The mufflerman returns

The Aam aadmi party has titillated the imagination of the Indian public. Clean politics in India has been an oxymoron. Politicians will make hay, a semblance of governance is a happy byproduct. Two years back, the AAP juggernaut pulled into Delhi and traditional parties were caught with their pants down. Who would have thought that the common man was actually serious about clean politics? The reality of governance however, soon dawned on Kejriwal and his band of crusaders. Pre election promises came home to roost, spelling a quick retreat for AAP to the fringes with a bloody nose. With this as the backdrop, nobody would have given them a second chance, much less the landslide which swept everything in sight. Still, the crusader tag can prove to be a heavy millstone around their neck, such are the compulsions of parliamentary democracy in India.

For starters, they should focus on the economics of running a government. Slashing electricity tariffs may be music to the common man’s ears, but does nothing for improving the creaking infrastructure, if not sustainable. AK presents an interesting caricature, perhaps not entirely unintended. A man of slight built with a scarf a permanent fixture around his neck. A coughing crusader willing to take on a well entrenched machinery but unable to shake off a nagging cough, betraying his common man with common problems credentials. He would have to go beyond the rhetoric now, in order to deliver. Electorates have been known to be notoriously fickle; their memories don’t go beyond the last price cut.