Decontextualized Discourse: The Curse Of 49

The avalanche of information this election season is not just diluting the political discourse but is also decontextualizing events, altering their meanings completely. The Aam Aadmi Party's phenomenal rise has been affected negatively as electoral campaigns reaches a feverish pitch, with personality cults, controversial statements and general mood of festivity drowning the more earthy issues taken up by the Aam Aadmi Party. As of yet, traditional parties, being unable to counter the very real stands taken by the Aam Aadmi Party had been attacking it for its lack of experience in governance and impracticability of its demands but now AAP government's resignation on 49th day of it assuming power in Delhi Assembly is being touted as vindication of their claims. It is nauseating to find even editorials of India's largest selling newspapers' mention AAP's 49 day stint as failure and abdication of responsibility.

Government Formation
The Delhi 2013 Assembly elections results not only threw a hung assembly but also a unique situation n which the three parties were so ideologically opposed to each other, that any genuine understanding between them was out of question or so it seemed then. Later on it transpired that Congress and BJP had unsaid agreement over several issues.

• Neither wanted re-poll as it pretty much guaranteed AAP winning majority of seats.   
• Both wanted to discredit AAP through propaganda as opposed to taking them on in elections. 
• Despite being the single largest party the BJP did not stake its claim to form the government, something it has done numerous times in the past, including the 13-day and 13-month NDA governments in 1996 and 1998-99. But BJP hadn't declined right away, its first response after the declaration of results was that it will "try to give Delhi a government but wouldn't resort to horse-trading"
• Congress offered unconditional support to AAP to form government but what has been wiped off public memory is the fact that the BJP too extended support but strictly issue-based.

BJP on Friday asked Aam Aadmi Party, the second largest party in Delhi assembly with 28 seats, to form a government while assuring it of constructive cooperation in fulfilling its promises such as slashing tariff by 50 per cent and providing free water upto 700 litres daily. [Indian Express Dec 13th 2013]

• AAP faced a dilemma; if it refused to form government, the two parties could accuse it of running away from responsibilities and also for having promised things in manifesto which couldn't be implemented. If AAP formed government, it wouldn't be able to bring sweeping changes without majority and thus still be discredited. Though both the Congress and the BJP promised to help AAP fulfill its pre-poll promise, there was little doubt on it being false promise.
• Support for AAP's 18-point agenda was agreed upon by the Congress though the response bordered on ambiguity. 
• Further, Arvind Kejriwal sought people's feedback through SMS campaign. In a political culture where people have to be paid money for even participating in a rally, 5 lakh Delhites SMSed in response to Kejriwal's call referendum and overwhelming majority was in favour of government formation.

Why is Arvind Kejriwal shying away from his resposibility to form the government in Delhi as he already has support of 8 MLAs of Congress?
— Dr. Harsh Vardhan (@drharshvardhan) December 14, 2013

Right after Kejriwal was sworn in, the BJP began a malicious campaign accusing AAP of going back against their pledge of having no trucks with the Congress, conveniently forgetting that even the BJP had offered issue based support at that point in time..

While the BJP's attack was from the front, the Congress had a more insidious agenda. Given the unique nature of NCT of Delhi's administrative structure, the AAP government was left with very little room to manoeuvre, leave alone bringing systemic change. With the high level of expectation from the AAP government and Union government tightening the shackles of technicalities, the situation was similar to being thrown into a boxing ring with your hands tied behind your back.

Resignation
That the AAP government had a limited lifespan was a foregone conclusion but the manner of it going out was still a matter of speculation. Arvind Kejriwal quit on his own terms after the Janlokpal bill was defeated in the assembly. However, with a sustained campaign by various stakeholders in the present order managed to bury AAP's achievements in those 49 days, only the resignation of Arvind Kejriwal was allowed to live in public memory and that too in a perverted form.

The media's focus is too short and too enamoured by sharp and vitriolic sound bytes made by popular political personalities to dwell on the way things played out after the Delhi elections and decisions taken by parties in view of constitutional propriety. The fact is that the Aam Aadmi Party had formed the government on assurance given by the Congress that it would support the passage of Janlokpal bill, the issue on which the movement had begun. After blocking the bill the Congress not only went against its commitment, it also proved that the AAP did not command confidence of the house and its constitutional obligation was to resign. Minority governments functioning through horse-trading or jugaad during the test of strength on the floor of the house may have been the norm in last two decades but AAP cannot follow the path and occupy the moral high ground that it does. 

Has personality-centric politics so diluted civil discourse that following the ethical and constitutional path is now seen as folly even by intellectuals ? Or has too much real-time information decontextualized events of  recent past, allowing them to be reinterpreted as part of the media wants it to ?

Posted By Danish 5:40 PM

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AAPidemic: The Socio-Political Epidemic of India

Not a day passes by without any of the leading newspapers of India not carrying a column on AAP by one intellectual or the other. While overwhelming number of these news columns hail AAP as having surpassed expectations and for making a positive impact on political culture of India, these statements usually end with a "but" clause followed by an advice,apprehension,warning on how a particular party line could damage its future prospects. Right from the day AAP was formed to this very day, nearly everyone in the habit of writing, articulating personal opinion to the public, from political pundits to part-time bloggers (including this one) have been speculating self-convincingly that the "next" step of this new party is too risky and may boomerang, yet nothing of that sort has happened. The AAP phenomenon is truly unprecedented but perhaps there is something more, something that doesn't fall into any of the categories we know.

Is it epistemic contempt ?   AAP's successes continue to prove that the experts, who have been studying all the equations, examining the numerous variables so painstakingly are being proved wrong continuously. Electoral results turning out contrary to the psephologist's predictions are indeed victories for democratic system but the entire methodology being proved wrong is quite embarrassing. So despite genuine admiration, a bit of skepticism, cynicism and even hostility continues to creep into columns and  statements on TV. One has to presume that lot if not most of these mixed messages are genuine appraisal. But this too raises another question, why would rational and intellectually honest people hold the opinion that they do.

There may not a a single, satisfactory answer to this question, it is a fact that Kejriwal has continued to represent himself as a common person through symbolic gestures, oration and his government's policies, but there have always been people like him, perhaps it is because Kejriwal has offered less and not more that sets him apart and also triggered a phenomenon that most people find difficult to define. A flashback into the genesis of the movement, may shed some light.

Less than a year back, the media was rife with speculations on whether the 2014 election would take place in the shadow of Narendra Modi or of Rahul Gandhi. Loyal Congressmen anticipated their reluctant messiah to finally lead them to deliverance. Sangh cheerleaders sang of a Modi wave, even tried hard at manufacturing it and therein lay the fault. Waves are laud,powerful even spectacular but have a relatively tiny lifespan and ultimately crash on meeting the shore. In the information age, ideas are contagious. More importantly, positive, constructive ideas are more contagious than highly emotive but shallow ones. The ideas of the Aam Aadmi Party spread like a highly resilient pathogen creating a social epidemic as Malcolm Gladwell would say. As a matter of fact, I believe Modi's campaign managers have tried to create strategy keeping Malcolm Gladwell's best seller, The Tipping Point in mind (but can't substantiate in this post), but can say it didn't turn out that way at all. People joining the AAP in droves without any incentive or even persuasion is symptomatic of spread of a contagious disease rather than political movement.

Gladwell lays down three characteristics of an epidemic-
Contagiousness - This is quite different from carefully thought over behavior, when newspapers describe the idea of AAP going viral, it can also be read as a phenomenon of ideas spreading like jungle fire but travelling beneath the surface. Isn't that  similar to how a biological virus works.

Small is Big- Little causes have big effects. The AAP grew out of IAC, the movement launched to

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pressurize the government to pass the Jan Lokpal bill. In itself, it wasn't even tackling corruption in all forms. Anna Hazare's immediate call was to pass a particular bill, no one believed it was a magic pill that would eradicate corruption from the country. Arvind Kejriwal's electoral plank wasn't building India a military superpower or promise of billion dollar schemes nor was it about eradicating poverty at one stroke. He talked about cheap water, electricity, on diverting resources meant for the lavish lifestyles of the VIPs
towards welfare of the poor. These promises also had "Stickiness Factor" but to a  lesser extent. Corrupt politicians storing their ill-gotten wealth in Swiss banks, is big, it does infuriate the public but mostly in that instant or later when there is a context. Kejriwal laying down documents describing how water/electricity price is high because of endemic corruption remains in public memory persistently.

Change Happens in One Dramatic Moment - This doesn't need explanation. The AAP's phenomenal rise began with its impressive performance in Delhi Assembly poll results. Once the party had shown its capability to win election, there has been an avalanche of support, people from every section of population are lining up to join the party.

Epidemics have a limited lifespan too but they also have a way of reshuffling our priorities and restructuring society, thus leaving their marks behind which can be a blessing in disguise. Something similar to epidemiological transition, except that diseases and sickness can replaced by government policies and general social behavior. The biggest epidemic in human history was the the Black Death in  14th century Europe and parts of Asia,which claimed lives of a significant portion of global population. The Plague killed about 30% to 60% of European population but the social upheaval in its aftermath also contributed new thoughts,reforms and ultimately Renaissance. Thankfully, social epidemic is about ideas not diseases and hopefully the deaths will be those of undemocratic practices, corruption and discrimination and the aftermath bring about systemic change.

That would explain why the AAP effect defies conventional wisdom, it may appear chaotic but there is an order that we are able to perceive but not understand (at least I am unable to). Perhaps it is some sort of collective consciousness, not spiritual or metaphysical but purely anthropological with cyber space being a part of it. While similar phenomena are taking place across the world from Cairo to Manila,the happening in Delhi and rest of India is bit different in that there is no precedence to it. The two national parties are making every  effort to discredit the AAP but the most important part they forget or rather, never noticed is that this is indeed a movement of the common people. Established political parties are known to bribe and ferry people in trucks or dumpers to showcase support. Today, lakhs of people from diverse sections of the society are lining up for membership of the Aam Aadmi Party. Parties  distribute TVs, laptops and other freebies for vote but after the Delhi Assembly election results, 5 lakh people actually sent SMS in response to Kejriwal's call for referendum.

What this really means is that Kejriwal is correct when he says even if CM, he is still a common man, representing other common people. The Congress and the BJP attacking the AAP government in Delhi, attempting to bring down top leadership of the party may be a futile exercise, Arvind represents the movement, he  doesn't take credit for it. Before the AAP was formed, Anna Hazare was phenomenally popular during the protests against corruption but he disassociated himself from the newly formed party, the party did not go down but Anna's media coverage decreased but the party's popularity increased. So its time that other politicians, intellectuals, media person understand that this is a socia-political epidemic, it may not last for decades but regardless of who is in charge it will run its full course.    

Note: This post was composed nearly 2 weeks back but wasn't published, it doesn't take into account recent events. But nonetheless, my opinion remains the same :)

Posted By Danish 9:03 PM

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#AAP Effect: The Politics Of Denial In Delhi

Denial is not just a river in Egypt,  it is also a strong current of a sentiment flowing in the corridors of the established political class of India. For once we see the Right, Left and Center of India’s traditional political spectrum publicly uniting against motley group of ordinary people who neither have great legacies, wealth nor fame but still believe they can contest elections in a democracy!  The very idea of winning polls without exploiting identity-based issues whether fictitious or real, making hollow rhetoric or bribing, coercing voters would be the height of incredulity.

Posted By Danish 3:05 AM

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Can AAP's Broom Withstand Assault Of Vacuum Cleaners Of Corrupt Establishment ?

Let me begin this post with a little jingoism. Aam Aadmi Party's success in Delhi Vidhan Sabha polls is indeed victory of the common man and of the idea called new India. It is not a victory because of its seat tally in the state assembly but because of the fact that psephologists, analysts, columnists and even bloggers including, yours truly, could not predict the outcome even after the exit polls. Prior to this election smug educated, urban citizens often displayed antipathy towards political processes, one of the reasons cited is that their stake is diluted by "their claim of" votes are bought by candidates by providing liquor, cash and other freebies, to the poor. Time and again it has been proven that the weaker sections of population exercise their right to vote much more intelligently. After all voting is the only right they actually have, even in practice. Ironically, some of the people who held this view are now part of Aam Aadmi Party !

The cynicism around the impact of AAP on electoral results stemmed from the belief that the party was too idealistic, the electorate is swayed by more emotive issues and identity-based politics rather than less excitable issues such as availability of clean water. Arvind Kejriwal was not just threatening the ruling dispensation but the establishment as a whole. And now that the upstart has upset the establishment, it faces much bigger challenges than a national election. While Rahul Gandhi has gone on to say that he is willing to learn from AAP's approach to politics, other senior Congress leaders as well as leaders of the BJP and most established parties have been far less sporting or gracious in defeat. If at all, they have been far more vindictive. Before even the counting of votes over, a senior Congress leader (Digvijay Singh if I remember correctly), grinning from ear to ear, pointed out that the elected members of AAP would now have to face individual voters and supporters seeking favors such as getting their kids admitted to schools and the like.

As the counting came to close and the question on who would be form the government in Delhi was being discussed and AAP clearly declining to take or lend support to neither contenders, BJP leader Ravi Shankar Prasad seemed livid at the naivety that the TV show host was expecting politics of jugaad live on television. Prasad's body language almost seemed to say, "Doesn't she know that these negotiations take place through back channels ?!" A hung assembly only means more bargaining power of the party that holds the key and the support could be always be bought, if not through money than through concessions and compromises - the two fundamental tenets of coalition dharma. However, as AAP stuck to its commitment to its voters of not aligning with either the BJP or the Congress, the outrage among established political class has become vitriolic. As it became clearer that AAP was not keen to form the government, it was read by opponents not as staying true to the commitment but as fear of being unable to deliver the promises.

However, far from being the new Left, that believes in only protests and not governance, AAP seems to be more pragmatic and result oriented. If the party says that water tariff can be decreased substantially, it also points out that according to Delhi Jal Board more than 200 million gallon water is lost due to leakage per day. If the water from leakage is being soaked in the ground it should raise water table and since this is not the case, that much water should flood Delhi ! Something similar applies to electricity tariffs too, if figures are fudged, just auditing DJB and discoms and taking appropriate steps should bring the tariffs down.  

 But that is not all. Both the Congress and the BJP are so thoroughly convinced that the traditional model is the only model of governance in India that they are not even pretending to take the mandate of Delhi voters seriously. The grins and smirks of Congress and BJP leaders seem to say that it is time Arvind Kejriwal and team do a reality check but perhaps the Old Order needs to do a reality check in the era of information revolution. Their decisions send out the message that they are not in the race to grab power, they seek to bring changes to act as catalysts  of a social transformation that Indian society must undergo at this juncture if it is to emerge as a nation that truly values democracy, human/civil  rights, openness and transparency of it institutions... 

Posted By Danish 2:24 AM

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