The arrest of the Deputy Chief Minister of Delhi, Manish Sisodia, in an alleged liquor scam continues the unravelling of the fastidiously crafted picture of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) as an anti-corruption celebration. AAP got here into existence by free-riding on the anti-corruption motion of civil society throughout the UPA days. The large corruption, inflation and coverage paralysis underneath the UPA regime created common revulsion towards the political class and allowed anarchist forces to seek out traction within the public creativeness.
Several activists and NGOs with opaque backgrounds and sources of funding began sprouting up, claiming to have discovered miraculous options to the challenges going through the nation. Often fixated on a single situation and single-point simplistic answer however with a fanatical zeal, they have been amply aided by the TRP-hungry media channels. Arvind Kejriwal and others like him hijacked the general public sentiment to create the Aam Aadmi Party, promising to finish corruption by passing the Jan Lokpal Bill, an ambiguous extra-constitutional physique with sweeping powers far superseding these loved by any constitutional submit to date.
In the ten years, AAP has grown by preying upon a public reeling underneath the corrupt rule of the Congress celebration. AAP got here to energy in 2015 with a lot fanfare round its utopian guarantees and insurance policies. Mohalla clinics, free medicines and consultations; air pollution management; visitors and transport administration; reforms in training, energy, Jal Board, and concrete planning and improvement have been a few of the guarantees made to the residents of Delhi. Despite a second full majority mandate, all these guarantees nonetheless have to be fulfilled.
The complete technique of AAP has been to run an commercial blitzkrieg as a substitute of doing any actual work on the bottom. Delhi’s much-touted well being and training mannequin is just discovered within the in depth commercials in newspapers throughout the nation. Mohalla clinics are an abject failure. An RTI question revealed that no new hospitals had been constructed underneath the AAP regime since 2015. It led to an enormous mattress crunch throughout the pandemic, leading to a better dying fee than in different states.
Public transport in Delhi can be collapsing. Fewer buses are seen on the roads as there have been no new acquisitions besides centre-funded electrical buses underneath the FAME-II programme. No new flyovers/roads have been in-built Delhi in the identical interval. There have been zero faculties or larger training establishments constructed by the Kejriwal regime and just one college. At the identical time, 1000’s of educating posts are vacant in Delhi colleges, and lots of of faculties are with out principals.
State government-funded faculties of Delhi University are going through an acute crunch of funding, with salaries of pensioners, educating and non-teaching employees usually pending for months, with Manish Sisodia allegedly making an attempt to power the appointment of his cronies within the governing our bodies because the pre-condition for the well timed launch of funds. The politics of freebies has resulted in a fast enhance within the Delhi public debt. The state is operating a fiscal deficit of greater than Rs 9,000 crore. Even its much-advertised income surplus is as a result of the Centre pays pension liabilities of its workers, expenditure on police, and many others.
The corruption in Delhi has turn into extra institutionalised underneath AAP. Allegations, just like the renting of a celebration employee’s property for a Mohalla clinic approach above the market fee, are commonplace. And now the large liquor rip-off has uncovered AAP for what it’s: A syndicate of opportunistic careerists who crave energy and wealth in any respect prices, unrestrained by ethics or morals. AAP has no real interest in governing however solely seeks to seize increasingly more energy for its dictatorial, visionless management. Its victory in Delhi was not used to work for the betterment of the town, however to leverage it for enlargement into Punjab and different states. Just a number of months of AAP rule have seen a complete collapse of legislation and order in Punjab, which is being remote-controlled by Kejriwal. Now anarchists have overrun police stations, and the Punjab CM is assembly with Kejriwal and Uddhav Thackeray in Mumbai to plan new electoral alliances.
When confronted with a disaster, AAP has abdicated all tasks in Punjab identical to it left Delhi to its destiny throughout the first and second waves of the pandemic. It has been following a intelligent coverage of intense paid propaganda to assemble a false image of pro-people work in departments like well being and training whereas its ministers bask in such shenanigans. Delhi is the one state whose well being and training ministers are in jail on severe expenses of corruption. The similar is the story in Punjab the place the well being minister and MLAs have been discovered indulging in corruption.
The spell solid by freebie politics and paid propaganda of the AAP is nearing its finish. People are realising that AAP is solely Congress 2.0 minus the dynasty.
The author is National Vice-President, BJP youth wing