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An ‘anarchist’ that he isn’t!

When Delhi’s former chief minister Arvind  Kejriwal sat on a dharna near Rail Bhawan against the inaction of Delhi Police during the mid-night raid conducted by his party MLA Somnath Bharti and union home minister Sushil Kumar Shinde for not suspending the police officers in question, he declared defiantly that he was an ‘anarchist’ and wants to create anarchy for the ‘corrupt’ and ‘ineffective’ government. Media houses, political observers, and politicians went on to criticise Kejriwal for his remarks. Even the president of India Pranab Mukherjee stated that ‘populist anarchy cannot be a substitute for governance.’ Anarchy is a state absence of governance or that of the leader. But Kejriwal, as it was pointed out, was running his government from the streets of Delhi. Sitting on a demonstration with his cabinet colleagues, he emphasised on the relevance of ‘protest politics’ in a democracy. He and his newly-found Aam Admi Party gave sleepless night to his rivals through his ‘disruptive politics.’

Journalists Gautam Chikermane and Soma Banerjee’s book titled The Disrupter describes in detail the change brought out by AAP in the politics of the country which is marred with corruption scandals and lack of governance. The book provides a deep insight into the journey of what came to be known as AAP, a harbinger of change the country and its people was seeking for a very long time. The title of the book defines the kind of politics adopted by AAP and its leaders. What Arvind Kejriwal and AAP are trying to do is nothing less than organising a shift in power using disruption as a lever for that change. The book states that over the past few years the meaning of word ‘disrupter’ has evolved. ‘While it earlier carried a negative connotation (read destructive), in the age of Gogle searches and Twitter streams, the word has accumulated some respect,’ mentions the book.

The book attempts to analyse the ideas of AAP and its man, whom they call ‘the disrupter’. It defines Arvind Kejriwal as a ‘political entrepreneur’ whose unique brand of politics (such as introducing innovative ways to generate awareness and the transparency in funding process which the traditional political parties shy away from) caught the attention of his audience and rivals.

The book takes its readers on a journey of AAP’s initial days of struggle and how it overcame those hurdles to emerge as second largest party in Delhi assembly polls.

The corruption plank was raised various times in the past by Baba Ramdev, BJP in the parliament, Anna Hazare and Kejriwal himself during their joint movement at Ramlila Maidan in Delhi. However, Kejriwal as a politician was successful in capturing the niche in public.

The book, as described by the writers, is not a final word on the disruptive politics of AAP. It is a first attempt to study the new political phenomenon in India which has taken established political parties for a ride in a matter of few months.

The disruptive politics of AAP will see a new breed of writers and authors coming up who will dig deeper than their predecessors. ‘The book is only the first and not the last word’, explain the writers.
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