Kejriwal & AAPs Tryst With Hindutva When Populism Trumps Ideology – The Quint

Before 2019, the AAP assumed a vocal anti-BJP character, with Kejriwal regularly feuding with the Central government, and particularly with Modi personally, at one point even terming the Prime Minister a coward and a (sic) psychopath. He appeared on TV channels accusing the ruling BJP of being the handmaiden of Ambani and Adani and slaying government policies such as demonetisation. While he was never an outspoken critic of Hindutva like Rahul Gandhi, he could occasionally condemn Modi for his Hindu-Muslim politics in public rallies. The path to expansion then lied, for Kejriwal, in capturing the opposition space by attacking the BJP.

All this changed after the 2019 election when AAP was humiliated by the BJP in all seven seats of Delhi. But for Bhagwant Manns win in Punjab, it would have lost all the forty seats it contested. Almost overnight, the AAP lost its anti-BJP voice, and it has spent the next two years pursuing a thorough course correction.

All of AAPs subsequent politics has been informed by its reading of the 2019 election mandate. The party made two calculations, both valid in this authors estimation. One, the ideological centre-ground of Indian politics has shifted Right, and two, for the foreseeable future, India would be under a BJP-dominant system. Gauging these larger structural shifts, Kejriwal set about refashioning his centrist populism in a distinctive rightward mould.

This is a rather simplistic conclusion. Whatever the moral objections to AAP legitimising Hindutva majoritarian symbols in the public sphere, it is quite possible that this new politics might aid the party in its expansion plans.

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Kejriwal & AAPs Tryst With Hindutva When Populism Trumps Ideology - The Quint