सुनो सुना रहा हूँ दोस्तो इस बार  ‘आप’ की दुखद कहानी,

कुछ आपबीती, कुछ जगजाहिर सुनो तो जरा मेरी जुबानीI

अवसर था, देश जब आतुर था लिखे जाने को कितना सुन्दर इतिहास,

लोभ-लाभ के चक्कर में लेकिन ‘आप’ बन गयी एक अनचाहा परिहास I

                                      Rise and fall of 'AAP' 

                                           

                   

Outlook magazine in its cover story of  12 March issue has dubbed AAP as ‘Arrogant Aadmi Party’. Responding to it, a reader prefers to call it ‘Arrogant Arvind Party’. Well, call it by any name, but politically, if there has been any event in recent history that gave hope to the millions of ‘clean politics’ and then proved such a disgusting let-down, it has been the birth of AAP in November 2012, its rise and steep fall. Imagine those days when Anna Hazare launched his first nation-wide agitation with the little known Arvind Kejriwal by his side spewing heat and fire. Recall his loud and vehement utterances. His clarion call and a firm promise to usher in a new era of corruption-free, transparent, performance-oriented, clean, accountable, people-friendly governance devoted to ‘Gandhian’ values. Here at last is the saviour, the superman the country has been hungering for to rid the nation of corruption-steeped political parties– the Congress, the BJP, and the regional ones in the stranglehold of feudal lords. That’s what we all thought. Sick of the prevailing stink and rot, the whole nation was excited by the promise of a bright new dawn  in the murky landscape of Indian politics. I was no exception. AK became my hero. And I too jumped into the fray, became his ardent follower and an AAP member.  With a surge of enthusiasm I dashed off to Kangra along with a couple of my equally enthusiastic colleagues to attend a regional meeting and ventured to contribute my humble bit  in letting the AAP wave sweep all over my homeland too. But with disillusionment seeping in, wisely I retraced my steps  and finally quit.

Recall AK’s first stint as the CM of Delhi in December 2013. This coughing ‘muffler-man” was still my hero at the time. But lo, he was sitting in dharnas, sleeping on ground at public spaces and shouting invective at his opponents instead of burning midnight oil and expending his energies to put in place a radically new system of governance for Delhi. I began to doubt my hero. And then after his party’s mind-boggling second win in February 2015 with 67 out of 70 seats in its kitty, and his new term, that huge edifice of hope began to quickly erode and crumble. It didn’t take long to realize that he too had packed the party with men and women with feet of clay and in no way different or better than those that all other parties are peopled by. The kind imbued with idealistic fervour, grand vision, sacrifice, self-less service and moral values were nowhere to be seen. And as was but natural, one by one, skeleton after skeleton in the cupboards of many of his team began tumbling out. No wonder a good many of the lot were soon fighting court cases for alleged criminalities of various kinds. Instead of setting an example of austerity and simple life, the AAP helped itself to hefty pay rise for its ministers and MLAs, swanky bungalows and luxurious cars. Its soul-keepers and founding fathers such as Prashant Bhushan and Yogendra Yadav had already been rudely chucked out to pave way for life of power, luxury and splendour without any voices of dissent putting a foul taste in the mouths of AK and his coterie. A sad witness to all this drama unfolding before me, my disgust and disillusionment with AAP and its leader had come full circle. I who clapped for and cheered at every word from AK’s mouth now found the  very sight of AAP's protagonists even hard to bear. I am sure quite similar must have been the thoughts and feelings of many of you as well. And you will agree that unless the AAP reappears in some new and noble avatar, it will remain a party just like any other and the posterity too will have nothing charitable or kind to say about both the party and its leader.

Had AAP been the AAP of aam aadmi’s dreams, had it stuck to its original idea of good, clean politics  that the country is desperately in need of, it had a great chance of winning the hearts and minds of people and winning many elections.  But divorced from these ideals and indulging in nefarious games of money and power play, it bungled and floundered and even lost Punjab where it stood a very good chance. In Himachal, the arrogant AAP blundered again. Out of the blue, it air-dropped a rank opportunist and a political renegade as its c-in-c to the surprise and anger of sincere workers who had toiled to bring AAP to HP.

In short: AAP came as Godsend, but it did nothing except pretend. 
A great opportunity went abegging. 
Sad, isn’t it?

                                 (All photos/images are from Outlook, 12 March issue)

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