Why we need politician Kejriwal more than apolitical Anna

The recent charges by Anna Hazare against, Kejriwal, and Anna’s efforts to discredit him, betray two unmissable characteristics of the Gandhi impersonator who talks in third person - that unarguably he is apolitical, and he is still trapped in a misplaced sense of self-importance. With a single-point agenda of corruption and no strategy to fight it beyond a dogmatic version of the Lok Pal, what Anna could manage at best was to be a fire in the pan among the apolitical urban middle class. But then, even they got tired because politics is what drives democracy in India. Who wants to listen to somebody who keep slamming it with no alternative? [caption id=“attachment_1241897” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Anna Hazare with Arvind Kejriwal. PTI image[/caption] Perhaps, people in cities also realised that Gandhism can be a temporary fad, but not a philosophy they could practice. Anna himself was no Gandhi either. So the entire Anna movement sank without a trace. It was neither a civil society movement such as the ones that changed regimes from Philippines to Egypt, nor a spontaneous uprising of people. Genetically, the movement was meant to last only till it lasted - it didn’t even had the longevity of a moderately long soap-opera. But then, there was this mutation - Arvind Kejriwal. He literally mutated out of slow death and seized the opportunity when the wiliest politicians called the Anna brigade names and dared them to engage in a hand-to-hand combat. He couldn’t have continued to push a dying civil society movement because the self-timed Anna phenomenon was imploding, and rightfully took up the challenge - a truly daunting challenge. Aam Aadmi Party first appeared to carry the genetic fragments of the Anna movement. But Kejriwal learned fast on the job and today has a party that can give both Congress and the BJP some trouble. He also offered a choice to many regular voters, fence-sitters, and a lot of otherwise apolitical Delhiites. Arvind Kejriwal is in fact a real phenomenon - establishing a political party and making it election-ready in less than two years is a tremendous achievement that has been unprecedented in India. And to think that they might win a few crucial seats, let alone calling the shots, is astounding. Under normal circumstances, it could have taken them at least 5-10 years to be considered worthwhile in elections. This election will also give them a quotable vote-share. Kejriwal couldn’t have done it without the Jan Lokpal movement that rode on the lonely Gandhian image of Anna Hazare. When the apolitical Anna found himself abandoned by the ephemeral public affection, Kejriwal knew it was the time to take over. Being apolitical in a democracy such as India is foolish, a folly that needs to be punished. And people did punish Anna by banishing him to oblivion. Perhaps that is what annoys Anna and prompts him to target Kejriwal. His social capital is with Kejriwal today. The latter has reinvested it and is seemingly reaping mega returns. Anna, the Gandhi, seemingly cannot digest it. What better way than to charge him with financial misdeeds. Kejriwal is a politician and Aam Aadmi Party is a political party. The Congress and the BJP have a fight at hand and they want to slander him as well. Kejriwal’s virtue is his avowed immunity from, and aversion to, corruption. The Congress and the BJP want to tell Delhiites that he is not a paragon of virtue and he is no different from them. And there comes Anna Hazare with this useful handle. Whatever Anna’s motivation is, it’s only helping the politicians that he called names. Today, they quote Anna to slur Kejriwal. Is he batting for somebody? The fundamental reason for the Anna debacle was that Anna and Team Anna were apolitical or chose to be politically ignorant when politics is central to everything we do in a democracy. Slamming the entire class of politicians and the very process that runs our democracy was fundamentally flawed. One has to work with the system and not disrupt it. Perhaps people understood that a flawed democracy is better than anarchy. And Kejriwal had the methodology, tenacity and cadre-strength for a rapid response. What Kejriwal is attempting in Delhi might turn out to be a template for many such localised movements in urban India - a pilot effort that could be replicated across the country, not necessarily by AAP, but by others. Hopefully, it can also strengthen decentralisation of power and the space for a new breed of politicians.