The electronic media all through the day (10 March 2022) has been waxing eloquent about the stellar significance of the stunning BJP victory in UP. To me, that ranks second to what the Punjab results promise.
Most BJP strategists will agree with me, even if they won’t do so in public. Let me tell you why.
The politician the BJP fears most is Arvind Kejriwal. His spreading beyond Delhi could ruin the sleep of many a BJP stalwart.
Mamta Banerji may seem a sturdier antagonist, but that is so only from a superficial point of view. I say this, despite my admiration for Mamta.
The politician who represents the political paradigm contrary to that of the BJP is Kejriwal, not Mamta. Mamta is a street fighter. She is a female version of Subhash Chandra Bose vis-a-vis the British Raj. Kejriwal is a Gandhi-analogue. He is as much a Gandhi as Mamata is an S.C.Bose. That is, as far as analogies can go.
While the BJP monopolizes charismatic-leader-centric politics, Kejriwal pioneers people-centric politics. If BJP is corporates-funded, AAP is crowd-funded. If Modi is magic, Kejriwal is logic. And, believe me, it is logic, not magic, that prevails in the end. Many in the BJP know this; hence the worry.
It was all right so long as the AAP model of governance was limited to Delhi, where it could be held under bit and bridle. AAP was choked, disallowed to serve the people of Delhi to the extent the Kejriwal team wanted. The details of this unedifying history need not be recounted here.
The curious thing about Delhi Democracy is that the un-elected Lt. Governor of Delhi calls the shots; whereas the people-elected CM has to wait on the LG’s charity for serving the people of Delhi.
With the AAP winning Punjab, this changes dramatically. The APP is from now onwards free to display in full the scope of its governance model. What the party has achieved is not merely growing beyond the borders of Delhi, but earning the right to be fully itself! If it succeeds in doing so -and I see no reason why it shouldn’t- the AAP model is sure to appeal widely to Indian voters.
Propaganda, image-makeover and advertisement-enhancement of on-the-paper governance can work only so long as there is nothing to compare it with. Should the APP government in Punjab begin to deliver, that advantage could go up in smoke.
When the people of a state, ruled by a different party, are seen to be served far better than they are served, citizens in diverse other states will begin to feel disillusioned.
It is like the new model of a phone, coming into the market, making customers feel suddenly disenchanted with the model they have, with which they were very enchanted till then. AAP is that new model in the market.
It doesn’t take long -or much- for contrived euphoria to turn into disenchantment. Wait and see for yourself!
AAP victory in Punjab is bad news for the BJP. The real issue is not that Kejriwal has gained one more state, but that he has spun out of control. The genie is out of the bottle.
