BJP-RSS used India Against Corruption campaign to bring down UPA government: Prashant Bhushan

Prashant Bhushan has said that he regrets not having realised in time that the India Against Corruption (IAC) campaign was “propped up by the RSS” to bring down the UPA government.

The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) founder member and senior lawyer was a core member of the anti-graft movement IAC that eventually became AAP. Bhushan was later expelled from the Arvind Kejriwal-led party along with Yogendra Yadav in 2015.

“…But in hindsight there are two things which I regret. One is not having seen that the movement was to a very large extent supported and propped up by the BJP-RSS for their own political purposes to bring down the Congress government and get themselves to power,” Bhushan said in an interview to India Today on September 12.

Both Kejriwal and Bhushan were part of IAC core committee, also known as Team Anna, that in 2011 launched a nation-wide movement demanding a pan-India ombudsman or Lokpal. Kejriwal's two prominent Team Anna comrades --retired IPS officer Kiran Bedi and former Army Chief General (Retd) VK Singh -- have joined the BJP since.

Bedi, BJPs CM candidate against Arvind Kejriwal in 2015 elections which she lost, is currently Lieutenant Governor (L-G) of Puducherry. General (Retd) VK Singh is serving as Minister of State for Roads, Transport and Highways in the Narendra Modi government.

In the past, the Congress party had made similar remarks accusing that RSS was behind the IAC that targeted UPA government for being “corrupt”. Bhushan’s latest remarks evoked a response from the Congress party's former president, Rahul Gandhi.

“What was known to us has been confirmed by a founding AAP member. The IAC movement & AAP were propped up by the RSS/BJP to subvert democracy and bring down the UPA government,” Gandhi tweeted on September 15.

Unlike many other Team Anna members, Bhushan and Kejriwal continued to work together, till April 2015 when the two differed on ideological issues in handling AAP following which the Supreme Court lawyer was expelled from the party.

“Anna Hazare was probably not aware of it. Arvind (Kejriwal) was aware of it and I have very little doubt of that,” Bhushan said referring to the three-time Chief Minister of Delhi.

Bhushan said his second regret was that he could not understand Kejriwal’s 'unscrupulous' character early enough.

"I understood it too late by which we have created another Frankenstein monster,” he said in the interview.

“I was exceedingly fond of Arvind but I was never very critically looking at him in order to see whether he was unscrupulous in his means.. but it became clear immediately after the Lok Sabha elections, one after another things unfolded, that he was not just unscrupulous and dictatorial but he had contempt for the policies of the party,” Bhushan said

In 2015, Bhushan made allegations against the party's leadership, including Kejriwal, its functioning and its deviation from the core ideology, values and commitments. Later, Bhushan and Yadav founded Swaraj Abhiyan. Many AAP leaders have often accused Bhushan of supporting Kiran Bedi as BJP's CM candidate in 2015 and wanting AAP to form government in Delhi with the BJP.

IAC also referred as Team Anna could not stay together with its main face Anna Hazare not agreeing with Kejriwal and his other colleagues’ decision to jump in the political fray in 2012. Anna Hazare has been relatively silent with an appearance here and there. Other prominent Team Anna members including Shanti Bhushan, father of Prashant Bhushan, social activist Medha Patkar, poet Kumar Vishwas, to name a few, have taken different routes since then over disagreements with Kejriwal.