The arrest of Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal is the biggest crisis faced by the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) since its founding in November 2012. Kejriwal has captained the 12-year-old party with complete control and authority, overcoming every episode of intermittent turbulence along the way.
Over the years, many of Kejriwal's associates from the India Against Corruption (IAC) days have quit the AAP. The likes of Prashant Bhushan, Yogendra Yadav, Kumar Vishwas, Ashutosh and Ashish Khetan blamed his autocratic and authoritarian style of functioning for their exits. It is well-known that some of them were bitterly upset with Kejriwal for denying them Rajya Sabha berths and even accused him of "selling the seats".
After Kejriwal, Who?
Kejriwal's arrest will undoubtedly hit the AAP hard and impact its functioning at a time when his three key lieutenants Manish Sisodia, Sanjay Singh and Satyendra Jain are already behind bars. Along with Kejriwal, they had been instrumental in expanding the AAP footprint across the country.
That leaves AAP in the hands of the next rung of leadership, comprising Gopal Rai, Saurabh Bhardwaj, Sandeep Pathak, Raghav Chadha and Atishi.
As of now, the most powerful leader in the AAP after Kejriwal is Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann, whose acceptance and popularity among the cadre has phenomenally risen since assuming the top post in the border state.
However, he won't leave Punjab for Delhi or remote control the party from Chandigarh.
Running Government From Prison?
In that case, the first preference for Kejriwal would be to run Delhi from prison and if that doesn’t work then he would select his successor.
Anticipating his arrest, AAP had already launched a door-to-door "Mai Bhi Kejriwal (I am also Kejriwal)" campaign in Delhi, seeking public opinion on whether the chief minister should resign if arrested or run the government from jail.
The party claimed that an overwhelming majority of the 2.4 million households covered under the campaign unequivocally favoured Kejriwal to run the government from prison, if arrested in the alleged Delhi liquor scam case.
The strategy is to escalate the showdown by asking for government files from jail which the Centre is unlikely to accept.
The plan is to force the BJP-led central government to go for midterm elections in Delhi, and then seek a fresh mandate and return to power by playing the victim card.
Centre Proceeding Cautiously?
But unlike other political leaders who have been arrested in various cases, the Centre is treading cautiously in Kejriwal’s case. It doesn’t want a public backlash or a repeat of 2011 in the national capital. Though activist Anna Hazare was the face of the anti-graft agitation against the Congress government, Kejriwal was the strategist and the brain behind the movement. He played a key role in mobilising public support then and could do it again.
While Prime Minister Narendra Modi continues to be the most popular leader and best orator in the country at present, Kejriwal too has mastered the art of narrative building over the years. Political circumstances have turned the former bureaucrat and activist into a mass leader and a vote catcher for the AAP.
He has twice beaten the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) at its own game after hitting a rough patch in his political journey.
Kejriwal first bounced back in a big way in the 2015 assembly elections after having resigned in a huff as the Delhi chief minister within 49 days of forming an AAP-Congress coalition government in 2014. He repeated the sweep of the Delhi assembly a second time in 2020.
These were stupendous victories especially after the BJP had convincingly won all seven seats in Delhi in the 2014 and 2019 Lok Sabha elections.
Unlike the Congress and other regional parties, the AAP is an unconventional political outfit that traces its origins to the 2011-12 anti-corruption movement and has the capability to surprise its opponents with its shock and awe moves.
AAP’s Perception Management Challenge
The party appears to have worked out a plan to make a big spectacle of Kejriwal's arrest as part of its strategy to take the battle to the BJP's camp. It wants to make a big 'tamasha' out of the arrest and try to garner public sympathy from the images of chaos that follows his arrest from his residence.
The liquor scam might have dented Kejriwal’s image to some extent but not among his core voters who have hugely benefitted from his so-called freebies. They still consider him the best bet in Delhi and someone who has not been allowed to do his work by the central government.
And before his arrest, Kejriwal ensured that the alliance with the Congress in Delhi and other states was sealed to prevent any sabotage at a later stage.
The AAP is hoping that Kejriwal’s arrest will stir the people and further consolidate the 12-year-old party. The chances of AAP disintegrating in Kejriwal’s absence seem remote in view of a strong organisational network and an established hierarchy.
But the challenge for the AAP is to maintain its edge over its rivals as far as the perception management battle is concerned. The war has just begun. Will it win that too, remains to be seen.
Aurangzeb Naqshbandi is a senior journalist who has been covering the Congress for 15 years, and is currently associated with Pixstory. Views are personal, and do not represent the stand of this publication.
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