Strong stance against Waqf law signals marked shift from AAP's known praxis

Marked shift in stance

In the Rajya Sabha, senior AAP MP Sanjay Singh led the party’s charge against the Bill, uniting with other Opposition parties, including the Congress party, to dub the legislation as being “unconstitutional” and one that would set a precedent for governmental interference in the practice of other religions and their institutions.

In the Lok Sabha, AAP’s MP from Punjab’s Sangrur, Gurmeet Singh Meet Hayer, echoed similar views. On Monday (April 7), AAP MLA Amanatullah Khan became the latest individual in a steadily growing list of petitioners to move the Supreme Court challenging the controversial legislation, now enacted after its smooth passage in Parliament and a briskly given Presidential assent.

Also read: SC to decide on listing of pleas challenging new Waqf Act today

Though no word of criticism for the Act has yet come from AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal, the fact that the party has taken up cudgels against a law that directly affects India’s Muslim community is a marked shift from the AAP’s known praxis.

For the past decade, a period when Narendra Modi’s ascension as prime minister and the AAP’s election to power in Delhi coincided, Kejriwal’s party was often found on the same side as its saffron rival when it came to issues concerning Muslims. Though part of the Opposition at the Centre, the party aided the passage of Bills such as the CAA, the criminalisation of instant triple talaq or even the abrogation of Article 370 on one pretext or the other.

The AAP also seemed to be at ease with the Hindutva right’s continuing attempts to target Muslims socially.

The AAP leadership kept a stony silence on instances of mob lynchings and bulldozer injustice. Even more disturbing was the vanishing act by AAP’s Delhi leadership during the February 2020 North-east Delhi riots and its tacit endorsement for the persecution of individuals like its own councilor Tahir Hussain, Umar Khalid, Sharjeel Imam and the anti-CAA protestors of Shaheen Bagh.

Through all this, in stark contrast stood the AAP’s brazen peddling of soft-Hindutva; its Delhi leadership often making a show of their credentials as ‘Hanuman bhakts’, descending at Delhi’s Akshardham temple on Diwali, camera crew in tow, to offer prayers and, weeks ahead of last month’s Delhi assembly polls, even announcing a financial assistance scheme for Hindu priests.

Also read: J-K Assembly adjourned for the day after ruckus over Waqf Act

It is in the backdrop that the AAP’s vocal criticism of the Waqf Bill stands out as a major break from the past. That this change of stance comes within a month of the party losing power in its political janmbhoomi of Delhi has triggered speculations on whether it was the poll setback that prompted AAP’s zealous criticism of the BJP.

Fighting perception battle

The Act, after all, is expected to significantly impact hundreds of waqf properties in Delhi and by extension the Muslim community, which comprises nearly 13 per cent of the electorate in the national capital.

A contrary and more simplistic explanation for the AAP’s changed tenor is that the party, having now suffered its first major poll loss against the BJP while its top leadership continues to stare at an uncertain future given the many cases being probed against it by central agencies, is determined to prove those accusing it of being Modi’s 'B-Team' wrong.

Speaking to The Federal, an AAP insider admitted that the party is fighting a perception battle when it comes to Muslim issues.

“Over the years, there has been a growing perception that AAP does not take a clear stand on matters concerning Muslims. That’s not a good indication for a party that calls itself secular,” the insider said. He further explained that the party’s decision to vocally oppose the Waqf Bill had more to do with changing this perception than being a direct reaction to the Delhi election results.

“It was time we sent a message. Silence can’t be an answer forever,” he added.

AAP's hold over Muslim votebank

Sources in the AAP and political commentators who have followed the party closely ever since its inception assert it is wrong to suggest that the party’s stand on the new Waqf law is directly linked to the party’s performance in the Delhi polls.

They point out that while the party did lose power and a substantial chunk of its vote share, it held on to nearly all of Delhi’s constituencies that have a sizeable Muslim population and with fairly robust margins even if these were smaller compared to the 2015 and 2020 victories. The assertion, at least in terms of data, isn’t off the mark.

The AAP secured 22 out of Delhi’s 70 seats in last month’s assembly polls, down from the 62 seats it had won in 2020. The party’s vote share too plummeted to 40.57 per cent from the 53.57 per cent it had garnered in 2020. Yet, the party retained six out of Delhi’s seven Muslim-dominated constituencies despite losing anywhere between six and 22 per cent of votes across these seats to rivals such as the Congress and Asaduddin Owaisi’s AIMIM.

The AAP’s ability to hold on to Delhi’s ‘Muslim seats’ like Matia Mahal, Ballimaran, Okhla and Seelampur, despite the palpable disillusionment within the community against with the party, is, arguably, a key driver of assertions that AAP’s stand on the Waqf law must be delineated from the Delhi poll outcome.

Also read: Kejriwal, Mann pray at Golden Temple on completion of 3 yrs of AAP govt in Punjab

Saba Naqvi, journalist and author of the 2015 book, Capital Conquest: How the AAP’s incredible victory has redefined Indian elections, cautions against reading AAP’s stance purely through the prism of Muslim politics.

“There’s a tendency to assume that any opposition to a Bill affecting Waqf is necessarily about pandering to Muslims,” Naqvi said, adding that the AAP’s stance should rather be seen in light of the “broader constitutional question about religious autonomy and the State’s overreach”.

“In most Muslim-dominated constituencies, AAP won (in last month’s polls). There might have been a dip in vote share in some pockets, but that’s more a result of a multi-cornered contest than a decisive shift away from AAP,” Naqvi said while asserting that claims of Muslim disaffection with AAP are “inaccurate”.

She added that the AAP is currently in power in Punjab, where the otherwise minority community of Sikhs constitutes a majority with a 58 per cent of the state’s population, and the party’s messaging on the Waqf law and religious rights “is now also shaped by sensitivities around institutions like the Shiromani Gurudwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC)”.

What's behind shift in posture

While Naqvi’s explanation for the AAP’s strong criticism of the communally divisive law can’t be faulted on data, considering that the party did indeed retain its hold on Delhi’s Muslim-dominated seats, it appears to also disregard the well-established electoral practice of Muslim-dominated seats invariably voting en bloc not necessarily in favour of a party but almost always against the BJP.

Given the BJP’s known excesses against the Muslims, the community rallies behind a party or candidate best placed to defeat the BJP nominee. In the case of the Delhi polls, that party was the AAP as the Congress’s inability to form the government or even give the BJP (or the AAP) a tough challenge was widely known.

Satish Jha, associate professor of political science at the Delhi University’s Aryabhatta College, believes the AAP’s shift in posture stems from two interlinked factors: electoral backlash and national expansion plans.

“The electoral debacle in Delhi is one reason why they may have decided to change their strategy. There were enough indications that Muslims were unhappy with AAP’s stance on issues such as the CAA, the criminalisation of triple talaq, political prisoners, and the party’s overall adoption of soft Hindutva to counter the BJP’s Hindutva. They clearly lost Muslim votes in Muslim-dominated areas, even if not in constituencies with a mixed population,” Jha said.

Explaining that the AAP’s recalibration also bore in mind sentiments of other religious minorities, the Delhi University professor added, “In Punjab, while Muslims are not a major factor, pro-minority sentiments matter…these considerations may have prompted a rethink in AAP’s strategy regarding Muslims, secularism, and communalism.”

AAP sources also suggested that the party leadership, wary after the Delhi loss, was also under “pressure” from the party’s Muslim leaders such as third-term Okhla MLA Amanatullah Khan, to take a clear and unambiguous stand against communal politics and policies of the BJP.

Whether this departure from the past marks a lasting shift in AAP’s engagement with issues concerning the Muslims or merely a temporary realignment remains to be seen.

For now though, by choosing to publicly oppose the Waqf law and speak up for Muslims’ religious rights, the AAP, as a party, has stepped into a conversation it long avoided – even if Kejriwal is still silent on the matter.