Anti-Corruption

The crusader against corruption 

The anti-corruption movement in India has spilled onto the streets; actually spread more than spilled. To use the word spill is to undermine the surge and the multitude which back the emotion and anger that an average Indian is experiencing.
If BJP’s Arun Jaitley, Leader of the Opposition in the Upper House of the Indian Parliament, termed the movement as a “defining moment” in history, Rajya Sabha MP Shobhana Bhartia summed up the people’s mood aptly when she said that the people’s anger is against corruption and Gandhian Anna Hazare has become the face of that anger. Anna Hazare, it may be recalled, was the first to launch a crusade against corruption some months ago. He, along with his supporters, had claimed to represent civil society and demanded that the Government led by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh introduce legislation in Parliament to end corruption and make legislators, bureaucrats and judiciary accountable.
Above all, it insisted that the Prime Minister come within the purview of what it named the Jan Lokpal Bill. The Government, of course, calls it the Lokpal Bill.
Ostensibly, the government’s case is to go along with the majority view that corruption must be rooted out. What it did not do, was follow the path which would lead to this.
This is not to suggest that the Anna Hazare formula is an ideal one. Or that it is the only solution to corruption. But this time around it is not the nitty-gritty that matters: it is the issue.
On that there is a consensus that the corrupt must go and corruption must end. Like there is to the Prime Minister’s inclusion under the purview of the anti-graft legislation. The people’s sentiment is that the powerful and the influential must not be spared; neither should they enjoy immunity.
Their case is that everyone, however important, must be measured by the same yardstick as a common man. Anna Hazare’s success is that he gave a voice to the till now dormant common Indian feeling.
His success is also that the government goofed up big time. Had it not been for its complete mishandling of the situation Hazare would never have become a national hero as he did overnight.
First they ignored him, then they tried to act tough by sending him to jail, and finally bent over backwards to do whatever it took to appease him.
They did it earlier when the Hazare movement was at a nascent stage and they repeated the blunder when Hazare had occupied centre- stage. In other words, from a crusader and a hero, they helped him don the mantle of what the international media termed as a “new Gandhi”.
There is a churning among political parties that is taking place on the Indian political scene. Though technically this remains an inter-party issue, the ground reality is that each and every move has a bearing on the national scenario.
Whether it is Mrs Sonia Gandhi passing the baton on to Rahul Gandhi or BJP’s clamour for power or its focus on collective leadership, each of these has a bearing on national polity and politics of India.
If Mrs Sonia Gandhi’s health issues have necessitated a change of guard, it is infighting within the BJP which has led to its strategic decision not to showcase a prime ministerial candidate.
Not the content and context but the manner in which it has been handled; new Gandhi…largest democracy on its knees…

The writer is a senior journalist and political commentator, and a columnist for The Independent

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