The magic of Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and the enormous support that Arvind Kejriwal had received before and after the Assembly elections appeared to be dwindling on Monday. Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal’s dharna for the suspension of police personnel failed to elicit desirable response from the people. Barring a sparse crowd of the AAP volunteers, general public remained absent from the protest venue.
Kejriwal and AAP had received huge popularity during the Delhi Assembly elections but this was not evident on Monday as only a handful of supporters were seen at the dharna. Kejriwal had on a social networking site on Sunday appealed to the people not join him at the protest since it would hamper security arrangements for the Republic Day celebrations. later, he changed his decision once he sat on dharna and adopted a tough stand by extorting one and all to join his protest near Rail Bhavan. A head count was enough to realise that AAP was losing ground as around 400 people were present at the venue wearing the party cap.
There were hardly 200 people when Kejriwal sat on dharna around afternoon. Party workers startled trickling in and the number doubled up. Members of legislative Assembly (MlAs) of AAP too joined the Chief Minister and soon text messages were sent to the volunteers to come and join the protest.
Delhi Police was in mood to allow the protesters to spill around the venue as security arrangements have been placed for the Republic Day celebrations. The area was heavily barricaded and Delhi Police did not allow the people to enter the protest venue, who had gone out. Therefore, the supporters sat near the barricades and staged their own protest. Delhi’s Health Minister, Satyendra Jain also had to face this as he left the venue to attend to nature’s call but was not allowed to join the agitation again, following which he sat near the barricade and staged a protest. “I had left for 10 minutes looking for a toilet and on my return, I wasn’t allowed to enter on grounds of breach of security,” Jain said.