Dear Mr Kejriwal,
Your meteoric rise to the position of Chief Minister, Delhi, has come
about in such quick time that an average politician of this country will have
nothing but envy for you. It takes years, sometimes decades, to be noticed as
somebody in an arena where most of the seats are taken by previous appointment.
Of the few seats that are left, someone who has already done a marathon of
political mileage can hope to be considered. So, Mr CM, you are not merely a
wild card entry into a hitherto reserved arena, you are also the hope for many
who want a change in the existing political climate of the nation. As a TV
presenter would say, ‘the nation wants to know’ why it so happened that you
resorted to theatrics which quickly put you in such a tight spot that you were
seen gasping for breath, and looking for the very first opportunity to
dismantle the stage you became an exhibit of? One can see that the energy of a
youngster who got a serendipitous lollipop is there in you and in the members
of your team of activists after conquering the Delhi citadel which was so far
held by two biggies. This is a historic development, and should be taken
forward with much solemnity. To see you in a street protest was certainly not
acceptable. To see that you were to proclaim that all the confusion your
actions caused, all the disruption that the people of Delhi had to endure, were
to lead to merely leave for a couple of police officials is a very painful
realisation indeed. Please don’t malign the people by proclaiming that it is “a
peoples’ victory”. My friend, Arvind, you have really let all those down whose
expectations were for something much more meaningful to emerge from your
ill-advised method of protest in the instant case.
It may be useful to remind you that investigating cases of rape and
crime against women is not the only agenda of Delhi Police, though, admittedly,
it is an important part of police work. However, to have come out in support of
an agitation which ultimately looked like a misadventure leading to negligible,
if any, gain for the aam aadmi, you have certainly missed the woods for the
trees. If the case is that the police should be under the Delhi government and
not the Government of India, by your immature and ill-advised actions you have
actually raised serious doubts if this will be a prudent move. Delhi does not
have full statehood yet. The bill which was drafted in 2003 for granting full
statehood to Delhi also proposed to keep police and public order under the
purview of the Centre. Mr Kejriwal, I am sure in your sane moments you will agree
that Delhi Police shall have to be under the control of the MHA because
Delhi Police faces some unique challenges not faced by other State police
forces. It cannot be put under the whimsical command of over-charged champions
of the Delhiite’s causes. I am confident that you are aware of the need of
Delhi Police to coordinate with the Ministry of External Affairs on a
week-to-week and, occasionally, on a day-to-day, basis. There is also a
diplomatic community to look after and to take care of their professional
requirements. After your recent road-show it can be seen that your team clearly
lacks the gravitas essential for serious business like running the affairs of
peoples’ security; especially in the light of the fact that your Law Minister
himself shows in his deportment a poor appreciation of human rights and
jurisprudence. Som Nath Bharti and his equally over-zealous friends displayed
in public last week that they apparently had the license to do what they
wished. Your reaction to the whole thing was, to say the least, most
disappointing. Instead of reining in an errant colleague, you chose to make a
laughing stock of yourself by joining him in his unacceptable vigilante
activities.
Bhai Kejriwal, there are many who may have not joined the AAP bandwagon,
but were optimistically curious about the emergence of a group of idealists,
would now be worried about the anachronism that is AAP.
There are sections of the middle class who are not particularly
enamoured of Narendra Modi and are apprehensive about the meaning of his
message were hoping that AAP will somehow manage to check the Modi juggernaut.
Now, in the backdrop of recent manifestations, will this ‘hope’ actually
materialise or simply dissolve into thin air, is the question.
Arvind, have you actually let a historic possibility vanish into thin
air?
Yours etc.
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