Written
by Dr. Seshadri Kumar, 16 December, 2013
Copyright © Dr. Seshadri Kumar. All Rights Reserved.
Disclaimer: All the opinions expressed in this article are
the opinions of Dr. Seshadri Kumar alone and should not be construed to mean
the opinions of any other person or organization, unless explicitly stated
otherwise in the article.
*********************************
“The more things change, the more they stay the same.” This famous statement, made by Jean-Baptiste
Alphonse Kerr (1808-1890), is an excellent summary of the predicament that
the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) today
finds itself in, when one compares it to the situation faced by their
predecessor organization, the India Against
Corruption (IAC) group.
The AAP
has won 28 seats in Delhi’s 70-seat legislature in the 2013 state elections,
coming second only to the Bharatiya Janata Party
(BJP), which finished with 32 seats, the remaining taken up by the incumbent Congress party. By all measures, this is a remarkable
achievement for a party that is just one year old.
The BJP, not having gained an absolute majority, has refused
to form the government, especially since the AAP
has publicly stated that they would not support a BJP government; and the
Congress cannot be expected to support a government headed by its arch-rival,
the BJP. A BJP government, therefore, if
it accepted the decision to form a minority government, could not prove its acceptability
on the floor of the House.
The AAP’s situation is different from that of the BJP. Even though it has fewer seats than the BJP,
the Congress
party has issued a statement that it will unconditionally support the AAP
in the interests of avoiding a hung parliament in Delhi and the associated
costs of running a fresh election. The
AAP is dithering on whether to take up the reins of government as a minority
government, even with outside support from the Congress.
Although this seems like a new situation for the AAP to be
in, there are eerie parallels of the current predicament of the AAP with the
situation of the IAC in August 2011, at which time, again, they had
just won a phenomenal victory – galvanizing the entire country during Anna
Hazare’s “fast unto death” in order to try to get the Jan Lokpal Bill
passed.
That, too, was a time when the IAC had enjoyed tremendous
success in spite of being a little-known organization before Anna’s fast. And, as in today’s situation with the AAP,
the IAC had a choice of either compromising on their demands with the UPA
government at the Centre in order to pass a reasonable Lokpal bill that would
achieve most of what IAC wanted, even if it had to give up on a few demands, or
completely rejecting any bill that did not fully incorporate all their
demands. The
IAC chose the latter route, and ended up with nothing to show for their
efforts.
Had they let things remain where they were in 2011, Mr.
Kejriwal and his followers would today be a forgotten footnote in Indian
history – a brief blip that temporarily threatened to upset the order of
political business but did not have what it took to create lasting change. They had reached a dead end and the limit of
what they could do as IAC. Fortunately
for them, they decided to change avatars, and transformed themselves from a
political movement, the IAC, into a political party, the AAP, and succeeded at
the polls. This success erased their
failure to achieve something with the Lokpal movement in their IAC avatar and
gave people a fresh hope that as AAP, this band of individuals might be able to
accomplish something concrete.
In spite of these achievements, the AAP today is in a
similar situation to what the IAC was in 2011.
In 2011 the IAC had two options: refuse to compromise on the specifics
of the Lokpal bill, or compromise with the Congress and BJP on the content of
the Lokpal bill in order to create the first Lokpal in India’s history after
more than 40 years of failure. It chose
the no-compromise option, and today the IAC is a forgotten relic. Today the AAP has either the option of
forming a minority government, which means, in spite of the assurance of
unconditional support from the Congress, that they may have to compromise at
least in some limited way on their vision for Delhi; and the option of refusing
to partner with either the Congress or the BJP and thereby refusing to assume
power in Delhi (the no-compromise option.)
Just as the IAC rejected any attempts at compromise with the
central government in Delhi in 2011, the AAP is currently rejecting any attempt
at compromise with the Congress legislators in Delhi, and demanding that the
AAP policies be accepted in toto, without discussion or debate, by the
Congress, as Mr.
Arvind Kejriwal did yesterday.
The AAP might do well to take note of the famous words of
the Spanish philosopher, George
Santayana (1863-1952), who said that “Those who cannot remember the past
are condemned to repeat it.”
The leaders and members of AAP might do well to reflect on
the current miserable predicament of their one-time leader, Anna Hazare, under
whose leadership the IAC scaled such heights in August 2011, and reflect on
what has reduced Hazare to this sorry pass.
The Sad
Plight of Anna Hazare
In August 2011, Anna went on a "fast-unto-death"
in New Delhi to force the Lok Sabha to implement his Jan Lokpal Bill. Impressed by the lakhs of Indians who were
stirred by Anna’s dedication, the LS, while not fully agreeing to the Jan
Lokpal bill, agreed to three major demands that Anna had in his agitation: 1. A
citizen charter, 2. lower bureaucracy to be under Lokpal through an appropriate
mechanism, and 3. establishment of state Lokayuktas.
There
was a "sense of the House" resolution agreeing to these demands,
but later discussions produced a bill that was not to Anna or the IAC's
satisfaction. In fact, they ridiculed
the bill introduced by the Govt. in Parliament after discussions broke down,
calling it a "Jokepal."
Shortly thereafter, the entire IAC movement collapsed and splintered,
largely because the Government had successfully stalled on the Lokpal bill in
the face of intransigence from the leaders of the IAC, including Anna Hazare
and Arvind Kejriwal, who would agree to no dilution of their demands.
We have already seen what Kejriwal and his followers did
following the breakup of the IAC movement – form a political party that has had
unexpected success in Delhi. What did
Anna do?
Anna Hazare had the choice of joining and even leading this
political party, but he refused the responsibility, claiming that he would have
nothing to do with active politics. He
also tried
to sabotage the AAP with accusations
that Arvind Kejriwal had siphoned off money collected during his fasts. In spite of all this, the AAP had resounding success
in the Delhi elections in spite of its candidates having had no experience in
government. The AAP is today in a
position of strength, having proved itself at the elections.
Anna Hazare, on the other hand, missed the chance to be the
leader of this party and share in the glory.
After the fact, Mr.
Hazare very ungraciously made a statement that had he been with the AAP, they
would have won a complete majority.
That is certainly possible, but having not joined it when he was
entreated to by AAP party members; having
accused them of siphoning his funds, a charge that was never proven; and having
a supporter publicly accuse Kejriwal of wrongdoing just days before the
election, Anna should know better than to act in such a crass manner as to
try to take any credit for AAP’s extraordinary success. But human nature tells us that Mr. Hazare’s
behaviour is hardly surprising – it is a natural reaction arising from his
reduction to insignificance and his resulting insecurity that he should try to
appropriate the glory of others who owe little of their current success to his
efforts (one might say they succeeded in spite of Anna.)
So, while his former protégés and comrades have tasted
electoral success and are the toast of the political world, Anna languishes in
obscurity. A
few days ago, he announced that he would go on fast again to see the Lokpal
bill passed in Parliament. Unlike August
2011, where his every movement and speech was minutely covered by the media,
today’s media does not even devote five minutes in a day to discuss Anna’s fast
or worry much about his health. In
short, Anna Hazare has lapsed into complete irrelevance.
Nothing illustrates this so completely as his reaction to
the current
Lokpal bill introduction by the UPA and conditionally
supported by the BJP. The bill,
following its unsuccessful introduction in Parliament in 2011, was referred to
a select committee, which
made some changes in the bill. The new,
revised draft bill is little changed – in substantive terms, as far as Anna
Hazare’s and Arvind Kejriwal’s demands were concerned – from the one that they
so derisively rejected in 2011 as a "Jokepal" - no citizens’ charter,
no independence of the CBI from government control, no assurance of state
Lokayuktas, no whistleblower protection, very high penalties for frivolous
complaints – yet see now how these same two personages view that same
bill.
Arvind
Kejriwal, Kumar Vishwas, and other AAP leaders, in a stand that is consistent
with their stand in 2011 (and with Anna Hazare’s own stand in 2011), have
dismissed the current Lokpal bill draft that the Congress and BJP have agreed
to pass as a “Jokepal” bill that they will not agree to. Mr. Kejriwal yesterday spoke derisively of the
proposed Lokpal bill and said that let
alone a politician, this Lokpal could not even convict a mouse.
Anna, on the other hand, is now happy to see any bill with
the name Lokpal passed, so that he can claim some victory, despite the fact
that the bill does not satisfy the three main points that the “sense of the
House” had assured him of in 2011 - and he is going on fast currently to try
and force the government to pass the Lokpal bill – a fast that is,
incidentally, completely unnecessary and guaranteed to succeed since the
Congress had already stated prior to Mr. Hazare’s fast that they planned to
pass their version of the Lokpal bill in the winter session, and the BJP has
already said it would support the bill introduced by the Congress. Mr.
Hazare made a public statement a couple of days ago thanking the Congress and
their BJP for their help in passing the Lokpal bill this session.
Arvind Kejriwal, Kumar Vishwas, and others have
publicly expressed their astonishment that Anna Hazare would be willing to
accept the same bill he so roundly condemned two years ago.
So what's happening?
Simple. Arvind Kejriwal is
speaking the language of a winner, and Anna Hazare is speaking the language of
a loser. Beggars cannot be
choosers. In 2011 IAC, and therefore both
Anna and Kejriwal, were on a high - they had been successful in awakening the
whole nation, so they could set terms.
Anna Hazare today is a pathetic figure that the Congress and BJP don’t
even bother consulting when planning their Lokpal bills.
Why did the mighty Anna fall so low?
There are two main reasons for this. The first is that Mr. Hazare had only one
weapon in his armoury – the fast unto death.
But you die only once, regardless of what Ian Fleming tells you. As Swaminathan
Aiyar so eloquently described, Anna Hazare has lost the potency of his
fasts through overuse, much as Sant Fateh Singh lost the potency of his fasts.
The second is that politics is the art of accommodation to
achieve objectives. The cardinal mistake
that Anna and the IAC made was to agree to no real settlement with the UPA
government on its demands for a Lokpal.
They refused to agree to the dilution of conditions even when it was not
in the power of the central government to agree to the undiluted conditions. A very good example was the establishment of
the state Lokayuktas that was a fundamental “non-negotiable” of the Jan Lokpal
movement. The UPA said, and correctly
so, that establishment of state Lokayuktas was not something they could mandate
from the centre, as this was a state subject and went against the principle of
federalization. If they tried to mandate
it, the states could challenge it in the courts – and win. And, indeed, some states refused to accept
this condition, even in 2011 when it was first discussed, citing it as an
infringement on states’ rights.
UPA ministers tried to impress upon the IAC that the bill
had made great progress since its first appearance from the Congress stables,
and most of the improvements had been because of IAC suggestions. They suggested that the IAC allow the bill to
pass in the form it was in for the time being, and that improvements could be
made later. The IAC rejected this
suggestion in toto. It was all or
nothing for them – the Jan Lokpal or nothing.
So they got nothing.
The IAC disbanded, and Anna split from Kejriwal once he decided to form
a political party. And no one cares
about Anna today.
If Anna had agreed to the negotiated bill and presented it
as not having his full approval but one that he was willing to give his
blessing to as a first step, he could have declared victory, been a hero in the
eyes of the people and, depending on how the implementation of the Lokpal was
working in practice, he could always call another agitation if he felt things
were not satisfactory. The people would
view him as performing the role of an important watchdog. Instead, by refusing to compromise even an
iota, Anna ended up in the dust heap of history.
Those
who Cannot Remember the Past...
The IAC would have ended up in the same place, but did not
because Kejriwal decided that as long as they were IAC, they would share Anna’s
irrelevance. The former IAC was saved
because they transformed themselves into a political party, the AAP; but their
survival from now on will be dictated by the decisions they take in this
crucial period.
Winning 28 seats out of Delhi’s 70 has been an unexpected
achievement. But now hopes and
expectations of the people are high. The
AAP promised clean governance and a host of other things, including some very
impractical populist promises such as halving electricity bills and 700 litres
of free water per person in Delhi.
But even to get to fulfill those promises, the AAP must
first govern. They might disappoint their
supporters by not even assuming power, in spite of the Congress’ unconditional
support.
The AAP said in response to the Congress’ offer of
unconditional support that it
would only assume power if the Congress and BJP agreed to support it on 18
points – its election manifesto.
While the AAP’s trepidation is understandable – forming a government is
not as important as being able to execute your policies – and if the Congress
and BJP were to vote against all their initiatives, they would not be able to
accomplish anything – the smart thing to do was to accept the Congress’ offer,
with a disclaimer that this does not mean a quid pro quo.
After forming the government, the AAP should have then
started drafting bills that favoured neither party, which would prove to their
supporters that there was, indeed, no quid pro quo. If, at that stage, either the Congress/BJP
were to repeatedly obstruct their efforts to pass legislation – then they could
resign and call for a re-poll, after proving openly to the public that the two
main parties were not allowing them to execute their vision – and so ask the
public for a decisive mandate. And even
in determining this – the ability to execute its vision - it is not an
all-or-nothing measurement. If the AAP
were to be able to pass 70% or 80% of the bills they wanted to pass with full
support from the Congress, such an achievement would still allow them to claim
victory. If a re-poll were necessitated by the lack of
cooperation from the Congress and the BJP to the AAP, then very likely the
Delhi populace would overwhelmingly vote the AAP to an absolute majority in the
repoll.
Instead, asking parties to commit to their entire program in
advance just shows that they don’t understand the workings of a democracy.
And just as the IAC demands on the Jan Lokpal were a bit
unrealistic, so
are the 18 demands of the AAP. To
take a few examples:
1.
Passing of the Jan Lokpal – the very version
that Anna fought for – at the national level.
This is not something that the Congress can guarantee, because other
parties (such as the SP, BSP, and BJP) are also opposed to this. And why is it necessary that this be agreed
to when administering Delhi? Whether
this is agreed to or not will not affect the AAP’s ability to govern
Delhi. They have received votes for
seats in the Delhi legislature, not the Lok Sabha. They could not have promised the people of
Delhi that they would get the Jan Lokpal Bill passed at the centre, because
even if they had an absolute majority in the state, they would have no
authority to pass a nationwide bill.
2.
Stopping the VIP culture is good, but Kejriwal
can only ask that he be allowed to do this without interference in Delhi’s
legislature and related bodies – asking MLAs in the Delhi legislature to forgo
their privileges. He cannot, for
example, ask the MPs in the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha to forgo their privileges. That is a national matter. The AAP needs to focus on what it can do in
the state of Delhi.
3.
Statehood for Delhi with complete independence
may not be a matter that only the Congress can decide, and certainly not Delhi
MLAs alone. It is a national matter and
probably requires a Constitutional amendment, which will require consensus in
both the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha.
This is not something Congress MLAs can promise.
4.
The rest of the demands are in line with the
idea of local governance, i.e., with the idea that AAP, as the party in power,
can pass bills to achieve these goals (more hospitals, schools, disallowing FDI
in retail in Delhi, etc.). To ask for
advance agreement on the passage of these bills is absurd. Agreeing on a bill means understanding the
details of that bill – what it costs, how it can or should be implemented, etc. The details of these bills should be debated
in the legislature. If another party
feels that some legislation is absurd or impractical, they should be free to
object, as long as the motive is not to completely de-fang the AAP in the
performance of its duties and the opposing party is simply exercising due
diligence as a responsible opposition.
By asking for advance blanket agreement on these issues, the
AAP is, in effect, asking for a government without an opposition. To give them that would be a disservice to
the millions in Delhi who voted for the 32 BJP representatives and the 8
Congress representatives.
These demands are an extension of the “all-or-nothing”
mentality the IAC, Anna, and Kejriwal and associates exhibited in their
negotiations with the Government in 2011 on the Lokpal bill. Unfortunately, it seems those attitudes have
not changed.
Lessons
for the AAP to Learn
The first lesson to learn from 2011 is that if the AAP
repeats the earlier IAC insistence on an all-or-nothing solution, then they
will again be left with nothing in 2013, as the IAC was left with nothing in
2011. They have claimed that good
governance of Delhi is their goal, so they need to assume power and show people
their vision for Delhi. If the
Congress/BJP obstruct their ability to govern, they can always resign later,
after a good-faith effort to rule by their principles. But giving up before even trying will not be
forgiven by the people. If people are
convinced that the AAP could have done more if they had a better mandate, then
they will vote them in with a majority vote; but if the AAP is shy of taking
office, they will likely fail next time they go to the voters.
The other major lesson that the AAP needs to learn from
having lived in the wilderness between October 2011 and December 2013 is that
success is ephemeral. Huge crowds
followed the IAC in August 2011; only a total of 5000 people came to their
venue in December 2011. The fact that
they won 28 seats in Delhi’s legislature does not mean that they are guaranteed
to win more seats either in a re-poll or in a general election. Whether they will win more or less will
depend largely on what they do in these next crucial months before either a
re-poll or the national elections.
It is quite possible, for instance, that the people of
Delhi, disillusioned by the failure of the AAP to take power when it was
offered on a platter to them, might lose faith in the AAP and not vote for them
again.
It is also very likely that, if a re-poll in Delhi were to
be held at the same time as the national elections, the effect of Mr. Narendra
Modi, widely expected to lead the BJP to a thumping victory, will also be felt
in the Delhi state elections and give the BJP an absolute majority which they
do not have now.
In 2011, when people saw the constant intransigence of the
IAC in negotiations with the government, many started believing that perhaps
Anna, Kejriwal, and other members of the IAC were not serious about bringing in
a practical Lokpal bill. This was one of
the reasons for the hardening of the government stance against the IAC and the
subsequent breakdown of talks.
The AAP is risking a similar fate with the Delhi legislature
in 2013. Given the extreme nature of
some of the AAP’s demands (as discussed above), one cannot be blamed for
wondering if Mr. Kejriwal is serious about forming a government in Delhi; and whether
these 18 demands are simply excuses to avoid taking office in Delhi.
Perhaps the AAP feels that they have
made promises that are too tall to keep – halving electricity bills, giving
free water, etc. Or perhaps the AAP
feels that going back to the voters with a request for a decisive mandate will
be better than assuming power today...that perhaps, some of the indecisive
voters who were not sure if voting for the AAP would be a worthwhile thing and
so did not vote for them would now actually vote for them in a re-poll and thus
increase their vote share, perhaps even giving them an absolute majority.
But all these are speculations. As discussed earlier, a re-poll could also
decisively favour the BJP. The people of
Delhi, in electing so many untested AAP candidates to power, have voted for
change, and it is the duty of the AAP legislators to not fail them. If they shirk their duty, they may not get
elected again.
The AAP has talked about national ambitions and their
interest in participating in the general elections of 2014. But winning state elections in a small state
like Delhi and winning national elections in a country as big as India, with
only 5 months to go, and with issues still unresolved on how to deal with the
situation in Delhi, make this just a pipe dream. The AAP had a very strong grass-roots
organization in Delhi because this is where the IAC movement was headquartered,
and so they had a volunteer base that had been built up over a period of 2
years (most of the IAC volunteers stayed on with the AAP). But most of this organization was only in
Delhi. In other places the IAC itself
had a very patchy organization – very little for the AAP to leverage a victory
in the general elections. Perhaps they
could win a few seats in one city, maybe two or three cities, such as Bangalore, but
not many more. Even that would be
ambitious.
The best outcome for the AAP is to assume power in Delhi as
a minority government, go on faith with the Congress’ assurance that it does
not intend to impede the functioning of the AAP government, and try to prove
that it is more than just a rabble-rouser – that it can actually deliver the
goods at the state level in a small state like Delhi. Remember that all these newly-minted MLAs
have never seen the inside of a legislative assembly, let alone work in one. They have a lot to learn about parliamentary
democracy, and it would be best for the AAP to focus on Delhi and build on its
historic win here by learning how to govern.
Over-reaching at this point, either by asking for a re-poll or by aiming
for national elections, only dilutes their focus and hinders their ability to
deliver.
So far the AAP has delivered nothing except for a
vision. It is time for them to execute
that vision and provide the real governance they have been promising Delhiites. If they can do so, and if they have patience,
then success awaits them in future elections anywhere in the country. But overweening ambition at this stage will
only sink their ship, just as it did in 2011.
And this time, they will not be able to reinvent themselves
if they fail. Maybe Ian Fleming was
right, after all – you only live twice.
The AAP is Kejriwal’s second political life, after his first life in the
IAC ended. He won’t get a third one if
he makes a mess of this one.
