Life is a game of snakes and ladders, you work hard to climb and then you make one wrong move and you are upside down on the slide, but then you pick yourself up and make the climb all over again. This is what exactly happened with the muffler man, who after laboriously winning the Delhi assembly election last year made a grave mistake of resigning only after 49 days and contesting the Lok Sabha election, which he and his party lost very badly.
Seeing the momentum shift from his AAP party to the all-capturing BJP, he quickly realized his mistake and started again from a scratch. However, it will be fair to say that he actually got good help from the BJP itself. The communal approach of BJP with the Ghar Wapsi, burning of churches in Delhi and the cheap gimmick of announcing of bringing of black money every time before elections actually helped the AAP party.
Even the attention grabbing idea of inviting the US President for the Republic Day celebration backfired with the US President leaving with a parting shot of reminding Modi that the nation will only progress as long as there is religious tolerance in the country. Nevertheless, hats off to the muffler man who despite facing the wave of Modi refused to be blown away by it by standing firmly on his feet.
Valent Mascarenhas, Calangute
