Ahead of the Punjab Assembly elections, where Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) is hoping to win big, a former member of the party has brought out an “insider account”, in the form of a web series, which claims the party has deviated from its principles.
The web-series in the political genre, ‘Transparency: Pardarshita’ has been produced and directed by Dr Munish Raizada, a medical practitioner from Chandigarh working in Chicago.
The web series available on YouTube is an “insider account” showing how things went from being transparent and for bringing in a systemic change to being non-transparent and becoming part of the same political rut.
The web series was completed in October 2020 and released on OTT platform MXPlayer and as per Raizada, received positive response.
“However, as the platform was not promoting it saying it is a political series, I thought about how I can take it to a larger audience and then thought of YouTube,” Raizada told IANS on phone from Chicago.
The web series was released on YouTube on January 17.
Raizada had taken a sabbatical from his practice in Chicago and had joined the AAP as a volunteer in 2013.
According to Raizada, he remained with the party till its victory in Delhi Assembly polls in 2015 and even worked in the government for some time. Then, when the issue of “lack of transparency” in donations came forth ahead of 2020 elections, he raised his voice against the party.
The AAP has emerged as a main contender in the political space in Punjab and recently declared Bhagwant Singh Maan as its CM face. Raizada had even toured Punjab recently and held a press conference in Chandigarh in January first week, and again, declared how the party had “systematically deviated from the principles.”
“Remember they came promising vyavastha Parivartan (systemic change). But now they have totally changed,” Raizada said and recalled the happenings in the party that led him to raise voice against the “non-transparent” manner in which donation collection was happening then.
Former AAP members Yogendra Yadav and Prashant Bhushan too had raised their voices about these things and were later thrown out of the party.
The thought of web series came to Raizada’s mind to bring out what he claims are the “wrongdoings” that went on in the party. The series could not be completed before the February 2020 Assembly polls in Delhi, so he released only the theme song and a trailer in January.
“If you look at it, Kejriwal is still doing the same thing. After gathering large donations in a non-transparent manner, he is still saying, ‘I will break piggy banks of children to collect funds for getting work done’. Therefore, I thought, people need to know the truth,” he said as the reason for bringing out the web series on YouTube now.
The web series has interviews with a whole lot of people who were disappointed with Kejriwal’s “deviation” from what he had promised when the party was formed in 2012. The long list includes Kumar Vishwas, Yogendra Yadav, Mayank Gandhi, Shazia Ilmi, Shivendra Chauhan and a number of volunteers. In the end, when Raizada tries to meet Kejriwal, it is shown that he is unable to meet.
The six parts web series’ song ‘Kitna Chanda Jeb Mein Aaya’ – sung by Udit Narayan, composed by Pravesh Malik, lyrics for which have been written by Annu Rizvi – had become an instant hit and caught the imagination of people, especially on social media.
Much later after the February 2020 polls, when he completed the series, Raizada went back to Chicago and re-started his practice.
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