By Sidharth Mishra

Ajay Maken has resigned, for the second time in past six months, as the president of Delhi Congress. Former chief minister Sheila Dikshit is back in Delhi from France, having convalesced from a heart ailment. In the past few weeks she has expressed the view that she wasn’t averse to leading the party once again in the national Capital. This should be the ideal situation for passing the baton back to Dikshit.

However, there are forces within the Congress party who may not be very keen on having Dikshit back lest she become an impediment in their ‘Pan-India’ plans of alliance with the regional forces. The appointment of the next president of Delhi Congress is umbilically connected to the party’s strategy for the Lok Sabha polls in the summer of 2019. The next president of Delhi Congress who would have to bear the burden of leading or rejecting an alliance with the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP).   

By Sidharth Mishra

Delhi entered the New Year reeling under severe air pollution. There are no farm fires in Punjab right now and still air pollution condition in Delhi, if not worse, it’s definitely not better than what it was during the harvest time in November first week. The Delhi Government, having blamed one and all for the bad air of the national Capital, has now ordered a study to find out the reasons for the cloak of pollution hanging over the national Capital.

What do we need to study? Will it be possible for the present government led by Arvind Kejriwal to accept the honest findings of a sincere study? Unlikely; especially having come to power riding on populism propelled promises, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) can least take the chance of annoying its vote bank. Thus the souls in the national Capital can live and rest in polluted air for sometimes to come.

By Sidharth Mishra

Revolutions eat their children, goes the famous saying. This maxim was very effectively used by one of the founders of political journalism, Jacques Mallet du Pan while writing pamphlets during the French Revolution, in support of the Royalists. Time may have come to use the famous phrase with context to the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), which was born out of Anna Hazare-led anti-corruption movement and has since then devoured several of its founding members.

The latest farce in this context was played out in the Delhi Legislative Assembly, where a motion moved to provide succour to the victims of the 1984 anti-Sikh riots ended up demanding stripping late Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi of the Bharat Ratna, the highest civilian award bestowed by Government of India. It led to a skirmish among the different factions of the ruling party inside the house, it played out on their WhatsApp group and later spilled over into the news columns.

By Sidharth Mishra

Delhi Assembly is celebrating 25 years of its existence in it’s present form. In keeping with the current political trend in the national Capital, this event too has courted controversy. The polls in Delhi assembly, ever since it came into existence in 1993, too were used to be held along with states of Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh (since 2003), Rajasthan and Mizoram.

The cycle broke in 2013 following the emergence of Aam Aadmi Party (AAP). The polls five years ago threw up a hung house in the national Capital and Arvind Kejriwal became Chief Minister for the first time, with the support of eight Congress MLAs. Kejriwal did not hold onto the chair for long and soon resigned from office leading to subsequent dissolution of the assembly and fresh polls in 2015.

By Sidharth Mishra

The inauguration of the first multi-modal terminal on the Ganga river in Varanasi last month was publicised by the Centre as a major breakthrough in search for cheap mode of transport. It also was feted as major feet for generating employment in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s parliamentary constituency of Varanasi. The cargo route is soon to be extended up to Allahabad aka Prayagraj.

However, down the stream, the move has not generated much appreciation, as the river closer to the delta especially as it flows east of Patna into Jharkhand and West Bengal before joining the Bay of Bengal. This stretch is home to the threatened Gangetic Dolphins, which ironically has been christened by the government as the National Aquatic Animal.

By Sidharth Mishra

Sometime back Punjab chief minister Captain Amrinder Singh has questioned his Delhi counterpart Arvind Kejriwal’s wisdom in claiming that stubble burning in Punjab was solely responsible for the high pollution levels in the national capital. He had wondered how Kejriwal, an IIT graduate, be talking in most unscientific manner. Singh and Kejriwal are political rivals in Punjab and thus the statement was passed off as another instance of political skirmish.

Captain’s dig at Delhi CM, on the hind side, was not without basis. Severe air pollution is a harsh reality that the Delhi government failed to do anything on despite making big claims. The city population has today grown to approximately 25 million with a huge floating population, from 1.7 million people in 1947.

By Sidharth Mishra

The Signature Bridge inaugurated by the Arvind Kejriwal government a day before ‘Dhanteras’ came with the fireworks generally reserved for Diwali. The bad air engulfing the city has had its ill effect on city’s political culture, known so for dialogue and mutual respect between political rivals. The Sunday evening incident sounded the last bugle to such engagements where a city level Congress leader could walk up to BJP’s tallest leader with a complaint against his party men.

The Signature Bridge inaugural, and the two inaugurations before that of the Rani Jhansi flyover and the ITO Skywalk, made news not for the engineering marvel being given to the city but for the political bitter talk. Both Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal and Delhi BJP president Manoj Tiwari, or for that matter Centre’s designated Minister for Delhi Hardeep Singh Puri, in his capacity as the in charge of Urban Development, have little to with the completion of these projects.

By Sidharth Mishra

It was a reflection of the changing times that when the carriage carrying the corpse of former Delhi chief minister Madan Lal Khurana arrived at the Delhi BJP office on Pandit Pant Marg, it went off as mostly a non-event. The sorrow on social media did not really converge on the streets of Delhi, where once Khurana ruled the roost.

In the heydays, Khurana was referred to as Dilli Ka Sher or the Lion of Delhi. He won Lok Sabha elections from south Delhi in 1989 and 1991, defeating Subhash Chopra and Romesh Bhandari, respectively, building the momentum for the assembly polls in the national capital in 1993 when it was provided the legislative body. During this period Khurana also played a substantial role in the success of the Rath Yatra that was led by LK Advani in 1992 during the Ramjanmabhoomi movement. The assembly of the huge sea of supporters in 1992 welcoming Advani when he reached Delhi was credited to Khurana.