When newcomer Arvind Kejriwal defeated three-time chief minister Sheila Dikshit in her constituency of New Delhi in 2013, jubilant supporters took to the streets, hailing the moment when a common man got an opportunity to master electoral politics. Kejriwal’s Aam Aadmi Party soon became the preeminent force in Delhi politics. In less than a decade, it extended its sway to one more state by winning the Punjab assembly elections in 2022, becoming the only regional party to be in power in two states. Growing footprint and ambitions in states like Goa, Assam, Haryana and Gujarat further catapulted the AAP into the non-BJP, non-Congress political space and raised the profile of its talismanic leader.
However, the arrest of Kejriwal by the CBI could not have come at a worse time for the party. After recording a below average performance in the Lok Sabha polls, the AAP was banking on the release of their leader from jail in the money laundering case of the Enforcement Directorate to go back to the drawing board. Despite dominating the Delhi assembly for a decade, the party failed to open its account in the capital, losing all seven Parliament seats to the BJP, third time in a row. The massive loss has dented the credibility of the AAP as a national player and of Kejriwal as a national leader.
The Punjab story, too, did not go as expected, as the AAP could win only three seats against the Congress’s seven. While the party’s vote share increased to 26 per cent, it had 42 per cent vote share and 92 seats in the 2022 assembly polls, which allowed it to form the government. The AAP’s candidates in Assam, Haryana and Gujarat failed to open their account.
“With Kejriwal in jail and the AAP’s ordinary performance in the Lok Sabha elections, these are very difficult times for the party and it may adversely impact its expansion plans,” said Sanjay Kumar, professor and co-director of Lokniti at the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies. “The situation has posed a tough political challenge for the AAP, which faces assembly elections in Delhi next year.”
Kejriwal has been on a legal roller coaster since June 21 when a Delhi court granted him bail in the ED case, only to be put on hold by the Delhi High Court a day later. Just as he was looking to secure bail from the Supreme Court, the CBI arrested him in the same case on June 26. It has opened a new battlefront for the AAP as Kejriwal faces corruption charges under the Prevention of Corruption Act. In 2022, when the CBI first registered a case under the Act in the liquor policy scam, it did not name Kejriwal as an accused. But the net has been widened with the CBI probing charges of corruption and bribe-taking by public servants, while the ED is separately investigating the alleged money trail in the case.
The CBI is examining the role of the Delhi Group of Ministers (GoM), consisting of senior AAP leaders including former deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia, in tweaking the policy to allegedly benefit the “south liquor lobby”, referring to a group of influential persons from south India. The role of the chief minister’s office is also under a cloud as CBI sleuths are examining evidence against Kejriwal’s close aide Vijay Nair who was allegedly given the responsibility to coordinate the meetings with the “south group”. The CBI said the report prepared by the aides became the policy in which profit margins were increased from six per cent to 12 per cent.
Following allegations of irregularities, the new liquor policy was scrapped on August 1, 2022. The ED in its chargesheet named Kejriwal and the AAP as accused and claimed that the chief minister was involved in formulating the policy and demanded kickbacks to the tune of Rs100 crore. The ED also accused Kejriwal of utilising Rs45 crore of laundered money in the party’s Goa election campaign in 2022.
“It is a double whammy,” said M.L. Sharma, former CBI special director. “The PMLA (Prevention of Money Laundering Act) comes into play after the registration of a predicate offence by the police or the CBI. This means an accused is liable to be arrested twice by the two agencies. What follows can be a rather complicated and time consuming legal battle as a chargesheet has to be filed in the predicate offence and the arrested person can remain in jail due to the stringent provisions for grant of bail under PMLA.”
The AAP blamed the BJP for its legal woes. “When there was every possibility of the chief minister getting bail, the BJP went into panic mode and got him arrested by the CBI in a fake case,” it posted on X. Kejriwal is likely to remain in jail till July 12.
The BJP functionaries, on the other hand, said that actions of the politicians would shape the electorate’s opinion. “The aspirations of the electorate have changed and their maturity level has gone up,” said Binay Kumar Singh, senior research fellow at the Dr Syama Prasad Mookerjee Research Foundation and BJP spokesperson, Jharkhand. “Until now dynastic politics and caste factors were dominant. But now the memory of the electorate does not fade away and they take cognisance of what politicians do. The voters do not forget their involvement in corruption.”
The fresh cycle that has begun with the CBI case has not only put on hold the possibility of immediate relief to the chief minister, but has also upset the AAP’s plans to work really hard to salvage its image and political future. The signs are worrying, and so are the statistics, conceded AAP leaders. The party’s alliance with the Congress failed to make an impact just as Kejriwal’s campaign for the elections failed to attract sympathy votes during the interim bail period granted by the Supreme Court. “When the election results were announced on June 4, there was gloom among party workers,” said an AAP leader. “After the energetic campaign by Kejriwal, we were hoping to win at least two seats in Delhi and more than three in Punjab. But the results have impacted the morale of the party workforce.”
The combined vote share of the AAP and the Congress was about 43 per cent, much less than the BJP’s 54 per cent. “Even hardcore AAP supporters now believe that their stance of projecting themselves as an anti-graft crusaders was false and that they are like any other petty and corrupt politicians,” said Singh.
Making matters worse, the rift between the AAP and the Congress, which was latent during the polls, is out in open. The grand old party, which registered an impressive performance by winning 99 seats in the Lok Sabha polls, has started distancing itself from the AAP. “Had we not contested the elections with them, our seats would have increased. Because of the excise scam, the Congress suffered a loss in the Lok Sabha elections,” said Abhishek Dutt, national secretary of the Congress.
Delhi’s water woes, too, failed to break the ice between the two parties. When AAP’s crisis manager and minister Atishi went on a fast, Dutt said it was the minister’s job to provide full facilities to the public. “There is no water in Delhi and they are doing dharna,” he said. And when it poured in Delhi, the AAP faced more flak from the Congress. “We have been warning the government about the monsoons, but in times of crisis, the Delhi government runs away,” said Delhi Congress chief Devender Yadav.
The AAP is facing an uphill battle as it grapples with various legal challenges. At the moment, the party’s focus is less on political issues and more on its legal woes. Delhi voters have, meanwhile, conveyed to the AAP that Kejriwal’s popularity will be judged on merit by the work being done outside courtrooms. The big question is when Kejriwal will get out of jail and get on the streets again.
“The AAP is now left with no street fighters. Their style of politics includes protests and dharnas, which are getting thinner by the day,” said Kumar.
Kejriwal’s refusal to resign from the chief ministership has further complicated matters. If a chief minister governing from jail is a first, the consequences of continuing to do so for weeks on end could throw up more unpleasant outcomes.