Sunday, March 1, 2015

Unhappy Development In Aam Admi Party

I do not want to comment much on unpleasant development taking place in Aam Admi Party (AAP) during last few days. There is no doubt in it that AAP got unprecedented landslide victory in Delhi Election held a month ago . People of Delhi will be highly disappointed and feel cheated in the hands of AAP and Mr. Kejriwal if top leaders of AAP behave like leaders of other parties .

Media messages and contents of letter written by internal Lokpal of AAP and that by Mr. Prashant Bhusan make it crystal that there is no unity among party top leaders . Even during election and before announcement of  last election , news of inner party rift, lack of discipline, news of misuse of party fund, use of wine for wining election, revolt by party Supremo Mr. Shanti Bhusan  lack of cohesiveness and lack of respect for leaders other than Mr. Arvind Kejriwal came to light.

Though Mr. Yogendra Yadav pleads that mutual mud-slinging in the party indicates party's faith in democratic principles, it sends stinking smell outside party's campus. Mr. Sanjay Singh , Mr. Prashant Bhusan, Mr. Yogendra Yadav, and many others are accusing fingers towards others . In no way it may be considered as symptom of healthy democracy in the internal party' set up. In the past  too, we have seen how Mr. Binni or Mr. Saza almi criticised AAP and left the party.

Despite all, people of Delhi extended full support to AAP and made Arvind Kejriwal Chief Minister of Delhi. People expressed full faith on Mr. Arvind Kejriwal and  trusted ability, honesty and capacity of Mr. Kejriwal. They are now expecting that Mr. Kejriwal and his party will not involve in dirty politics which they used to say about others. It is very easy to for us put blame on others but very difficult to do all good things so that others not put the same blame on us.

In such position it becomes the duty of Mr. Kejriwal to maintain internal discipline, maintain moral standards above dirty politics of other parties, maintain internal cohesive and natural unity and work for people of India unitedly , devotedly and sincerely. It is not important whether AAP spreads it network outside Delhi to become National Party , more important is to prove that they can rule a small state like Delhi without much hallah-bullah. Party leaders should now stop preaching sermons to other political parties on moral standards or party discipline and should introspect whether they are following the same ethics and moral standards which they used to preach others before election.

AAP has to prove by action that they can perform better than other parties and Mr. Kejriwal is duty bound to motivate all leaders of the party to avoid taking help of media to prove their unique features or to keep their personal ego . Interest of party is much above that of individuals . And interest of people of Delhi is above the interest of individuals of the party and the part both. People of Delhi were annoyed on Mr. Kejriwal when he left the post of Chief Minister last time only after 49 days of rule on flimsy ground. This time Mr. Kejriwal should not repeat the sad story of last victory. They should as such stop dreaming becoming National party and stop  dreaming of dethroning Mr. Narendra Modi from the post of Prime Minister of India and concentrate on getting full success in their maiden Delhi experiment.

Prashant Bhushan attacks Kejriwal, says AAP has become one person-centric party-India Today-02.03.2015

The rift in Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) has once again come out in the open.
After senior party member Admiral Ramdas's explosive letter, AAP co-founder and senior lawyer Prashant Bhushan has shot off a letter to the National Executive of the party expressing his anguish over the growing divide and trust deficit in the party.
Launching a scathing attacked on Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and party's top leadership, Prashant says AAP has also become one person-centric party.

The AAP co-founder alleges that Kejriwal overturns decision taken by the National Executive (NE) and the Parliamentary Affairs Committee (PAC).

ClICK Here And Read About Yogendra Yadav And Letter of Internal Lokpal

In a joint note, both Yogendra Yadav and Bhushan have demanded to form a ethics committee to probe funds of the party.
In a detailed note written a day before the AAP National Executive on February 26, Admiral Ramdas said it is important that the party "give out clear signals that all senior members of the party - primarily the PAC - are together and united".
Prashant's note has suggestions and questions for the party and also reveals that there are "two camps" and inner conflict in the AAP.

Transparency and accountability
- AAP has put out the list of its donors but not expenses.
- Far from putting out the list of shortlisted candidates on a public website for inviting information from the public and our volunteers, AAP has not even shared the bio-datas or even the names of the candidates selected by the DECG with the PAC.
- Regular meetings of the National Executive or the PAC should be held as required by the Constitution.
- A committee should be set up to report on the systems of transparency and accountability.
- The NE needs to be expanded to have better gender and other balance, and to make it more broad based.

Inner party democracy and Swaraj
 - Clear party's stand on AAP candidates who distributed money and liquor to lure voters in Delhi Assembly elections.
- Put out all the details of MLA funds on a public website in real time.
- Arvind Kejriwal over turns decision taken by the National Executive.

Policies of the Party
- AAP has not been able to formalise the reports submitted by the 30 member expert committee even after 2 years have been passed.
Funds of the Party
- AAP has failed to spend the party fund in a systematic manner.
- AAP has no empowered committee or decision making system of deciding how the funds are to be spent.
There are some volunteers who are paid by the party but a vast majority of them are not. Why?


For reading more and looking at letter written by Sri Prashant Bhusan , click on following link of India Today
http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/aap-rift-prashant-bhushan-yogendra-yadav-arvind-kejriwal-national-executive-admiral-ramdas/1/421720.html

AAP rift: Yogendra Yadav and Prashant Bhushan offer to opt out of political affairs committee -Economic Times

 
dna Exclusive: Prashant Bhushan's scathing letter raising concerns over 'structural issues' in AAP
 
Since the party held it’s first National Executive meeting in Delhi, on February 26, reports have been pouring out of rifts within the party. Sources witness to the meeting say that there was high drama and much ugliness at the way former friends faced off against each other. Sources say that two letters were written to the National Executive on the 26th, one by Bhushan and the other by Bhushan and Yadav together, which dna has access to.

It has become clear that Delhi CM and AAP National Convenor Arvind Kejriwal wants both Yogender Yadav and Prashant Bhushan out of the National Executive, the decision making body of AAP. Bhushan and Yadav have been bringing up questionable party practices, which has drawn Kejriwal’s ire. Though refusing to give details, Bhushan confirmed that the news reports are true and that he and Yadav had raised questions of “transparency, candidate selection, swaraj  and regular meetings”. He added, “there is a problem and we have raised structural issues about the systems relating to the party.”

Bhushan’s letter severely indicts the party on multiple counts. He also warns it of becoming “just another one man centric party, which is prepared to use any kind of means to attain power”. Kejriwal’s growing cult of personality has been a cause of concern and Bhushan makes it a point to credit the volunteers of the party for the win. He also writes that this win is, “ the result of the dissatisfaction with the present BJP government which is now increasingly being seen as anti people.

Both letters rake up the funding scam AAP found itself in before the elections, where four cheques of Rs 5 lakh each were donated to the party by suspicious companies. These led to allegations of money laundering by the party.
The joint letter says, “The party was right to say that our dealing was clean and transparent. The media was right to say that these companies did not look genuine business entities. We had tasked the PAC with screening donations above Rs. 10 Iakhs precisely to save ourselves from such dubious donors. We now need to get to the root of these donations and find out if the PAC scrutiny mechanism failed and work out ways to avoid such an embarrassment in the future.”
Sources say that these cheques were never kept in front of the PAC. Bhushan calls out Kejriwal on overruling decisions taken by the National Executive: “the lack of recording decisions of the NE/PAC has led to situations where decisions taken by the NE (about not seeking Congress support for forming the government in Delhi after we resigned last year) were repeatedly flouted. Not only was a letter sent to the LG asking him to postpone the dissolution of the Assembly in June, but even as late as November, just before the actual dissolution of the Assembly, attempts were being surreptitiously made to seek Congress support to form the government again in Delhi without having to contest elections.”

The non existence of minutes of PAC and NE meetings were of major concern in both letters. “Even when the NE had decided to let the States decide whether to contest elections in their States, that decision was frustrated by Arvind deciding not to allow the states to contest elections... in his speech on the day of oath taking, Arvind announced that the party should not contest elections in other States for the next 5 years. Though that may be his view, but such public airing of views by the convenor of the party at such an important function would naturally be taken to be the view of the party.”
Saying that this violates the the party’s principle of swaraj, he adds,
“All this, along with the One person centric campaign which was run during this election in Delhi, is making our party look more and more like the other conventional parties.”
Sources say that Bhushan, his father Shanti Bhushan and Yadav still support expanding the party in other states. Bhushan questions how “many of our most dedicated volunteers are facing humiliation at the hands of people who call themselves office bearers and then misbehave with ow dedicated volunteers.”

Both letters also bring the issue of AAP’s missing gender parity, something party Lokpal Admiral Ramdas’s note also pointed out. Ramdas’ note had also mentioned the “ crisis brought about by Prashant Bhushan’s unhappiness with candidate selection and decision making processes.” Bhushan’s letter brings up the matter, saying that many old volunteers too were unhappy with these  candidates being parachuted into the party.

Bhushan had placed a list of 12 candidates with criminal and/or corrupt backgrounds in front of the party before the Delhi Assembly elections. Of these, only two had been removed. His letter raises grave doubts about these MLAs: “Our own party had complained against several of them that they distributed money and liquor or beat up our volunteers in the last elections, when they had contested on the tickets of other parties. One of them (the original Wazirpur candidate) went back to the BJP within a few hours of our giving him a ticket.

Another was implicated in illegally importing and storing liquor in the middle of the election. There was a video which surfaced about one of them where he is heard saying that it is okay to lure people to his Jan Sabha by offering them liquor. We did not cancel their tickets even after finding this out. One of them had been made the constituency prabhari and promised a ticket immediately after he agreed to take the rap for our party putting out a communal poster for which some of our volunteers were arrested. They are our current MLAs, and will be handling crores of MLA funds and will exercise several other powers such as giving PDS certificates etc.”

So angry are the two camps with each other that it seems they aren’t even talking directly. A three member committee comprising National Executive members Gopal Rai (also Delhi’s Transport and Rural Development Minister), Professor Arvind Kumar and Pankaj Gupta, has been constituted to communicate with Kejriwal, Bhushan and Yadav, to help them come to and relay decisions to others, explains Professor Kumar.

It is learnt that senior leader Ashish Khetan and Ashutosh most strongly took Kejriwal’s side, in opposition to Bhushan and Yadav. They argued to give Kejriwal a free hand to reconstitute the Parliamentary Affairs Committee.  This decision was taken in another NE meeting on 27 February, which Bhushan and Yadav did not attend. There is a strong chance that with Kejriwal calling the shots, Bhushan and Yadav will lose their place in the PAC. 

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