All those who had got energised at the prospect of a new force in Indian politics must be totally disillusioned today.
There is no denying that the formation of the Aam Aadmi Party had galvanised large numbers of people who were disgusted with the Congress but felt alarmed at the emergence of the Bharatiya Janata Party and especially its controversial leader Narendra Modi.
They were looking for an alternative and the AAP, with its promise of clean politics, a determination to expose corruption and refusal to compromise on its principles offered an ideal choice. Today they are lost, wondering how it all went wrong.
The AAP’s continuous tirade against big money’s involvement in politics, the profiteering ways of corporations and the shady land dealings — things that are otherwise unsayable in public — won it instant fans.
Arvind Kejriwal took issues head on, naming names and shaming them. Whether it was Robert Vadra or the Ambanis and Adanis, Mr Kejriwal did not indulge in clever, euphemistic language that politicians are known for — he went straight for the jugular.
Moreover, his operational style was novel. The political hungerstrike in India had become a farce, with fat cat politicians spending an hour or two in between breakfast and lunch in the full glare of television cameras and then heading home for a nice, post-prandial nap.
Mr Kejriwal showed he was ready to sleep on the streets in the cold, Delhi winter for his cause.
That the cause he had taken up — the dismissal of a couple of cops — was trivial and unworthy of a chief minister’s attention was a different matter; it was his sincerity that captivated those who had become jaded by politics-as-usual.
Many of Mr Kejriwal’s ideas were impractical in the extreme — calling for a neighbourhood referendum for every little thing was silly and unworkable. These flowed from the old nostrums peddled by Indian socialists over the years — partyless democracy, power to the people, rejection of isms etc.
Jayaprakash Narayan was a great votary of such politics and his acolytes and devotees have tried to introduce them into Indian polity.
Inevitably these attempts have come to naught and the Indian political system has weeded them out, yet the true believers just don’t stop trying.
Mr Kejriwal was the perfect instrument for giving traction and credibility to those discredited ideas.
The Congress, meanwhile, claimed that the AAP was the B team of the BJP, tasked with cutting into non-BJP votes.
A younger generation, devoid of historical context and excited at the idea of political engagement lapped up everything that the AAP had to offer.
A credulous media, which at that moment was gunning for the United Progressive Alliance government was even more excited and built him up as the new star on the Indian political firmament, a messiah who would decimate the Congress.
Corporate types, filmstars, bankers, social activists all clambered on the bandwagon, which, after the handsome victory in the Delhi state elections looked like picking up speed.
Mr Kejriwal could do no wrong. A look at the newspapers of just a few months ago will throw up articles headlined — “Kejriwal could become India’s Prime Minister.”
In retrospect, the victory in Delhi was the worst thing that could have happened to the AAP. No one could believe it, the party least of all.
The results clearly indicated that the AAP’s following was genuine and committed; it also cut across class lines.
From the autorickshaw driver to the rich executive, from the college student to the professional, they all genuinely believed in the AAP and were ready to stand by it.
But the AAP did not know how to handle that victory and build upon it. In politics it is not always important to be right all the time; making mistakes is not a sin, provided you learn from them.
As a new party and then government, the AAP made several mistakes, including the misguided adventures of loose cannons like Somnath Bharti’s foray into a neighbourhood to rid it of vice.
But the AAP robustly — and wrongly — defended those actions. Its biggest error of judgment was quitting the government — it clearly showed that this motley bunch of activists were full of bluster but were not prepared to ready to take on the responsibility that comes with power.
Came the general elections and the AAP decided to contest over 400 seats but while the energy was there, it was not the same any more. Besides, the media had tired of Mr Kejriwal; now it was obsessed with Mr Modi.
Mr Kejriwal put up a brave fight in Varanasi, but apart from the four MPs in Punjab, the AAP candidates were left biting the dust.
It was inevitable that fair weather friends would desert it, given that it was a losing proposition.
Now its own senior leaders are leaving or fighting internecine battles.
They are talking of a “personality cult”, which is ironic, given that it was this very cult that gave them a high profile in the first place.
Either they are bailing out or indulging in name-calling — both characteristic of a certain kind of politics, which does not believe in organisation building and long-term thinking.
But where is the determination to identify and rectify the gross errors in style and substance that the AAP has made and looks set to repeat?
No surprise then that the AAP, yesterday’s wunderkind, is now on the brink of an implosion.
There are many who, with a sense of schadenfreude will say, “we told you so”.
Mainstream parties will now breathe a sigh of relief that they can go back to politics as usual. That will be a pity.
Despite its many tactical and strategic mistakes, the AAP offered hope that new thinking was possible and could actually change things in the country.
What the party needs is what old- style leftists called “course correction”, but for that to be of any use, it will need to know what the course is — it cannot rely on outdated ideologies and a self-righteous, negativist attitudes, hitting out at everybody who does not agree with it.
Its leaders will have to cast aside personal ambitions and egos and put the organisation’s interest above everything.
If they don’t, the AAP is doomed and will forever be remembered as an interesting but ultimately foolhardy concept.
