The journey of Arvind Kejriwal from an IRS official to the incumbent chief minister of Delhi can be broken down into two parts. Part 1 had Kejriwal as an upright anti-corruption activist, who played a significant part in bringing into force the Right to Information (RTI) Act via his NGO called Parivartan. He then joined hands with Anna Hazare in demanding the Jan Lokpal Bill in the 2011-12 Anti-Corruption Movement. Kejriwal and Anna Hazare split on the issue of formation of a political party. While Anna Hazare did not want to enter mainstream politics, Kejriwal and his supporters formed the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in November 2012. A year later, the party made its debut in the 2013 Delhi Assembly Elections and emerged as the second largest party, winning 28 of the 70 seats. Kejriwal spectacularly defeated the then CM Sheila Dikshit of the Congress in her home turf by a margin of over 25,000 votes.
From here on, we have witnessed Part 2 of Arvind Kejriwal, where honesty and ethics have taken a backseat (rather thrown out of the car) and selfish ulterior motives have taken the driver’s seat. After serving as Delhi CM for 49 days with outside support from the Congress, Arvind Kejriwal quit on the grounds of not being able to table the Lokpal Bill in the Delhi Assembly. He then went to Gujrat to ‘verify’ the Gujrat Development model when his arch enemy Narendra Modi was the CM of Gujrat. He then decided to contest the Lok Sabha Elections of 2014 from Varanasi and in a one-on-one contest against Modi, lost by a huge margin of nearly 3.5 lakh votes. After apologizing to the people of Delhi for quitting after 49 days and due to a spirited campaign, the AAP won a stunning 67 out of 70 seats in the Delhi Assembly elections of 2015, thereby giving Kejriwal a second stint as CM.
His second stint was characterized by the AAP in various rifts with the BJP-led central government, Delhi LG Najeeb Jung, the Delhi police, the CBI and also some of the former AAP members like Yogendra Yadav and Prashant Bhushan. Actions like his open support to the Mahagatbandhan (which had the epitome of corruption Lalu Prasad Yadav) in Bihar, unnecessarily politicizing the deaths of Akhlaq and Rohith Vemula but at the same time keeping mum on the National Herald scam and Malda, his splurge on amateur TV ads and MLA salary increase but crying for lack of funds for development, the derogatory ‘thulla’ remark for the Delhi police, the controversy over the appointment of Shakuntala Gamlin conclusively suggest a complete lack of ethics, sensitivity, a deep personal hatred for PM Modi, the BJP and the RSS and also the AAP being a B team of the Sonia Gandhi led Congress. Kejriwal Jaitley tiff is the latest addition to Kejriwal’s long list of fallings-out.
Kejriwal Jaitley tiff
Kejriwal Jaitley tiff yet proves the double standards of Kejriwal and his party. It all started with the CBI raiding the office of Kejriwal’s trusted chief secretary Rajendar Kumar in December 2015 during the Winter Session of the parliament. The CBI had information about Rajendar Kumar’s involvement in murky dealings during 2007-14 where he used his official position to favor a particular company. After the CBI raid, Kejriwal accused the Modi government of using the CBI to raid the office of a democratically elected CM and used Twitter to call the PM a psychopath. Kejriwal in an earlier instance had recommended that CBI must have the authority to raid anyone at any point in time and there needs to be no advance intimation. In order to deflect the core issue of his secretary being involved in murky dealings and his appointment by Kejriwal in spite of him being aware, Kejriwal decided to bring the DDCA into picture. He now accused the CBI of trying to get access to the DDCA files, which he claims has information about financial irregularities by Jaitley when he was the DDCA President. A Serious Fraud Investigation Office (SFIO) was formed in 2012 during the UPA rule to investigate the financial irregularities of the DDCA. According to the SFIO report, there were instances of ‘procedural lapses’ but there was nothing in the report to indicate Jaitley as being guilty as he was not involved in the day to day operations of DDCA. It must be mentioned here that DDCA is after all a cricket body and cricket bodies in India are major cash cows headed by powerful people to further their agendas but the fact remains that the SFIO report does not indict Jaitley. Moreover, the SFIO report is out in public and AAP has not told anything new about the DDCA affairs.
Kejriwal Jaitley: Jaitley hits back
Jaitley, on his part has rubbished the allegations made against him and has quoted the SFIO report which gives him a clean chit. After making wild allegations against Jaitley without any evidence, Kejriwal decided to institute a probe led by Gopal Subramanian into the DDCA charges. Kejriwal’s rule is simple: make all kinds of allegations first and then constitute a probe. Jaitley responded by filing a 10-crore civil defamation suit against Kejriwal, something that was done on an earlier instance by Nitin Gadkari. In what was to be a fast track hearing, both sides are now accusing the other of attempting to slow down the court proceedings. Kejriwal told the court that the defamation case does not hold good as Jaitley lost the 2014 General Elections by a margin of 1,00,000 votes and Indian democracy has never accepted his claim of public character. Jaitley responded by saying that Kejriwal in his own eyes did not possess a reputation and character as he himself lost in the 2014 General Elections and in reality, Kejriwal does not understand the real meaning of ‘character’.
Kejriwal Jaitley: Rajendar Kumar ignored?
In this dirty ongoing Kejriwal Jaitley fight, Rajendar Kumar is a forgotten man. Kejriwal has successfully managed to deflect the core issue of Kumar and his murky dealings. Kejriwal the politician has learnt the tricks of the trade faster than the regular day to day Indian politician and has the capability to even outdo them when it comes to dirty politics. Kejriwal will never do a Subramanian Swamy and fight legally against anyone in court. His law is very simple: if he accuses someone albeit without any evidence, it has to be true because none other than Arvind Kejriwal is saying it but on the other hand, if someone else accuses him or any of his trusted men, then he is being targeted by psychopath Modi and the Central Government.
Arvind Kejriwal, the politician has come of age rather quickly but Arvind Kejriwal, the upright anti-corruption crusader is long dead. Kejriwal Jaitley Fight is going to go on for a long time but after the Kejriwal Jaitley faceoff, may be a Kejriwal Irani or Kejriwal VK Singh, he is a hit and run specialist anyway.