party.
Most likely, it’ll be either Duffer or Hitler who will become India’s next leader when the senile coward Manmohan Singh is put to pasture in 2014. (Unless Duffer’s cancer-burdened mother Sonia Gandhi does a volte face on beta and installs Nandan Nilekani on the PM’s kursi.)
But the $64,000 question is:
Why are Duffer and Hitler partying today?
An Indian Slum – Waiting for Relief
Dhoom 3 Moment
Conceptually speaking, a Dhoom 3 moment is one where there are unintended beneficiaries.
For instance, Abhishek Bachchan, who contributed little or nothing to Dhoom 3’s success, is probably drinking himself silly today as he gleefully ogles media reports of the film’s stupendous box office receipts, thanks to the contribution of the 2 Aamir Khans.
You can have Dhoom 3 moments in any walk of life – Bollywood, Cricket, Business, Politics etc.
Just as the Abhishek Bachchans of Bollywood get their once-in-a-blue-moon Dhoom 3 moments, Rahul Gandhi and Narendra Modi won the political jackpot today because AAP leader Arvind Kejriwal proved unable to resist the siren song of temptation to form the Delhi government despite lacking a majority of the seats.
AAP has been a thorn in the mottled, disease-ridden flesh of both Congress and BJP.
What Will Happen
Prediction is a game best left to astrologers, of whom there’s no shortage in Mera Bharat Mahaan.
But readers of the peerless SI blog have always counted on moi to help them understand the big picture, be it a Bollywood picture like Dhoom 3, or a lovely Korean flick like I Saw the Devil or the political picture in Delhi. 😉
So here I am predicting what will most likely happen in the coming months in Delhi:
* Arvind Kejriwal will walk into the Delhi administration to bat on a weak wicket. It’s a bowler’s pitch (controlled by Congress and BJP) since Kejriwal lacks the majority. In just a few weeks, Kejriwal will realize that governing is not as easy as campaigning.
* AAP will soon be beset by in-fighting and strong grenade attacks from outside, both the bane of all weak organizations. The well-meaning village idiot Anna has already distanced himself from Kejriwal and soon other notables will follow.
* Since a lot of AAP legislators are newbies with little exposure to the rough and grind of politics or governing the capital of an unruly, barbaric nation like India, they will make mistakes that will be wildly exaggerated by the shrieking clowns of Indian TV (don’t Indian reporters and anchors get training in speaking calmly?).
* AAP is still not a strong, resilient institution that can weather the challenges posed by know foes and (still) unknown challenges because it’s a young organization. Institution building is a process that takes a long time, often years, and is forged by the trial of minor challenges, major crises, electoral victories and defeats, success and failures in governing and leadership tussles. Rarely ever do political parties, movements or organizations turn into institutions in one or two years and most usually crumble quickly in the face of the trials I mentioned above.
* Arvind Kejriwal is not a charismatic leader, where the sheer force of his personality can compensate for institutional weakness. He’s built more in the nature of a technocratic leader, closer to the BJP Fuhrer Herr Hitler Modi in style than the Congress netas in functioning.
* Politics is the art of tactical and strategic compromises to achieve short-term and long-term goals. I doubt Kejriwal and his team understand the importance and role that compromise plays in politics. The AAP leaders and its followers appear to be of the unflinching and uncompromising kind with an idee fixe on corruption.
* Now I’ll go out on a limb and say Corruption is not as big an issue in the real world of India that the TV and print media and the middle class would have you believe. Indians have grown accustomed to petty corruption for decades because it delivers results. Weak governments like Kejriwal’s AAP that rail incessantly against corruption will not be able to deliver results and benefits, which are more important to people than corruption. I’d wager anything that given a choice between corruption and results, most Indians will prefer petty corruption.
* Unrealistically high public expectations and a series of crises (orchestrated both by the Congress and BJP) will ensure that Kejriwal has a hard time delivering the goods. Don’t be surprised if the law and order situation deteriorates.
* Fall of Kejriwal and his AAP could end up strengthening BJP in Delhi and reviving the Congress in Delhi, and deeply demoralizing millions chomping at the bit to cleanse the Augean stables of Indian politics.
*A lot of people are making the mistake of equating Congress’ electoral defeat in Delhi with its decimation. An organization like Congress may, occasionally or even frequently, be down in India but is seldom out. Self-interest of Congress leaders will make them united. Plus, Congress has money, a strong nexus with the bureaucracy and other forms of clout which accrue to organizations that have been grazing around the Delhi pasture for a long time.
* Obviously the biggest beneficiaries of the AAP in-fighting and eventual collapse will be the Congress and BJP. It’s hard to say who will win the 2014 Lok Sabha elections but BJP will have the upper hand in the next Delhi Assembly elections. I have seen the deadly plague in 1977-1980 when the ultimate beneficiary of the weak Janata Party was Indira Gandhi and her faction of the Congress. The only silver lining of those years for the Indian people was that the beast Sanjay Gandhi, long known for his Icarus syndrome, quickly fell to the earth in a mangled heap when his private plane came crashing down.
But there may not be any silver lining with the collapse of Kejriwal and his Aam Admi Party, inextricably trapped as the Indian masses are between the Scylla of the Congress and the Charybdis of the BJP.
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Very very well written…….
SearchIndia.com Responds:
I just woke up from a scary dream (I was in India, really!) 😉
I for one, am very, very interested to see how AAP is going fulfill it’s Utopian promises to the people of Delhi.
They are going to find out very soon that shouting from the sidelines is much easier than keeping up promises.
Along with them, the idea of a clean government might die, and that would be too bad!
SearchIndia.com Responds:
Thank you for summing up my lengthy piece in three sentences! 😉
@guruji:
While I agree with your thoughts, so much pessimism is not so good! Even if Kejirwal fails in delivering in his promises, he has already proved a strong point – that people will not hesitate to throw off a decade-year old party in favor of a newbie; one thought really augurs well for the future.
And there is no guarantee that Arvind Kejirwal won’t learn from his mistakes and try to amend them the second time around (And yes the people will be more than willing to give him a second chance)
All good things start with a small baby step… All great things are achieved only as a result of consistent failures and improvisations. Kejirwal and co may/may not fail, but in the eyes of many, he has already done something that is mind-boggling
1) Contested against a three-time Delhi CM and won
2) Had to go against his own guru (Anna Hazare) and still managed to captain his team despite the initial jitters
3) Managed to make BJP and Congress eat humble pie and play the waiting game (This being no joke!! We are talking about two national parties, who are number 1 and 2 respectively)
If SI and Guruji looked past into history, they will find that bringing a change has never been easy; the same will be the case with Indian politics. It may take 50-100 years, but let’s be happy that we have taken at least one baby step……Let’s not criticize AAP and Arvind Kejirwal because the road ahead is going to be one hell of ride for them… They will need our blessings and wishes all the way through and hopefully they will survive, learn, and prosper.
SearchIndia.com Responds:
You write: Let’s not criticize AAP and Arvind Kejirwal because the road ahead is going to be one hell of ride for them…
I’m not criticizing them because the road ahead is rough.
Au contraire, I’m criticizing them because they’re taking control of the Delhi administration when the time is still not opportune.
We’ll know in 6-months because by that time the honeymoon will be over!
//* Now I’ll go out on a limb and say Corruption is not as big an issue in the real world of India that the TV and print media and the middle class would have you believe. Indians have grown accustomed to petty corruption for decades because it delivers results. Weak governments like Kejriwal’s AAP that rail incessantly against corruption will not be able to deliver results and benefits, which are more important to people than corruption. I’d wager anything that given a choice between corruption and results, most Indians will prefer petty corruption.//
You have misspelt AAP as APP in the third sentence of the above paragraph.
I’d love to see AAP prove your prediction wrong.
But yea, that seems far fetched.
SearchIndia.com Responds:
1. Thanks, Sweetie! Fixed! 🙂
2. I suspect we’ll know sooner rather than later.
Perhaps, Arvind Kejriwal is a good student of history and will avoid past errors of history.
But given what I know of the Indian psyche and the lessons of history (Remember how Chandrasekhar’s govt fell in 1991 when Congress, then led by Duffer’s father Rajiv Gandhi, pulled the rug from under his minority government’s feet), I suspect the odds of Kejriwal’s first AAP government succeeding is low.
@SI – “I suspect the odds of Kejriwal’s first AAP government succeeding is low.”
Dear SI, I would like to quote a few incidents from Indian history in which parties have come to power promising things that were practically not feasible, but yet managed to survive the test of time.
The best example is DMK. If you remember, CN Annadurai, the first non-Congress chief minister in Tamil Nadu came to power with a promise that seemed so impossible, promising some kgs of rice for just 1 rupee. But he dropped the demand upon some good advice from his counsel.
While Anna Durai managed to rule only for a few years as CM and died as the ruling CM, his party, once called upon as a gimmicky one, has managed to rule Tamil Nadu for almost 2 decades now…
While Kejirwal is no CN Annadurai and neither is AAP a DMK, his party has come to power under similar circumstances.
However, I am hopeful that his party will survive in the long term, but doubtful about Kejirwal’s role as the CM in the future elections.
SearchIndia.com Responds:
Anna/DMK did not come to power overnight.
They were part of the DK movement earlier that socialized them into the political process long before the DMK (a splinter group that separated from the DK) took over the reins of government.
In short, the DMK had established a strong organization and extensive grassroots support long before they rode to victory in the late 1960s sending the Congress into a permanent wilderness in Tamil Nadu.
History teaches us that victorious organizations or movements (Mao’s Long March, Lenin/Stalin’s fight against the Tsars or the Congress freedom movement in India) go through a long period of activity during which they build the organization before assuming control of the government.
I cannot think of any one-year-old organization that took control of the executive arm of government and survived for the long haul.
In my not-so-humble opinion, Kejriwal should have declined the call to form the Delhi government and focused on building and strengthening the AAP party in Delhi and neighboring areas.
Instead, Kejriwal fell into the Congress trap! 🙁
@SI In my not-so-humble opinion, Kejriwal should have declined the call to form the Delhi government and focused on building and strengthening the AAP party in Delhi and neighboring areas.
AGREE.
Taking support from Congress = Giving the finger to aam janta who voted for AAP.
Unless there is a miracle AAP will emerge weaker in the next election. President rule should be imposed in Delhi for a year.
SearchIndia.com Responds:
The only lesson we learn from history is that we never learn from history!
People sometimes underestimate the Congress, forgetting it is an aggregation of the best crooks on the planet.
The future of India lies in more federalism and regional parties.
Kejriwal, Yogendra Yadav and others are good Hindi speakers.
Hard to imagine AAP winning an election anywhere else.
If they play their cards right, maybe they can become a relevant regional party in the urban Hindi-belt.
And SI, you are so sensible and informed.
You should do more posts like this one.
SearchIndia.com responds:
1. You write: Kejriwal, Yogendra Yadav and others are good Hindi speakers. Hard to imagine AAP winning an election anywhere else.
I’m inclined to believe the North-South Divide in India, both culturally and politically, will lessen only when English makes inroads into the hinterlands of North India and extends further into the rural parts of the South. But that won’t happen any time soon.
2. I too find it hard to accept that AAP will be able to establish deep roots in Southern states like Tamil Nadu or Pondicherry even if they have the support of the educated middle class working in IT, Biotech, auto-ancillaries, Research and BPO sectors. TN and Pondicherry have 40 seats in Lok Sabha, not a small number.
Mostly Modi will win the fight.
It looks like that coz he has mass appeal.
Rahul is no competition.
Perhaps Kejiriwal had been too hasty in trying to directly affect changes in governance.
He, along with Anna and his associates would have had much more clout in influencing public opinion and reforming government from the outside.
It is India’s misfortune that we only seem to have a choice of voting for the least evil between the two lessers.
A non political party could have influenced who gets into power through their endorsement, and thereby had a chance to change the current system in increments.
Let us hope that Kejiriwal has not jumped the shark with his current decision.
Having said the above, I do not think that the Lokpal bill would have passed in such a dramatic manner but the stellar showing by the AAP in the Delhi elections.
SearchIndia.com Responds:
1. AAP is a force for good, at least for now since it acts as a pressure point on the two big Indian crooks – BJP and Congress.
But to have real, lasting impact, AAP must entrench itself and build a strong organization that can withstand enormous pressure that will impinge upon it soon, both from within and without.
2. Any day, I’d credit Kejriwal with greater sense than that well-meaning village idiot Anna Hazare.
Thought provoking article.
Good analysis, that’s how lot of people feel anyway.
As you said there has to be a long road in building the organization of any political party/movement to gain some credibility. That’s what history has taught us like the peasant revolution in china. Handing over the mantle to the AAP is like handing over the throne of a Kingdom to a new born baby. Honestly, a novice cant pull off any wonders.
Some of the ridiculous demands Kejriwal put through prior to forming the government makes me suspect if he does have any any idea how a federal system functions. Anyway, now that the decision has been made, Kejiriwal has a tough road ahead and one could just hope he could strengthen his organization and maintain originality in the next 5 years unlike that buffoon Chiranjeevi.
SearchIndia.com Responds:
You write: Handing over the mantle to the AAP is like handing over the throne of a Kingdom to a new born baby. Honestly, a novice cant pull off any wonders.
Who knows, Kejriwal might pull off a miracle.
After all, even Rajinikanth says miracles happen. 😉
Hey SI, as one reader pointed out above, You should do more such posts.
An interesting and informing read.
I largely agree to the view points you put forth.
The real chutiyas that they are – the Congress party already backed tracked from saying unconditional support to Conditional support, saying they will decide on the support after how well Kejriwal keeps his promises.
The Congress and BJP will scheme together to prove that Kejriwal is an one-trick pony and, showcase him as a betrayer in front of the nation.
Though the winds of change have started blowing, difficult to dislodge the mountain that is Congress and BJP.
One step at a time, let us wish them lots of luck and some miracles!
SearchIndia.com Responds:
Congress’ greatest achievement is to instill into peoples’ mind the notion that Congress is the only party that can provide a stable government.
If Kejriwal and the AAP collapse, it will only strengthen the Congress = Stability notion.
And then there is one more factor Kejriwal will be tested on – Keeping his own men away from corruption since it is a party that rose against corruption.
Power – is an addictive stuff that a lot of people who taste it once won’t be able to give it up and, they in the process lose their core values.
Although people of India are themselves fine with corruption, if it involves Kejriwal’s men, it might spark controversies and the rival giants will make the most out of it.
No matter if Kejriwal will live up to the expectations or not, it is going to be some quite good entertainment in the coming days.
SearchIndia.com Responds:
You write: No matter if Kejriwal will live up to the expectations or not, it is going to be some quite good entertainment in the coming days.
Very true.
Bollywood has tough competition in the entertainment arena in the coming months.
Here are the top five promises by AAP.
No surprise that Congress can’t wait to see how AAP will manage them.
http://www.ndtv.com/article/cheat-sheet/aap-ki-sarkar-arvind-kejriwal-s-top-five-promises-to-delhi-461961
SearchIndia.com Responds:
Easiest is to remove the Red Beacons atop the cars!
The rest is hard stuff.
Arvind Kejriwal says no to security, also no to CM bungalow for residence….
SearchIndia.com Responds:
Moves without substance.
If Kejriwal does not move to the CM’s official residence, his neighbors will curse him daily! 😉
Arvind Kejriwal will pass orders to fulfill his election promise of providing 700 liters of water every day to each household within 24 hours of taking oath as chief minister of Delhi on Saturday.
In an exclusive interview to TOI on the day President Pranab Mukherjee cleared the way for him to be the CM, Kejriwal also declared that he would order an audit of the accounts of power distribution companies in the city to check whether they have engaged in fudging their records.
WOW ..freebies, why am i reminded of color TVs??
SearchIndia.com Responds:
Not a bad move. I hope he can sustain the supply of H2O.
Water hardly qualifies as a freebie except to some unthinking people.
Source: HT http://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/delhi-cm-designate-kejriwal-says-he-has-no-magic-wand-for-city-problems/article1-1166749.aspx
I will give you one good news everyday to start/err.. end your day with, rather.
SearchIndia.com Responds:
Please provide link URL in future when you are quoting from external sources. I have added it today.
It helps me and others to get the context of your comment.
“We’re here to break traditions; I will be mostly on the roads,”
Am I the only one who is yawning now?
SearchIndia.com Responds:
Let’s give them a few months time.
I for one will always be grateful to the AAP for screwing both Congress and BJP.