Open Letter to AK from J. Shriyan, Suratkal

Respected Shri Arvind Kejriwalji

Greetings of the New Year. Hope and wish the new year holds out all its promises that you have in your mind for the aam aadmi and your party AAP.

India, our motherland recognizes that you have arrived. Arrived with a bang. Legislators have confirmed that you will be allowed to function at least in the short run. So you will be left with the job of management or as it is called, in the public space, governance.

You are a highly educated and motivated person and hence not much has to be told to you. I have been following you up since quite some time with keen interest in your rise. Hope one day, your baby AAP makes its presence felt in the corridors of power in the parliament. I am sure, Indians will be fortunate enough to witness it, in your own life time. That you will grow in size and stature is never in doubt, since there is a whole lot of youth and even older persons who are comfortable with you, your brand of politics and AAP. So the rise of AAP is guaranteed.

Of course, the governance in political administration is not a rocket science as you rightly say. Anybody can do it, with a little amount of understanding of problems and its economics. If the intention is good, all will fall in its place, slowly and steadily. However, there is this English saying “Haste is waste”. Surely all of us are in a hurry to do things which we all feel should be done, either for one’s own good or for the general good. But being in hurry also causes, at times, avoidable problems and accidents. We could just stamp on somebody else’ foot, in our haste, who would have all reasons to complain. Of course, media should not play truant, since many a time it can be fickle for its own TRP/USP, as we have witnessed in the recent days some can be friendly, some can be hostile and some can be just matter of fact.

However, seeing media intervention, interlocution in both print and electronic media, it is generally felt that there are rough and blunt edges that you need to change for better. Unlike anyone else, you, Arvind, is in sharp focus.

Fortunately for AAP, you have one of the nation’s finest interlocutors in Yogendra Yadav. His dignified presence, ability to talk analytically and with robust sense has endeared him to most Indians. He should be seen as a national spokesperson for AAP in the short run. He will have a sobering effect, both on anchors and opposition representatives in the media interaction.

That you are honest, is beyond doubt. But you are too direct and at times attacking. Urge to attack the untruth and wrong is natural to someone as committed and honest as you are. But, it always pays to be nice to opposition views and opposition speakers.

One of the very important issue is of corruption. Treat corruption as an issue without naming any party or individual. It helps to build bridges among differing perceptions. The stand that ‘I am clean, and you are bad’, creates disquiet. You are interested in issues and hence talk only of issue without naming anybody, who in your view may be responsible. By naming, you are only inviting hackles which can impede your smooth ride.

You always keep quoting Mahatma Gandhi. Mahatma was always insisting on improvement rather than punishment. Hence say, what is wrong, rather than who is wrong. May be the person, who is wrong in your assessment, may join you, in correcting the wrong, if you do not attack him, or name him. After all your goal is good and clean governance. If all help your cause, what’s your problem? Try to take everybody on board. Remember your own words “28 MLAs cannot handle the situation, to solve the problems of Delhi. Entire Delhi has to come together. That will happen later, but at least all 70 members should have coordination” while thanking for Lt. Governor’s address. Even the most criminal deserve to be heard in our democratic polity. Your adversaries are issues, problems, troubles etc. Concentrate only on issues than saying both BJP and Congress are corrupt or BSP and SP are in the same boat. What you are saying may be true but that stand will not help your cause in the short run and in the long run it can create hurdles, humps & road blocks. You will spend both money and time to overcome these completely avoidable management of trouble and trouble makers. There is no point in making any political party your adversary or your enemy. You must always opt for a course of least resistance. Surely your parents could play a role in making you see the truth of the above proposition.

Just the other day, after your announcement of going national for the April 2014 election, there was this interaction with Rajdeep Sardesai of CNN/IBN:, where your representative Rahul, called both Congress and BJP as truly bad parties, which could have been avoided, whatever the provocation. This attitude will neither win friends or influence people. However to a very pointed question “whether Narendra Modi or Congress is your enemy, fortunately Rahul took the middle road by stressing we are fighting for a corruption free India and to give a people centric governance that is our agenda and is not focused on either Modi or Congress. This was a measured response, unlike the earlier one.

TuTu-Mai Mai – is a traditional ways of most political parties. AAP should cause a culture shift by not stooping to their level, since AAP is not a traditional political party. The recent happenings involving your law minister Bharti could have been differently managed with least bitterness and to better effect.

Your latest agitationist politics of taking to the street is not a right thing for a Chief Minister to do. Not sure, if this will win you friends and influence people. All your points could have been discussed with the Lt. Governor and leave the agitation to your party and MLAs. Even if you are to go for agitation, as a last resort, could have kept LG in the loop.

Coming to requesting some respected names among traditional parties, AAP should approach children of late Lal Bahadur Shastri, a truly Aam Aadmi icon, to become part of AAP, and surely there are many. By not accusing these parties, job of AAP becomes easier for approaching these clean souls who would truly make a difference in public space, given an opportunity.

Kindly do not take this as lecturing or being sanctimonious. I am senior to you in age. And it is well meant. I have no axe to grind at all. I am as much in love with the Bharath, our motherland, as anybody else and deeply distressed at the abysmal state of some of socio/economic sectors of our country. I am a staunch supporter of affirmative actions by the state like empowerment. And despite being an OBC, I have never taken any socio-economic benefits of reservation. My view is reservation & freebies have made people dependent. Our policy initiative should be to empower people. Development should be empowerment centric. This is my firm belief. Reservation, if any should be on financial status rather than caste, tribes, religion etc.

Reservation has always been used as vote bank politics, rather than a welfare measure, in the present scheme of things. There has to be a study on what benefits these plethora of reservation and benefits have done to our people for all these 60 years. Sooner or later they all have to be phased out to truly make people self dependent by making education and health as priority in development initiative. It is a short communication hence not right for me to go on and on. If needed a paper can be separately submitted. I end with a firm belief, that you are what Krishna said to Arjuna in the battlefield of Kurukshetra, and you could be the “Sambhavaami Yuge Yuge”.

Yours in admiration & respect