"It's my movement, I will take it the way I want," Kejriwal has been asserting this, rather brazenly and without spelling that out in words. AFP Photo
Arvind Kejriwal could well be the civil society’s version of Narendra Modi. He evokes extreme reactions, both negative and positive. You either like him or don’t; there cannot be halfway positions. He is also a go-getter — abrasive, at points seriously annoying, but still a go-getter. That the anti-corruption movement of Anna Hazare has stirred and shaken the establishment and stayed strong so far is a tribute to the man.
Combative, in your face, articulate, determined and good at rabble-rousing, he has been the brain and muscle behind the movement, while Anna has been its face. But that precisely are the qualities that could prove to be his undoing and take the movement down.
“It’s my movement, I will take it the way I want,” he has been asserting this, rather brazenly and without spelling that out in words, through his actions all through. That it is causing discomfiture among other civil society members is evident. He has manged to alienate mentors like Aruna Roy and Harsh Mandar through his aggressive positioning on the Lokpal issue already; now the core members of Team Anna are getting upset.
His decision to use the momentum in favour of the anti-corruption movement against the Congress in Hisar was more impulsive than rational. It has not gone down well among some members of Team Anna, though only Santosh Hegde has been vocal about it.

Kejriwal's mentors, of course, were not pleased to see the way their initiative was hijacked and the way things shaped up to be a mass movement. AFP Photo
“We jumped the gun in Hisar,” said Hegde in an interview to the Outlookmagazine. “I believe the (anti-corruption) movement is and should be apolitical. Even before Parliament could debate the Lokpal Bill, they went to Hisar and campaigned against the Congress. I don’t think it was the right thing to do,” he added.
He said if the need to intervene in the election was so compelling then members of Team Anna should have asked the people to choose the best candidate since corrupt people are not just in the Congress but in other parties as well. Hisar is the native place of Kejriwal.
In a hint that his disapproval was at a level deeper than that, Hegde, commenting on Kejriwal’s comment that Anna was above Parliament, told Outlook that such things happen when somebody talks “too much”. Clearly, things are deteriorating on the personal front. Signs of stress in the team does not augur well for the movement.
But Kejriwal, moving with the wave now, is not likely to stop. He has become bigger than the movement in some ways and the final arbiter of what direction it takes. The only force that can put the brakes is Anna himself. He is not inclined to do that at this stage.
His moves and rapid rise to this stature has surprised many of his comrades in the civil society and mentors. Under the shadow of Aruna Roy, Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan (MKSS) leader, former civil servant and activist Harsh Mandar, his associate Shekhar Singh and Magsaysay winner Sandip Pandey for long, Kejriwal broke ranks with them over the Lokpal Bill. It was the former who had initiated the idea of the Lokpal Bill and made some progress till Kejriwal came up with a much more radical version of it.
He formed his own core team — including Prashant Bhushan, Shanti Bhushan, Kiran Bedi and Santosh Hegde — and moved on to enlist the support of Gandhian Anna Hazare for his cause after former president Abdul Kalam declined to take the lead role. The movement just got bigger and bigger with the media coming into the picture and the rest, as they say, is history.
His mentors, of course, were not pleased to see the way their initiative was hijacked and the way things shaped up to be a mass movement. Mandar criticised the developments unfolding over the Jan Lokpal Bill severely. “This is a right-leaning, fascist campaign to push for an extremely regressive legislation. It is painful to watch colleagues and friends take such unreasonable positions. The Lokpal Bill needs wider debate, consultations and reasonable debate,” he said in an interview with India Today.
But by then Kejriwal was unstoppable. The anti-corruption crusade had moved far beyond any civil society movement earlier. Anna was the symbol of the movement but he was the real driving force behind it. His personality traits, his combativeness, his understanding of the mass mood and his ability to use the media were working to making him larger-than-life.
However, indications now are that he is moving too fast and without a clear direction. There’’ a hint of recklessness too.
Will Kejriwal turn out to be his own enemy? Let’s wait and watch.