Had Arvind Kejriwal been in the movies, he would have won numerous Oscars by now, outshining many acting legends. He has delivered another brilliant performance in front of the cameras, and it remains to be seen if he will secure another Oscar. In his latest role, he portrays a martyr, victimised by a powerful system and imprisoned for a crime he insists he did not commit. He has now presented himself before the public, believing that, as the hero, he will emerge unscathed and victorious, reaffirming his heroic image. However, Kejriwal seems to forget that politics is not a film.
How People Will Judge Kejriwal
Kejriwal's resignation drama resembles the 'lost and found' formula films of the 1970s and 1980s. He needs to be reminded that times have changed, and such formulas no longer guarantee success. In an era shaped by social media and AI, the tastes and aspirations of audiences have evolved. The world now lives in moments. Prime Minister Narendra Modi made a similar mistake in the 2024 parliamentary elections and it did not work. Similarly, in Delhi, Kejriwal's theatrics are unlikely to be effective this time. People in Delhi will judge and vote based on the performance of his government. If they believe he has served them well as Chief Minister, he may return to power. However, if public sentiment is otherwise, he may struggle.
His offer to resign and appoint a new Chief Minister is a sign of weakness and has diminished his standing in the eyes of the public. If he intended to resign, he should have done so at the time of his anticipated arrest by the ED. Like Hemant Soren, he could have convened a meeting of the legislature party and appointed a new leader to take charge of the national capital. Instead, he declared he would govern from jail. Kejriwal has played with the letter and the spirit of the Constitution. He forgot that the Constitution is not just a document but a living entity with a soul. Over time, the Constitution is also guided by conventions and traditions that are not explicitly written but are integral to its ethos. He focused on the letter while neglecting the spirit of the Constitution.
Kejriwal Should Have Resigned After Arrest
It is true that the Constitution does not ask a chief minister to resign if he goes to jail. However, the convention states that whenever a chief minister is faced with arrest, he/she has to resign. Lalu Prasad Yadav, Jayalalitha, Hemant Soren did the same thing. Once, out of jail, they again took charge, except for Lalu. Kejriwal broke that tradition and that has not been liked by the people at large, though his supporters and advisers may like to think differently.
Delhi in the last five months has witnessed a bizarre situation. It had a chief minister but he was in jail. He was incapacitated. He was incapable of discharging his duties. But he did not resign. This was a constitutional breakdown but the central government did not impose the president's rule. Now Kejriwal wants to absolve himself from that sin by resigning.
If he was the same Kejriwal, whom the world had seen in 2011, the fearless crusader against corruption, then he would have dared the Enforcement Directorate (ED) and other central agencies when for the first time ED had served him the notice to appear before the agency for inquiry. That day itself, he would have dared the ED to arrest him, declaring that he was not scared of it, that he was not scared of arrest, he was not scared of going to jail as he had not committed any crime. As he refused to appear before ED and started looking for excuses, he lost the perception battle.
On His Anti-Corruption Crusade
In his earlier avatar, his crusade against corruption was led by his declarations that anyone accused of corruption should resign. Without any substantial proof, he had accused top leaders of the country of corruption, and dared them to resign and face law enforcement agencies. The sheer scale of fearlessness and his intent to take the bull by the horns endeared him to the public. People saw in him a new messiah, a man who was not in politics to do politics but to change politics. People fell in love with that man. Hundreds of people like me left their lucrative professions and joined him with the hope that the country would change, but thousands of his supporters and fans felt dejected when they saw their hero running away from agencies to avoid arrest.
He jumped nine notices from ED; to save himself, he sought refuge in court. And when the Delhi High Court refused to save him from the humiliation of arrest, ED reached his residence and the world saw its hero going to jail. He lost the halo of a crusader, the challenger of the system. No wonder, people were not angry, they did not hit the streets, nobody was crying for him. That day I realised that he had lost the plot. Kejriwal is now a man of flesh and bones, an ordinary politician. He is no longer the idea, the phenomenon, that had mesmerised the common man. He is not the mirror in which everyone wants to see a bright future for the country. Now, the mirror has cracked. The future has been lost. The phenomenon is dead. The man is walking but the aura is gone. It is the death of a dream.
Why Were The Streets Empty?
If Kejriwal had resigned the day he received the first notice and had voluntarily surrendered himself for arrest, the Modi government would have hesitated to proceed with his arrest. He would have been hailed as a crusader, and his image as a messiah would have reached new heights. If the Modi government had arrested him under those circumstances, it could have backfired on them. He seems to have forgotten that during the Anna movement, when the Manmohan Singh government arrested Anna Hazare, Arvind Kejriwal, and others, the streets of Delhi were flooded with protesters, and the government had no choice but to release them. This experience might have troubled him: why were the streets empty when he was imprisoned this time?
Even when he was released from jail to campaign during the parliamentary elections, neither Kejriwal nor his party received any sympathy, and his party failed to win a single seat in Delhi. If a leader of his stature went to jail and failed to garner sympathy, it indicates he has lost his appeal.
The appointment of a new Chief Minister in Delhi won't make much of an impact now. It is well-known that regardless of who gets the post, Kejriwal will remain the real power behind the scenes. This move will not make him a martyr either. If Kejriwal wants to regain the support and goodwill of the people, he needs to think outside the box and present some radical new ideas. Old tricks and theatrics will not suffice. Even if he wins the election, it will not absolve him; only the court can determine his guilt or innocence. He understands that the battle is challenging and may be prolonged, which is why he is engaging in theatrics. However, drama and theatrics are illusions; reality is different. Let's see how far his acting skills will take him this time.
(Ashutosh is the author of 'Hindu Rashtra' and co-founder of SatyaHindi.com)
Disclaimer: These are the personal opinions of the author