Go Anna!!

Anna Hazare has become a household name now. Based on whatever he has done in the last one week, the number of people who know who is Anna has increased exponentially. Anna is not a new name in the field of social service. The septuagenarian, who has served as a driver in the Indian Army, has many accomplishments to his credit. He has built a self sustaining, one of its kind village in Ralegaon Sidhi, in the Ahmednager district of Maharashtra. Earlier, this district used to be one of the poorest in India and today has become one of the richest it seems. His contributions to the civil society have been recognized duly and he has also been honored with the prestigious Padma Bhushan by the Govt. of India.

Recently, he has taken it upon himself to fight against corruption and corrupt people in the country and is fighting for the Lok Pal bill, which will form an authority, who will be autonomous and will make civil servants accountable for their deeds. Anna had started this movement in late February and has garnered the support of a lot of famous personalities from varied walks of life. Last week, he went on a fast unto death because the Govt. had failed to come out with a notification on the Lok Pal Bill. The fast which lasted for close to 4 days, finally ended up in the Govt. relenting and promising to form a committee which will draft the bill and also assuring that the Bill will be passed by August 15^th.

In the midst of all this, there have been some people who have ridiculed whatever Anna is doing for the country. In the ripe old age, he is doing all this selflessly for us, the youth of the country. Some people argue saying that his actions and threats of fasting unto death amount to blackmailing and influencing the functioning of a democratically elected Govt. These people say that there are enough laws and legislations in the country which can already be used to fight against corruption and merely having another law will not do any good.

True. People can file Public Interest Litigations (PILs) and also under the Right to Information (RTI) ask for certain details. But how effective are all these in today’s world? Forget a PIL, filing a First Information Report (FIR) at a police station is a big head ache for the common man. I had to run after the CI and SI of a local police station for 3 full days to file an FIR when my bike was stolen. All said and done, if there are so many laws and legislations, why is corruption still rampant? Why has someone not been able to make use of these laws to bring the guilty to the guillotine?

Coming to the question of blackmailing and influencing the functioning of a democratically elected Govt., we all know how elections are held and how votes are cast in the elections. We all know the type of people who get elected as our representatives. Now people may further argue that it is we who elect these people and we should make sure that such people don’t reach the Parliament. Agree. But what option do I have? I make sure that I cast my vote in every election that happens. Unless everyone around me does the same, I don’t have much of a choice. Now people may also argue that non corrupt people stand for elections and bring out a change. Again, I agree. But change is not something that can happen overnight. It takes time. And especially when we have people like HD Kumaraswamy, who can go on the record to say that it is hard for politics and corruption to not co-exist, and even say that Gandhiji also would have either become corrupt or quit from politics were he alive today, shows the magnitude of the kind of change we are looking at. That’s precisely the reason why this change is difficult if not impossible.

Fortunately, we are living in a democracy. As a democratic nation, all of us as citizens are entitled to run the Govt. the way we want through our elected representatives. As such, I believe, we have every right to protest, if we think that something is going wrong. For Anna, he is doing it after giving proper notice. One citizen of a country has chosen to raise his voice and ask questions, whereas all you and I have chosen to do, is sit back, watch the tamasha and comment on his actions. Again, I agree that all of his demands may not be fully justified. There may be a lot of flaws in his draft also. But the fact is, instead of sitting back and commenting on the same through the media, I think we should make an attempt to communicate it to him, who has taken the mantle upon himself. If we ask questions such as “Who is Anna Hazare to decide what should and what should not form a part of the draft”, we should first ask ourselves about our credibility to sit back and question on his work and efforts.

Go Anna!! We know that your intentions are good and the whole country will rally behind you on your efforts, except for a few goons who will always want to hog limelight. If not anything, teach these goons a lesson!