By D N Singh
Among all the non-BJP governments in India, Arvind Kejriwal led Aam Admi Party has always proved as the most aching Achilles’ heel for the BJP as the latter has suffered the most unnerving defeats from the AAP.
From the Jantar Mantar’s dharna led by Anna Hazare to the citadel of Delhi, it had been indeed a roller coaster ride yet fruitful for Kejriwal who then appeared to have taken the baton from Ana although for Anna, power politics remained an anathema.
That was a point where Anna made and obtrusive exit from the Gandhian style andolan and went back to his abode in Maharashtra, a small room in the temple and a ‘thaali’ for lunch & dinner.
After initial hick ups Kejriwal muscled through the political undulations and plunged into electoral politics. Rest is history.
Defeating the most powerful political party in Delhi, when it was riding on the crest of power and popularity was no mere feat. Not once but twice Kejriwal landed the most humiliating blows on the BJP, its bastion by then and people consisting a cluster of think-tanks, intellectuals, journalists who stood by Kejriwal and helped his debut in politics grow.
Then onwards Kejriwal never looked back and earned the support of Delihites for a success repeat of twice and which grew to be an Achilles’ heel for the BJP.
The schooling pattern in Delhi and the teaching were not only appreciated by locals but it grabbed the headlines of the New York Times heaping praises on Manish Sisodia, the deputy chief minister of Delhi which ostensibly was not digested by the rivals.
And, rubbing salt on the injury came the resounding victory of APP in Punjab wresting it from the Congress.
Soon the skirmish of politics engulfed Sisodia in the alleged Excise scam and who still battles with his fate behind the bars.
Now it is for the fifth month that the pleas of Sisodia have gone unheard by the Courts despite no such concrete evidence to prove his and others’ involvement in the above scam.
And it is unlikely that, Manish Sisodia shall be freed before the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
Preceding Sisodia the AAP minister Satyender Jain was in jail on the money laundering case.
One of the most vocal critics of Modi, Sanjay Singh, AAP Rajya Sabha member, as expected, was dragged into the Excise scam about five months after the issue came up. That speaks a lot about the calculated languor with which the probes are being done. Is it watch and wait tactics.
Otherwise may be a lease that the agencies are given to travel to 2024.
ED has already visited the official residence of the Delhi chief minister Kejriwal for reasons best known to them.
After Kejriwal, in case arrested, the political firmament of AAP shall not be left with any star to blink.
