THE DISRUPTER
Arvind Kejriwal and the Audacious Rise of the Aam Aadmi
Gautam Chikermane with Soma Banerjee
Rupa Publications; 225 + xxviii pages; Rs 295
"What does this Kejriwal fellow think he's doing? There has been no water in my locality since last evening. It's high time he realised that running a government isn't the same as organising street protests." This was an acquaintance fuming on her way to the gym early morning sometime this January. Less than a month later, Arvind Kejriwal resigned as Delhi chief minister after the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Congress foiled his plans to introduce the Jan Lok Pal Bill in the Assembly. "See, I had told you. He wouldn't last long," said the acquaintance triumphantly. "He's taken everybody for a ride. He's just a disrupter."
The Disrupter: Arvind Kejriwal and the Audacious Rise of the Aam Aadmi, authored by Gautam Chikermane with Soma Banerjee, makes no pretence of answering all these questions. What it does is explore and closely scrutinise everything the AAP is about: for instance, the need for the party's creation; the reason for the mind-boggling push it has got from the aam aadmi; and the significant things it did while in power during those 48 days but which did not make big news. It analyses in detail three "disruptive entities" - anti-corruption, the decentralisation of decision making and the devolution of power, and the right to recall - on which Mr Kejriwal and his team intend to rebuild the structure of governance and politics. It traces the problems within the party, of which even members of Mr Kejriwal's core team are aware. For example, Prashant Bhushan admits, "We have neglected some of the party structures within AAP… Unfortunately, very serious organisational thinking did not go behind the making of the party - what organs should be there, how many people, recruiting those people, the structures."
It is an important book; it gets you thinking more carefully about the churning that is happening around us and of which the AAP is a catalyst. The common man has never been this assertive and this "disruptive" (the term "disruptive" also gets a fresh look here). He has never questioned or confronted issues the way he is doing now. And if he has, it has only been in a few pockets - for example, in Niyamgiri against mining bauxite, in Kudankulam against the nuclear plant, or in Bhopal against the Narmada dam. The "disruptive" common man is also not unique to India. He has triggered the Arab Spring, forced an uprising in Bahrain and Syria, led major protests in Algeria and Morocco and minor ones in Mauritania and Djibouti.
The authors, who have pulled off an impressive feat in five weeks, begin by juxtaposing the description of what Mr Kejriwal is doing with an account of his fight against the system that is being waged in a small, upscale locality of Delhi - Alaknanda. The residents of this neighbourhood are fighting a proposed mega-mall on a stretch of land the size of four football fields that was meant for a community centre. The roadblocks they encounter, the questions they face from within their community, their initial fears of threats that soon prove misplaced - all of this is like the story of the AAP being played out in microcosm.
Anarchy also gets analysed through a new prism. What is anarchy? What is Mr Kejriwal doing and getting slapped for? Or is anarchy what we are living with because of a government and a system that fail us at every step? Anarchy is what has forced citizens to form "our own little republics, our own micro-governments", according to the authors. For example, if cooking gas is not available, we get our own by paying higher prices. If power supply is erratic, we get our mini power plant, an inverter. If the police fail to keep us safe, we get our own security guards. According to the book, to be living in an environment where you believe "…the gods have blessed you if you can do an honest day's job and return home. This is anarchy".
Despite the short span of time the authors had for the book, they have succeeded in studying in some depth the AAP's plan that is evolving, changing, getting tweaked and also falling short as it struggles to keep pace with the dizzying speed at which the aam aadmi's imagination and expectations are soaring. The strategies of protest - acceptable, controversial and unacceptable, whether through polarisation, non-violent resistance, escalation and confrontation, Gandhi and guerrilla, or by means of a revolution - are laid bare.
Following the AAP's strategists, such as Yogendra Yadav, into the heart of Haryana - where the party's "broom of ambition" has drawn both village lads and elders as well as professionals from the United States - offers critical insights into how the party is spreading out and consolidating itself.
After the Delhi "letdown", the suspicion that the AAP is just about the "politics of protest" did become stronger in the minds of many people. But, as Shiv Visvanathan, a "social science nomad", is quoted as saying, "The Indian politics of protest has not yet matured into a protest of problem solving". However, that is the next chapter about which Mr Kejriwal has been talking.
Whether or not Mr Kejriwal should be given an opportunity to do this is left to the reader to decide. As the authors say, this is, after all, not the last word on the AAP.
Arvind Kejriwal and the Audacious Rise of the Aam Aadmi
Gautam Chikermane with Soma Banerjee
Rupa Publications; 225 + xxviii pages; Rs 295
"What does this Kejriwal fellow think he's doing? There has been no water in my locality since last evening. It's high time he realised that running a government isn't the same as organising street protests." This was an acquaintance fuming on her way to the gym early morning sometime this January. Less than a month later, Arvind Kejriwal resigned as Delhi chief minister after the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Congress foiled his plans to introduce the Jan Lok Pal Bill in the Assembly. "See, I had told you. He wouldn't last long," said the acquaintance triumphantly. "He's taken everybody for a ride. He's just a disrupter."
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A Disrupter promoting Anarchy - is that all Mr Kejriwal and his Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) are about? After all, weren't disruptions and anarchy the highlight of their 48-day rule in Delhi? Didn't his law minister, Somnath Bharti, behave as an unbridled vigilante and a racist in Delhi's Khirki Extension? Didn't Mr Kejriwal, as chief minister, bring governance on the street when he sat in protest outside the Rail Bhavan, prompting others - such as Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy, Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan - to follow suit? Where is his party heading? And where does it intend to take us, the aam aadmi? Should we give him another chance or would he drag us deeper into the mess if we did? We're well aware of the rot in the ubiquitous system; we've all suffered it at some point in our lives. But is Mr Kejriwal's solution - that of shaking up and, if need be, breaking down the system - the way out? Would it be safer to go with the tried and tested - the Congress and the BJP - or is it time to break the mould and risk a change?
The Disrupter: Arvind Kejriwal and the Audacious Rise of the Aam Aadmi, authored by Gautam Chikermane with Soma Banerjee, makes no pretence of answering all these questions. What it does is explore and closely scrutinise everything the AAP is about: for instance, the need for the party's creation; the reason for the mind-boggling push it has got from the aam aadmi; and the significant things it did while in power during those 48 days but which did not make big news. It analyses in detail three "disruptive entities" - anti-corruption, the decentralisation of decision making and the devolution of power, and the right to recall - on which Mr Kejriwal and his team intend to rebuild the structure of governance and politics. It traces the problems within the party, of which even members of Mr Kejriwal's core team are aware. For example, Prashant Bhushan admits, "We have neglected some of the party structures within AAP… Unfortunately, very serious organisational thinking did not go behind the making of the party - what organs should be there, how many people, recruiting those people, the structures."
It is an important book; it gets you thinking more carefully about the churning that is happening around us and of which the AAP is a catalyst. The common man has never been this assertive and this "disruptive" (the term "disruptive" also gets a fresh look here). He has never questioned or confronted issues the way he is doing now. And if he has, it has only been in a few pockets - for example, in Niyamgiri against mining bauxite, in Kudankulam against the nuclear plant, or in Bhopal against the Narmada dam. The "disruptive" common man is also not unique to India. He has triggered the Arab Spring, forced an uprising in Bahrain and Syria, led major protests in Algeria and Morocco and minor ones in Mauritania and Djibouti.
The authors, who have pulled off an impressive feat in five weeks, begin by juxtaposing the description of what Mr Kejriwal is doing with an account of his fight against the system that is being waged in a small, upscale locality of Delhi - Alaknanda. The residents of this neighbourhood are fighting a proposed mega-mall on a stretch of land the size of four football fields that was meant for a community centre. The roadblocks they encounter, the questions they face from within their community, their initial fears of threats that soon prove misplaced - all of this is like the story of the AAP being played out in microcosm.
Anarchy also gets analysed through a new prism. What is anarchy? What is Mr Kejriwal doing and getting slapped for? Or is anarchy what we are living with because of a government and a system that fail us at every step? Anarchy is what has forced citizens to form "our own little republics, our own micro-governments", according to the authors. For example, if cooking gas is not available, we get our own by paying higher prices. If power supply is erratic, we get our mini power plant, an inverter. If the police fail to keep us safe, we get our own security guards. According to the book, to be living in an environment where you believe "…the gods have blessed you if you can do an honest day's job and return home. This is anarchy".
Despite the short span of time the authors had for the book, they have succeeded in studying in some depth the AAP's plan that is evolving, changing, getting tweaked and also falling short as it struggles to keep pace with the dizzying speed at which the aam aadmi's imagination and expectations are soaring. The strategies of protest - acceptable, controversial and unacceptable, whether through polarisation, non-violent resistance, escalation and confrontation, Gandhi and guerrilla, or by means of a revolution - are laid bare.
Following the AAP's strategists, such as Yogendra Yadav, into the heart of Haryana - where the party's "broom of ambition" has drawn both village lads and elders as well as professionals from the United States - offers critical insights into how the party is spreading out and consolidating itself.
After the Delhi "letdown", the suspicion that the AAP is just about the "politics of protest" did become stronger in the minds of many people. But, as Shiv Visvanathan, a "social science nomad", is quoted as saying, "The Indian politics of protest has not yet matured into a protest of problem solving". However, that is the next chapter about which Mr Kejriwal has been talking.
Whether or not Mr Kejriwal should be given an opportunity to do this is left to the reader to decide. As the authors say, this is, after all, not the last word on the AAP.