Politics today is in a big way about narratives. The Rekha Gupta government, which has taken charge of Delhi, in the past two months has tried to set the development narrative. It has also tried to create a narrative, and rightly so, against the preceding Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government being corrupt. The tabling of the held-up reports of the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) ostensibly have strengthened their stand.
This grandstanding has however largely been from the Ministerial pulpits within the assembly. The AAP leadership, finding itself on the back foot, as part of strategy resisted engaging with the government on the floor of house creating pandemonium and being marshalled out or walking out on its volition. The BJP, however, must realise that its rival is a party whose rise has been fuelled by creating narratives in its favour. It doesn’t have qualms about its tallest leader Arvind Kejriwal creating a ‘storm’ on power cuts by posting on microblogging site X about an innocuous incident.
This forced the Delhi government to come out with clarification both inside and outside the house. This whole episode shows the strategy of the AAP to ‘embarrass’ the Rekha Gupta government. Their strategy would be to hit the government with what they call ‘citizen’ issues and then scoot leaving the government to do the explanations.
They managed to do this on the rise of the fee in the private unaided schools and then on the matter of the issue of the permanent free bus ride passes for the women residents of the national capital. AAP’s Delhi unit leader and a prominent face, Saurabh Bhardwaj addressed a press conference alleging how he foresees corruption entering into the process of the issue of passes.
And now the issue of saffron activists forcing closure of fish-selling kiosks in Market No. 1 of Chittaranjan Park, the Bengali dominated locality falling within the Greater Kailash assembly constituency of South Delhi. The said ‘outrage’ against the move forced the president of Delhi BJP, Virendra Sachdeva and the local BJP MLA Shikha Roy to come out with an explanation at a press conference.
The controversy erupted after a video was circulated, showing a member of “saffron brigade” making a case before the fish sellers for the shutdown of shops, citing a temple’s closeness. Mahua Moitra, the Trinamool Congress MP from West Bengal, posted a series of statements on X, accusing BJP workers of threatening Bengali fish vendors. It may recalled that Trinamool Congress had supported the AAP in the last assembly polls and they are close allies in INDIAlliance.
There is a possibility that the Delhi Police would work out the case, the video may be declared to be doctored and even some arrests made in the matter. However, in the war of narratives, the BJP government has again been put on the defence.
It’s said that there is no smoke without fire. In the past few years, a large number of the BJP leaders have imbibed Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath’s aggressive Hinduvta posturing. While this posturing has helped the BJP consolidate its position in Uttar Pradesh, given Adityanath’s ability to perpetuate the agenda and handle the fallout, it has created more headaches in the other states.
Before Delhi, we have the example of Maharashtra where from Aurangzeb the agenda meandered to bashing up of the non-Marathi speaking residents of the state.
In Delhi too, the BJP legislator from Patparganj, Ravi Negi went hammer and tongs on closing the meat shops during the Navratras. His idea may have been to target the Muslim population in his constituency, which doesn’t vote for him. The question is, can a ruling party MLA of a mega polis like Delhi afford to have such myopic vision.
The BJP must realise that among its political rivals pan India, in Delhi it has a party in opposition which has a reputation of being stronger in creating narratives than the ruling party.
They may not find the narrative booby traps in other states but in Delhi, the BJP government would have to think out of the box to not let such situations arise in the first place.
Sidharth Mishra
Author and president, Centre for Reforms, Development & Justice