As the euphoria of the fantastic AAP victory settles, and as you, the genteel folks of Delhi, mull over an imminent AAP regime, as you wait for the to-be-or-not-to-be SMSes from aam aadmi to pour in, you might be left wondering what you have got yourself into.
Imagine, if there is an income-tax query tomorrow, you can’t just call up your CA and ask him to take care of the matter before you come back from LA but will have to hunt for that dinner bill of April 16, 1981, when you took your family out, as demanded by the good I-T inspector. If your son jumps a red light at a lonely crossing and one of those hiding traffic cops pounces on him, he can’t pay a couple of hundreds and get going but will have to leave his licence with the new honest cop and collect it from court when the case comes up four days later. You can’t send your driver with some cash for the tout at the passport office to add more pages to it but stand in the queue yourself. (Remember how awful that government school was, with all those aam aadmis jostling you when you went to vote?) You can’t buy dollars at unofficial rates in Connaught Place for that trip to Cayman Islands. You can’t sell your suburban flat as the last buyer was willing to do the deal in “99 per cent black”. You can’t extend that balcony to make the extra room, usurp the public park to make your own herb garden, get that container released from customs. None of your connections will work to get your toddler in Delhi’s tony schools. Sheer luck that the new iic membership drive got over just in time.
When the grease that makes this city go round dries up, when no contracts come through, no digging tenders are given out, you can’t even drown your sorrows in the nearest tavern. If somebody from the Anna camp in AAP finds out you are tipsy, you might be tied to the Ashoka Pillar at the Qutub complex, just across Olive Bar and Kitchen, and given forty lashes. (And where does that leave the auto driver? Will he have to go to a fancy shop and buy a pouch of narangi at the price of Glenmorangie?)
But staying home may be hell. If the party keeps its promise of cutting electricity bills by half, chances are the discoms will shut down. So you will be left in your dark, joyless house, on a cold, wintry night, with no saas-bahu, no Bigg Boss, no Times Now. If this stifling atmosphere at home leads you astray to find solace in someone else’s arms who is not your husband or wife, beware, there may be a midnight knock by stern, professorial looking AAP volunteers, and there may be more lashings—CM-elect Kejriwal has warned that having an extra-marital affair is a heinous crime.
So dear khaas Delhiite, your only option might be to muse over Kumar Vishwas’s poetry (Sample: Amawas ke kaali raaton mein...Jab pichwade ke kamre mein hum nipat akele hote hain. Do go to kumarvishwas.com for more), sit with some Dasamoolarishtam from a Baba Ramdev Patanjali shop, listen to Prashant Bhushan and Kiran Bedi on how to be a model citizen and read 28 paths to righteousness. Oh, those good old, carefree Commonwealth Games days! It might be best to recuse yourself from this city for six months, till the next elections.
The writer is a deputy editor with Outlook; E-mail your columnist: satish AT outlookindia.com
