Sheila Dikshit : Will she return to Active Politics?
September 3, 2014
What a dramatic turnaround for the suave, erudite, mild mannered and urbane Sheila Dikshit, who not very long ago ruled for a decade and a half in the political firmament of Delhi with all her charm and ingenuity!
Only last December, she led the Congress party to a humiliating defeat in the Delhi Assembly elections where the party could win only eight of the 70 seats. She herself lost ignominiously by about 25,000 votes to political greenhorn and Aam Aadmi Party’s maverick leader Arvind Kejriwal in the Delhi elections.
As if this was not enough, the Congress in Delhi was completely decimated and drew a blank in the national capital in the subsequent Lok Sabha elections.
What the Stars Foretell
Blame it on her stars that nothing seems to be going right for the lady in the last one year – from undergoing angioplasty in November last year, to facing a police FIR for fund embezzlement, to electoral reversal, to unceremoniously stepping down as the Governor of Kerala following change in guard at the Centre – she has seen it all. Even her son Sandeep Dikshit lost his Lok Sabha seat from East Delhi in this year’s general election!
Questions are still being asked as to why she required 31 ACs, 15 coolers and 25 heaters as Delhi chief minister and her troubles continue to mount as more cases of reckless extravagance of public money are likely to come up against her. While making the case for her dismissal as governor, the BJP had referred to the alleged irregularities in the development works carried out in the unauthorised colonies of Delhi that had invited the scathing remarks of the Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) against her. Upping the ante, the BJP has now pressed the city’s Lieutenant Governor for police action against the former CM.
Legal Complications Abound
Legal complications seem to completely entangle Sheila Dikshit at the moment. Only in July this year, when still a governor, the beleaguered lady had sought that the Delhi high court quashed an FIR lodged against her citing her gubernatorial position as a shield. The court though, had refused to give any immediate relief to the then Governor as the advocate for the complainant, BJP leader Vijender Gupta, was unavailable. (This particular case was related to a complaint filed on August 31 last year by Gupta against the Sheila government alleging misuse of public funds to the tune of Rs 22.56 crore in an advertisement campaign ahead of the 2008 assembly polls in Delhi. The trial court had ordered lodging of an FIR against Sheila in this regard). Another FIR with regard to her involvement in the Common Wealth Games scam was lodged against her earlier this year by the then AAP government. Only recently, on August 8, Sheila’s name was yet again dragged when the Central Bureau of Investigation booked three senior officials of Delhi Jal Board and private companies for alleged irregularities in one of her pet projects for water distribution in Public-Private-Partnership mode, when she was the CM.
What does the future hold for Sheila Dikshit ?
Just after Sheila had lost power in Delhi, she made a sarcastic comment when asked if she had failed to read the mood of the public. “Bewakoof hain na (Are we idiots?)” she had retorted then. Indeed, this remark reflected the desperation of the lady on losing her foothold in the state politics that she dominated for 15 long years.
To the comfort of the former Delhi CM, the Congress party has rallied behind her. This was first confirmed when she was appointed the governor of Kerala by then UPA government. She remained defiant and refused to step down despite enormous pressure on her to quit from the new BJP-led ruling dispensation that even threatened to punish her with a transfer to the much smaller and more turbulent Nagaland as governor.
Yet, finally ending the guessing game, she resigned last month – the eighth UPA appointed governor to quit since the change of guard at the Centre. Typical of her, she sniped: “I have resigned…I have followed my heart and I didn’t do it under any pressure.” Equally caustic was the BJP’s reaction — “Good that Sheila Dikshit resigned on her own, now she can work for her (Congress) party.”
Can Sheila Dikshit Lead Again?
76-year-old Sheila is no pushover in politics but given the impending challenges, she at the moment is playing her cards discreetly triggering off speculations over whether she will return to active politics at all. “It is not decided yet,” is all what she has thus far stated.
But can the ingenious old lady of Delhi remain away from politics for long? Equally important, can she regain her foothold in electoral politics after such setbacks? More crucial, when the Congress is in complete turmoil in her home state – for which she too is equally responsible, can Sheila Dikshit be accepted as a first choice leader who could make the party a formidable force before the ensuing assembly elections in Delhi?
Her supporters have not discounted yet the possibility of her rejoining active politics and sound hopeful of such a prospect. Reports suggest city Congress MLAs, who face a leadership vacuum, clamouring for her return as one of them claimed, “…people still love and respect her.”
Obviously, politics is a never-ending game of possibilities. At a time when the popularity of Sheila’s tormentor Kejriwal seems to be on the decline, can she lap up the opportunity to reinstall herself as a formidable challenge to a surging BJP? It, indeed, will be a real test of her political acumen. But there is no doubt about one fact — despite the legal troubles and recent setbacks, Sheila remains a powerful force in Delhi politics – the grand old ‘aunty’ of the national capital.
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