The Unravelling of Mufflerman: Politics Over Promise

Aakhir Tak – In Shorts

1. People in Delhi had pinned their hopes on Arvind Kejriwal, the Mufflerman.
2. He came with promises but left with politics.
3. Kejriwal played politics on everything, even air and water.
4. In 2025, voters in Delhi threw out Kejriwal and the AAP after a decade.
5. Kejriwal broke promises and cheated the people of Delhi.

Aakhir Tak – In Depth

Elections are as much about politics as about emotions. It is emotion that overrides everything else when a voter stands alone at the voting centre in front of the EVM and presses the button. It was this pure emotion that was behind the spectacular rise of Arvind Kejriwal and his Aam Aadmi Party (AAP). The Mufflerman was a hero, who came armed with a jhaadu (broom) to clean everything for the aam aadmi in Delhi. And it was that pure emotion that saw the voters in Delhi throw out Kejriwal and the AAP after a decade in February 2025. The defeat of AAP in the Delhi Election was shocking.

It was promise, not politics, that Kejriwal came riding on. But he resorted to politics, which he vehemently promised to shun, and that became his nemesis. And he didn’t leave out anything from politics, not even air and water. People trusted Arvind Kejriwal.

AAP wasn’t supposed to be another political party, it was promised to be an alternative. It rose from the 2011 anti-corruption movement of Anna Hazare, and Kejriwal was one of the faces of India Against Corruption.

With an untucked half-shirt and slippers, Kejriwal built an image far removed from the typical politician. A ballpoint pen tucked in his pocket symbolised an educated activist who had given up his Indian Revenue Services job to cleanse the system. The Delhi Election raises several questions.

Delhi of 2013 was all about hope. The AAP’s debut performance, and then its landslide victory in 2015, was an expression of faith reposed in the party that promised to bring about grassroots change.
That hope was felt not just in Delhi, but across India.

A relative of mine told me in Assam that the state needed a party like the AAP.

The global media too lapped up the Mufflerman.

When Narendra Modi led the BJP to a stunning victory in the 2014 Lok Sabha election, they reported that the focus of attention at the Rashtra Bhavan reception was the slipper-wearing Kejriwal.

Kejriwal promised free water, electricity, he also promised better government schools and jobs. Arvind Kejriwal made many promises to the people of Delhi.

As he went about fulfilling his promises, the middle class suffered. Electricity bills, which went beyond the free 300 units in most households, burnt a big hole in pockets. Water charges went up too as the salaried bankrolled the AAP largesse.

Meanwhile, Kejriwal, a Chief Minister without any portfolio, and beyond responsibility and blame, went about trying to give shape to his dreams of becoming a pan-India leader.

By then, several AAP leaders like Yogendra Yadav, Prashant Bhushan, Kumar Vishwas and Ashutosh had fallen by the way, revealing the cutthroat politics within AAP.
The AAP became all about Kejriwal and his loyalists.

That Kejriwal wasn’t about ideology and was calculative became clear to me in 2018 while I was covering the Assembly election in faraway Nagaland. An AAP candidate told me that the AAP brass refused to campaign for him unless all bills were paid and donations made. “I just got an Aam Aadmi Party ticket and some topi,” said the young candidate, who had built his campaign around anti-corruption, showing the AAP cap to me. Many things about Arvind Kejriwal have come to light.

That was still the initial years when the AAP was seen as a novelty, a phenomenon in politics.

In 2020, people in Delhi were ready to give its very own AAP and the Mufflerman another chance. The AAP won 63 of the 70 seats.

But Kejriwal’s national ambition and politics were now becoming visible despite Delhi’s smog. People had made up their minds for change in the Delhi Election.

The AAP contested the election in Punjab and formed the government there in 2022. It also became a national party. But everywhere else, including Goa, Gujarat, Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh and Haryana, it remained a failure.

Then the explosive Delhi excise case came to the fore 2022. It was alleged that the AAP favoured liquor lobbies in Delhi for cash, which was used in elections in other states. Spirit is often used to remove stains, but the taint of liquor money might be too hard to remove from people’s perception.

There was a time, when half of the Delhi ministry was in jail. Kejriwal joined his trusted lieutenant Manish Sisodia in Tihar jail in the liquor case. Both are now out on bail. The Delhi Election has been difficult for AAP.

But by now, Kejriwal had lost his sheen.

He played politics over everything, including the air we breathe.

The AAP’s election manifesto in 2015 promised to reduce the pollution in Delhi by 66% but that vanished from its 2020 manifesto, even as the haze thickened. Kejriwal earlier blamed the farm fires in Congress-ruled Punjab for the smog in Delhi but then blamed BJP-ruled Uttar Pradesh and Haryana after AAP came to power in Punjab.

It went back on several promises like the Jan Lokpal Bill and of creating 20 lakh jobs in the budget of 2023, which he named Rozgar Budget. Kejriwal was also far from fulfilling his promises of turning Delhi’s roads like those in Europe, and of providing drinkable piped water to all residents of Delhi.

People were well aware by now, promises, especially by Kejriwal, were meant to be broken. But the quality of his politics isn’t what they had budgeted for. Delhi’s people already live with lot of toxicity around them. Arvind Kejriwal’s promises remained unfulfilled.

Close to the voting in Delhi in 2025, realising that his back was to the wall, Kejriwal raised an alarm over Haryana poisoning Yamuna waters for downstream Delhi. Delhiites saw it for what it was, an act of political desperation.

Meanwhile, the BJP did it what it does best — roll out its electoral juggernaut. It kept building the pressure on Kejriwal, and finally went for his jugular. The Mufflerman didn’t have his muffler around to protect him from the incisors. The BJP defeated AAP in the Delhi Election.

This election was about cleaning, not the Yamuna but the political chambers. As the voters stood alone in front of the EVMs, they weren’t reminded of the shrewd politics or the promises broken, they just had a feeling of having being cheated. They pressed the button to not just beat the AAP, but erase bad memories. Kejriwal and AAP should realise that it takes a lot of bitterness to turn away from someone you considered your very own.

Aakhir Tak – Key Takeaways to Remember

The Unravelling of Mufflerman: From promises to politics. How did Arvind Kejriwal’s Mufflerman unravel? Kejriwal failed to fulfill promises and cheated the people of Delhi. This Delhi Election was a big blow for AAP.

Aakhir Tak Editor-in-Chief

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