Today Punjab CM Captain Amarinder Singh lashed on AAP supremo Arvind Kejriwal as he shared an image of the ‘Punjab Referendum’ supported by AAP’s Punjab leader Sukhpal Khaira. Khaira is the leader of opposition in Punjab. The CM condemned the attempts of the Khalistani separatists for propagating the idea of secession from India. The referendum allegedly calls for a separate Khalistan.
Mr @ArvindKejriwal I strongly condemn the statement of your LOP @SukhpalKhaira supporting Referendum 2020 that aims for Punjab to secede from the Indian Union. Please clarify your stand on this & ask your partymen to act responsibly. Do see what this Referendum stands for?? pic.twitter.com/cX8MOsVR1w
— Capt.Amarinder Singh (@capt_amarinder) June 16, 2018
AAP’s dancing with Khalistan secessionist elements is long known. Ever since AAP started its political ventures in Punjab, their association with Khalistani elements is being exposed. Earlier this year, AAP leader Gul Panag had revealed on Twitter that the party had indulged in dangerous ‘flirtations’ with Khalistani elements, who, according to her, the party thought carried electoral weight.
AAP had reportedly sought the support of Khalistani outfits prior to the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. AAP leader Jarnail Singh was also under a lot of criticism as his posters appeared in support of a pro-Khalistani rally in London. Captain Amarinder Singh had spoken about AAP’s Khalistani afflictions before, even AAP’s own MP Dharamveer Gandhi has voiced concerns over it. It had supported the protests of radical Sikh groups demanding the release of Khalistani terrorists.
The most pressing issue on all these related events and later developments is that AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal neither attempted to stop it nor had he ever disowned or voiced displeasure over his party leaders who may be directly or indirectly supporting a cause that poses a threat to the very sovereignty of the nation. The onus of the responsibility must lie on Kejriwal because he did not stop his party from kindling Khalistani fires before the Punjab elections.
AAP was very vocal about the drug abuse issue in Punjab, the farmer’s issue too. But after losing the state elections, Kejriwal seems to have left the AAP workers and leaders in the state in a limbo. Kejriwal had accused Shiromani Akali Dal’s Bikram Majithia of patronizing a widespread drugs racket in the state. Those accusations fell flat. Earlier this year, Kejriwal had to apologise to Majithia for his remarks.
AAP Punjab is unravelling. And a great part of the blame would go to Kejriwal. As pointed out by many and even claimed by his own party men, Kejriwal just abandoned Punjab. If his partymen in the state are back to flirting Khalistani sentiments, its mainly because they are clueless about their party leadership. Their party chief is busy being a couch potato (quite literally) in Delhi, jumping from one excuse to another while making a mockery of the political and democratic process.
If you go by the history, it is not new for Kejriwal leave things midway. Abandoning causes that he championed for is something the mysterious phenomenon called Kejriwal does quite often. A classic example of Kejriwal’s ‘pick a cause dump a cause’ is his NGO Privartan. Founded by him for addressing people’s development issues and ‘transform’ governance and redressal systems, it now lies in tatters. Sunder Nagri, the area he promised to change is still a maze of choked drains, long queues and as the Outlook Magazine’s report claimed, Sunder Nagri’s situation has become worse.
Old NGOs are not the only thing Kejriwal has abandoned either. He quite conveniently abandoned the very cause that served as his launchpad into the Indian politics. He does not talk about the Lokpal Bill anymore. Neither has he acted on that 370 pages of evidence he had on the Sheila Dikshit government. Interestingly, his government’s FIR on the CWG scam did not even name Sheila Dikshit.
Kejriwal lost Varanasi to PM Modi by a margin of over 3.71 lakh votes. He had thanked the people of Varanasi for giving him more than 2 lakh votes and promised that his association with the city will continue. He did not keep that promise either.
Sadly, old NGOs state party units and lost constituencies are not the only things Kejriwal abandons. Most of all, he seems to have abandoned his principles. From a leader who promised a corruption free, transformative and clean government, he has reduced himself to a puny political drama artist. His pantomimes of baseless allegations and apologies have shattered his party’s credibility. Accountability was something AAP never had anyway. Now after a series of motor mouth allegations and apologies after legal tussles, the sand castle called AAP lies in ruins.
Mayank Gandhi, who was once by Kejriwal’s side in India against Corruption movement and later went on to become AAP’s state unit chief for Maharashtra, had written in an open letter to AAP workers and supporters that the quest for alternate politics is over and they might as well go back to whatever they were doing, rather than continuing to dream about some change through AAP. Every word of his letter seems to be happening like a prophecy in AAP. He wrote in another post that Arvind, the unselfish political leader, is dead.
Since last few days, Arvind Kejriwal has been doing a dharna inside the Delhi LG’s residence. In all the months being in power in Delhi, Kejriwal seems to have done little apart from blaming PM Modi, BJP and the LGs for all his government’s failures. Situations have become such that one has started feeling pity for AAP workers and supporters. In Kejriwal, all they had got is a leader who leads them on, only to abandon halfway and then forgets all about them. A selfish, self-obsessed and weak leader can ruin a party. Arvind Kejriwal’s theatrics have ruined AAP well and proper, but the dangerous affairs with Khalistani elements are not something to be taken lightly. In his quest for power, Kejriwal seems to have unlocked forces that threaten India’s peace and sovereignty.
