Poll Analysis | Kejriwal, Another Brick in the Wall?
News channels and papers have been rife with reports on Kejriwal uncovering dubious and corrupt deals of politicians and bureaucrats alike. Immediately after announcing his foray into politics earlier this month, Kejriwal took to exposing corrupt politicians and their deeds. Right from rioting outside Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s house to pointing fingers at BJP president Nitin Gadkari, the anti-corruption activist has earned a reputation for repeatedly uncovering the murky deals of politicians, across political parties, week after week. This however has given rise to speculations regarding Kejrwal’s intentions. Is he digressing from his initial agenda to make India a corruption-free country to becoming just another politician taking the route of exposing top politicians to gain political mileage?
I Paid a Bribe conducted a poll asking its readers, “Is Kejriwal using his anti-corruption crusader status to win votes for his newly formed political party?” While 45 % of the readers agree that Arvind Kejriwal is indeed trying to strengthen his political motives by using his status of an anti-corruption activist, 55% of our readers strongly disagree with the above statement. In fact, they support Kejriwal’s move of entering the political fray.
“How else would all these latest scams have been exposed, everyone knew what was going on, but nobody had the guts to speak out. At least Kejriwal has given it his best, not just accepting everything as we all do [sic]”, says a respondent on I Paid a Bribe. Another response we got from a reader contradicts the previous one. “He is now a declared political leader and all his actions have to see in that light only. He will do and speak, and not do and not speak, only if it gets him votes. That's why Anna being wise moved away from him as the objectives of an anti-corruption crusader are different from a political leader, however new[sic]”, opines the reader.
A lot of our readers opined that a new political alternative is the need of the hour. This, no doubt, is true for the country where every political party is neck deep in the charges of corruption. But are Kejriwal’s ways acceptable, regardless of how noble his intentions are to cleanse the Indian political system?