The Haryana-Delhi tangle between the Congress and the AAP holds a lesson for the Opposition INDIA bloc that has been more or less in suspended animation after general elections that returned Modi to a third term in power.
Published Feb 10, 2025 | 9:00 AM ⚊ Updated Feb 10, 2025 | 9:00 AM
Arvind Kejriwal and Rahul Gandhi.
Synopsis: AAP under Arvind Kejriwal was squarely defeated in the Delhi Assembly elections held last week but he might get a chance of revival in the next elections if the shortcomings are addressed. It is also lesson for the Opposition INDIA bloc that has been more or less in suspended animation after the general elections. The upcoming elections in Bihar may prove to be a new opportunity for the Opposition to re-emerge from recent setbacks.
In analysing politics, it is always good to have a long memory. As Delhi’s vast tribe of tireless politics watchers are busy writing the obituary of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in the state, it is best to recall American humourist Mark Twain who famously said: “The report of my death was an exaggeration.”
You never say never in politics, especially in a vibrant parliamentary democracy that allows combinations, permutations, and increasingly, ideological mutations that help a party bounce back.
AAP under Arvind Kejriwal was squarely defeated in the Delhi Assembly elections held last week, but it makes sense to recall that in 1984, in the wake of then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s assassination, Rajiv Gandhi made such a splash on a sympathy wave for the Congress party that the BJP won only two seats among 543 elected ones in the Lok Sabha.
It is almost impossible now to believe that the TDP under the late NT Rama Rao had then emerged as the main national Opposition party with 30 seats followed by the CPI(M) which won 22. Within five years, Rajiv Gandhi squandered away his mandate and the BJP bounced back big time soon after that.
This is not to take away from the BJP’s awesome Delhi victory that has controversy written all over it. We may never know what happened, but the so-called liquor scam allegedly involving Kejriwal’s government and BJP’s imagery of a “Sheesh Mahal” (Palace of Mirrors) about his expensive renovation of the chief minister’s house seems to have left a strong impression among voters that caused AAP’s downfall.
BJP-appointed Lieutenant Governor Vinai Kumar Saxena’s overbearing use of the peculiar division of powers in the state that falls under the national capital area, and the evidently political deployment of the Enforcement Directorate (ED) and the CBI in probing AAP leaders left the city-state’s ruling party paralysed at many levels.
For a party that has enjoyed two full terms and 12 years in power in Delhi, this was too much to handle. Anti-incumbency votes are more of a rule than an exception in Indian politics. Why should the AAP be an exception after all that?
Having said that, one must take note of Kejriwal’s abrasive, self-centred, bombastic political style that has bruised party colleagues, Opposition allies and Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s BJP alike.
His trusted government lieutenants included highly educated or professionally qualified people matching his Indian Institue of Technology (IIT) pedigree, and there is much on the ground to believe that AAP has focused a lot on welfare projects that touched the lives of the “common man” whose Hindi expression led to the party’s nomenclature. But these are not enough to compensate for what one might call Kejriwal’s political greed. He punched well above his weight and has paid the price for it.
One is reminded of Andhra Pradesh’s defeated chief minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy, whose YSRCP suffered a humiliating setback in the Assembly elections last year, leading to the bounce-back of the TDP under N Chandrababu Naidu.
Naidu had been written off much the way Kejriwal is being written off now. Reddy’s style was abrasive and combative, even as he embarked on welfare programmes at the grassroots level for the poor.
However, like Kejriwal’s “Glass Palace,” Reddy’s ₹500-crore “private palace” on Rushikonda Hill in Visakhapatnam became the focus of a political furore that smelled of self-aggrandisement, though officially the lavish structure was built as a tourist facility.
Optics are central to politics in general and particularly crucial for the BJP, whose mighty propaganda machine can amplify, modify, and mass-produce imagery that can bring down a rival.
The country has been witness to that for close to a decade now. Even late prime minister and revered Congress leader Manmohan Singh was not spared by the BJP’s punching machine, despite his self-effacing style, spotless personal reputation and quiet demeanour.
In contrast, Kejriwal provided grist to BJP’s outrage machine and even challenged it to a point where the saffron party badly needed a victory to show its might – and that of Modi – particularly because it was the BJP that had fought hard for statehood to Delhi that was once a Union Territory.
Where Kejriwal scored is that he has certainly changed Delhi’s politics from a national-centric one to a locally-centred one that focuses on everyday issues.
The AAP’s initiatives in health, education and other services such as public transport have set new administration benchmarks that have forced the BJP to embrace a welfarist agenda that was not part of its culture-and-religion-centric political DNA.
From a monthly allowance of ₹2,500 a month for women to cheaper LPG cylinders and free education “from KG to PG” the BJP’s promises to Delhi are such that even if 70 percent of its promises come true, it is a big win for the state’s citizens – even though critics (including myself) point to the city’s foul air and traffic jams as much-needed agenda items.
It is certainly a moment of introspection for AAP and Kejriwal. AAP’s political overreach in spoiling the Congress party’s electoral chances in Haryana last year primarily led to the Congress emerging as a force with vengeful nuisance value in Delhi.
We are yet to study constituency-wise details, but it is my belief that the Congress played spoilsport in several seats for the AAP, worsening the margin of its defeat.
The Haryana-Delhi tangle between the Congress and the AAP holds a lesson for the Opposition INDIA bloc that has been more or less in suspended animation after general elections that returned Modi to a third term in power.
An electoral ceasefire between the two parties may help chances for both and that of the alliance – assuming that the grouping still exists. The upcoming elections in Bihar may prove to be a new opportunity for the Opposition to re-emerge from recent setbacks.
I would call the sobering details of Delhi’s election results a silver lining in the Opposition’s dark clouds.
If AAP and Congress introspect enough to define their respective spheres of influence, it could boost the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA), whose current acronym is as cumbersome for laypersons as its acrimony is for voters to have confidence in the grouping. I would want them to have an easier name to sit on our tongues.
Modi’s image. shaken by last year’s electoral setbacks, particularly in Uttar Pradesh, have now been salvaged by a hat-trick of hard-fought victories in Haryana, Maharashtra, and Delhi.
His juggernaut is now rolling again. What the Opposition alliance needs now is less of muddling and more of huddling.
(The writer is a senior journalist and commentator who has worked for Reuters, The Economic Times, Business Standard, and Hindustan Times. He tweets on X as @madversity. Views are personal. Edited by Muhammed Fazil.)
