By Sushil Kutty
Playing the wronged man is Aam Aadmi Party convener Arvind Kejriwal’s forte. Kejriwal is often heard reminding people he’s being targeted by the BJP for being ‘kattarimandar’ and ‘honest bloke Kejriwal’ says the “BJP has crossed all limits of shamelessness…” after serial slanderer Ramesh Bidhuri’s utterly obnoxious remark on Delhi Chief Minister Atishi, who wasn’t missing her missing surname till Bidhuri reminded Atishi that she had a surname the last time she contested the Delhi assembly elections.
Ramesh also found time to direct his ‘obnoxiousness’ towards Congress MP Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, who Bidhuri hasn’t forgotten had called him out for his obnoxious comments made against Bahujan Samaj Party MP Danish Ali in the Lok Sabha in the full glare of ‘Sansad TV’, which later cost Bidhuri his MP ticket from South Delhi, the parliamentary constituency he represented when he called Ali ‘atankawadi’ and other colourful monikers with his poison-tipped tongue.
So Kejriwal wasn’t wrong when he lashed out at the BJP for crossing all limits of “shamelessness.” The BJP doesn’t care for such niceties and, in fact, waited for the Delhi assembly elections to be declared to “reward” Bidhuri. Ramesh Bidhuri is the sort you can depend on. In fact, doubly on. Priyanka Gandhi Vadra on one day, Atishi on the next.
To Priyanka Gandhi, he tendered an apology. But not to Delhi Chief Minister Atishi, which angered AAP. And Kejriwal has latched on to the non-apology to nail the BJP’s anti-women agenda. The word the media is using is “lashed” – Kejriwal “lashed out/is lashing”, hoping voters will react with a no vote for Ramesh Bidhuri. Is Atishi that popular?
Bidhuri’s offensive remark was a slur on the Delhi Chief Minister’s family. Calling out and joking that she “changed her father”. Atishi was earlier ‘Atishi Marlena’, and then she was “only Atishi”. Of course, it is not out of spite. Ramesh Bidhuri, perhaps, thinks creating a controversy around Atishi would fetch him victory in the Kalkaji assembly constituency from where Atishi is the AAP candidate.
Either Bidhuri is a simpleton or he was coached by some BJP strategist to take this line and create a ‘ho-halla’ over Atishi with the absurd remark “changing her father.” There are voters, dime a dozen, who fall to such capers. Ramesh Bidhuri has to win come what may; he won’t get another chance, this will Ramesh Bidhuri’s last ticket.
Incidentally, the Congress has fielded Alka Lamba from Kalkaji and that makes it two women against the misogynist name-caller; for, what else to call Ramesh Bidhuri? Bidhuri makes an interesting subject for an anthropologist working in tandem with a sociologist and a psychiatrist. Add to them a psephologist.
The question is, why hasn’t Chief Minister Atishi made a hue and cry? Why’s she taking Bidhuri’s remarks against her in her stride? Maybe, because the important thing is to win the election. Bidhuri’s comment “Atishi, who was Marlena, is now Singh. She has even changed her father” wouldn’t make much of a difference to who’s gonna win and who’s gonna lose?
Ramesh Bidhuri should be talking about the stinking water of Delhi, the garbage in the mountains of ‘landfills’, and the polluted Yamuna, and Kejriwal’s broken promises. Instead, Bidhuri lost his way by diverting to Priyanka Gandhi Vadra’s “cheeks”, a line stolen and paraphrased from Lalu Prasad Yadav’s original on Hema Malini’s cheeks. That was long ago and Lalu had a way about him that Ramesh Bidhuri does not.
Bidhuri was speaking at a rally organized by the BJP; from the same platform from where Prime Minister Narendra Modi also addressed BJP supporters, handing out huge “cardboard keys” to flats delivered “free to hundreds” of Delhi’s slum dwellers. PM Modi also dedicated a university and a couple of colleges to Delhi including one named after Veer Savarkar, whose apology to the British robbed him of ‘Kalapani glory.’
Prime Minister Narendra Modi is the current popular leader for the Delhi voter, for the majority of them, that is. In fact, the remarks fielded by Ramesh Bidhuri are right up the alleys of the hoi polloi who get free houses and Arvind Kejriwal shouldn’t have taken “Atishi changing father” as worthy of mention/reaction. What the hell was Kejriwal crying about when he said “crossing all limits of shamelessness”?
Who cares for such talk? Elections bring out the worst in politicians and the voters revel in the worseness. Voters don’t change ideology and preferences over some leader calling some other leader things they wouldn’t normally to their wives and sisters, mothers and daughters. But that doesn’t mean on Election Day, Kalkaji’s voters wouldn’t vote for Ramesh Bidhuri and all of them vote for Atishi because Bidhuri charged Atishi with “changing her father”?
“People of Delhi will not tolerate this and give a befitting reply to the BJP in the upcoming assembly polls. BJP leaders have crossed all limits of shamelessness. BJP leaders are abusing Delhi Chief Minister Atishiji. The people of Delhi will not tolerate the insult of a woman Chief Minister. All the women of Delhi will take revenge for this,” Kejriwal posted on X.
Kejriwal should know better. Voters of Kalkaji are also voters of the South Delhi parliamentary constituency and Ramesh Bidhuri has been winning from South Delhi like clockwork. The constituency includes rural as well as urban voters. Ramesh Bidhuri understands the voter of this constituency like the back of his hand and definitely poses a tough challenge for the sophisticated sort who the BJP routinely call “urban naxals”.
Chances are the two remarks, one targeting Atishi’s “changing father” and the other about building roads like “Priyanka Gandhi’s cheeks” must have tickled funny the bones of the rough and ready rural voters of the Kalkaji constituency.
The Congress, unlike Kejriwal, didn’t give much notice to Bidhuri; even after his “apology” to Priyanka Gandhi Vadra. Bidhuri was out to avenge a slight and his apology “I take my words back” did not change things. Bidhuri’s “anti-women mindset” and “disgusting mentality towards women” isn’t going to change the voting trend in the February Delhi election. AAP’s Saurabh Bhardwaj got the final word in: “Chunav ke jab result ayenge tab pata chalega kaun kiska baaphai.” Brave words! (IPA Service)