100 days of AAP's capital conquest

AAP came to power with a thumping majority but has had to battle several controversies to ensure that work gets done.

May 23, 2015 07:55 am | Updated April 02, 2016 11:37 pm IST - New Delhi

AAp supporters at a rally in Delhi.

AAp supporters at a rally in Delhi.

The Arvind Kejriwal-led government’s completion of 100 days in office on Sunday began with allegations of attempts to “buy” Congress MLAs, witnessed tumult with the mysterious death of a farmer at its rally and coincided with an ugly spat with the L-G over jurisdictions with regard to appointment of senior bureaucrats.

The confrontation, which started with the appointment of Principal Power Secretary Shakuntala Gamlin as the Acting Chief Secretary, has blown into a full-scale war between the Aam Aadmi Party government and the Centre. At the core of the issue is Statehood for Delhi which, if achieved, has the potential to revolutionise the political climate of the Capital forever.

“It’s a political issue. The Centre wants the Delhi government to run just like it was during eight months of President’s Rule. If this is the way things must be, what is the need to hold elections in the first place?” said Transport Minister Gopal Rai. Though a notification, that allegedly clips the wings of the AAP government has come as a shock for those in power, this is not the party’s first brush with controversies ever since it took over on February 14.

One of the first among these was a purported sting operation that emerged almost immediately after Mr. Kejriwal was sworn-in as Chief Minister. Rebel leader Rajesh Garg was seen alleging that he had masterminded a scheme to “purchase Congress MLAs”.

This was followed by a very public fallout between Mr. Kejriwal and founder members Yogendra Yadav and Prashant Bhushan, who ended up being expelled from the AAP for anti-party activities in mid-April, giving the Opposition to question his “style of functioning” as “Stalinist”.

What followed after every instance was Mr. Kejriwal’s attempt to shift the blame on the media what with the Delhi government recently issuing a controversial circular asking its officials to file cases against the media if they published or aired “defamatory news”. Though the Supreme Court stayed the circular, Mr. Kejriwal, who once enjoyed media limelight during the Anna Hazare-led anti-graft movement and his election campaign, emerged as detractor of the mainstream media.

Meanwhile, the death of a farmer at an AAP rally at Jantar Matar on April 22 against the Narendra Modi government’s Land Acquisition Ordinance sparked a fiery debate on agrarian crisis in the country. The 40-year-old farmer from Rajasthan was suspected to have committed suicide, as he wrote in a purported note that unseasonal rains had damaged his crops and his father had thrown him out of the house.

The alleged suicide led to a blame game. The BJP accused the AAP of doing nothing to stop the suicide and continuing the rally. The AAP held the Delhi Police responsible and alleged that the personnel had remained mute spectators.

The Delhi Police, under the Union Government, has been the target of attacks by the AAP government. The government found itself on the back foot once again when Law Minister Jitender Singh Tomar was accused of having a fake law degree. A Bihar-based University informed the Delhi HC that it has no record of him completing his law degree from there. The Bar Council of Delhi too sought a probe and said this was an offence under the IPC and sought the police report on or before May 28.

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