In a recent interview, AAP Leader Arvind Kejriwal said and I quote …

…for us (him and his party members) party is irrelevant.

Adding further,

… I even tell AAP supporters to forget about AAP (Aam Aadmi Party), the political party and concentrate on serving the country.

Is Political Party in Indian democracy irrelevant ?

Political party gives form to the grouping. This is the obvious benefit of a political party.

But there are some other not so obvious purposes of a political party as well.

For instance, when people are grouped under a political party … the electorate knows who to put liability on, if things don’t go as promised. That apart for any action of any member of the political party, the liability can be imposed on the party. Here the Political party assumes the form of person, and can be blamed and credited in the same way, as an individual.

That apart, a political party represents a collective consciousness of all the supporters and members. Just like a human, a political party acquires its personality by its main trait ( in the case of a political party, this trait forms its ideology). And voters vote on the basis of that main trait. Hence if the founder of a political party is reluctant in accepting the relevance of the party, he in a way is trying to hide the very personality of the party.

In a democracy, party is as accountable as anyone else. Because, if there’s no relevance of political party, then who will we chase, if things don’t go as planned?

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