Rains drown Delhi again. Where is Arvind Kejriwal?

Delhi barely had a day of rain and once more it has come to a watery standstill.

The roads are flooded, the traffic is crawling and the flights and trains delayed.

The citizens are caught in hours and hours of traffic jams, important engagements have been missed and the risk of water-borne diseases is staring us in our face.

Many of the aggrieved denizens of Delhi have taken to social media to vent their anger and wake the aloof administration to their misery.

But the Delhi chief minister seems to be living in a world of his own.

The flamboyant leader has been tweeting on a host of issues: FIR on Akhlaq’s family, Sheila Dikshit, women’s safety, Owaisi-Shah, among others, but there has been no tweet whatsoever about the ever worsening waterlogging situation.

Arvind Kejriwal's lack of initiative and absence of leadership in the situation is problematic at many levels and have been discussed below.

Why neglect Delhi, your first love?

In the month of July itself, Kejriwal has been to political tours of Goa, Gujarat and Punjab. Nearly half the time in this month, he has been outside the state, busy with bolstering AAP's electoral ambition.

Shouldn't he have first ensured that Delhi was prepared to deal with the monsoon, which was around the corner?

Clearly the sorry state of the administration after being found unprepared to deal with the monsoon once again was on display since Thursday evening.

Was desilting done? What has been done to redesign roads to make them less prone to flooding? What has been done to strengthen the information system to keep citizens more informed about the situation?

These are some questions that Kejriwal's government must answer. Also when the situation became unmanageable, why was the administration found to be totally missing?

Why was their no immediate stocktaking and why no remedial measures?

Political ambition versus Delhi’s welfare

Kejriwal often says that there is no shortage or solutions or money in the system; it's only a problem of intentions.

So should we assume that if today Delhi was again left at the mercy of the gods, it was because AAP government lacked the intention to address this recurring nightmare that Delhi finds itself witnessing every monsoon?

Perhaps he is too busy with AAP’s political expansion in other states to worry about such little things such as waterlogging which the citizens can be conveniently made to forget in the high-decibel blame game that will inevitably follow.

Doesn’t Delhi which elected Kejriwal deserve a CM who is devoted full time to address its problems?

It's all right for Kejriwal to be politically ambitious but the question he must answer is: is this political ambition coming at the cost of Delhi's welfare?

Why was there no advanced planning?

The problem of flooding in Delhi is not something that couldn't have been foreseen. It happens year after year.

This year, with the Met department having thrust us its forecast of significantly more rainfall than the previous year, the vulnerability to flooding is definitely more. Obviously, the administration knows this in advance. So why didn't it get any advance planning done to deal with the problem it knows too well was about to plague Delhi?

Given the advanced preparations were grossly inadequate, how does it aim to mitigate the rain fury and the inevitably clogged arterial roads of the national capital?

AAP-BJP ugly rivalry reason for poor coordination?

The problem of flooding calls for coordinated actions from all parties: the MCD, the traffic police and Delhi government.

With a total breakdown of relations between the BJP, which controls MCD and traffic police, and the AAP which runs the Delhi government, the erstwhile fear of poor management is coming true.

Given that the administration is split between political rivals perpetually at each other’s throats, no wonder then that the adversarial relations are translating into utter lack of coordination and near wipeout of any administrative responsibility on the ground.

In this game of political one-upmanship, Delhi seems to be losing. In such a confrontational environment, where is the scope for cooperation and good will to come to Delhi’s aid?

If things remain as dysfunctional between BJP and AAP, one fears Delhi may be in for its most problematic monsoon ever.

What happened to connecting with the public?

The Aam Aadmi Party claims to be connected with the people and being alive to their day-to-day problems. But where was it when helpless citizens cried and pleaded about their travails from the flood?

Why has a proactive response not been seen from the Delhi government?

Delhi’s confidence has already weakened in Kejriwal's promise of a new sort of politics and governance.

Before such big dreams inevitably shatter, could the people of Delhi, at least have a not-so-extravagant a wish – that of enjoying a monsoon without being troubled by floods – fulfilled?

Are you listening, Mr Kejriwal?