Kapil says “Wait and watch” about Anna’s August 16th fast threat....the government gets tough...

His interviews with both Barkha on NDTV and Karan Thapar on CNN IBN were remarkable. He spoke glibly like a lawyer. He spoke with a resolve that could not have been his own....clearly his party’s stand was what he was projecting. Enough was enough he said. Anna hardly represented the civil society movement. And when asked what the government would do on Aug 16^th if Anna went on a strike again, he said “Wait and Watch”. That reply flummoxed even Karan Thapar.....was the answer a threat? Was it a display of a new political resolve to handle the unnecessary crisis that has gripped the country? No one knows the answers, but I have a few theories.

The first one is that the Congress has done its own homework and realized that Anna is not the force that the media made him out to be. Yesterday HT carried a full page story on him “Does the Gandhi Topi fit?” which brought out pieces of information from his past that no Gandhian would support. For eg., in his village Ralegaon Siddhi, Anna would round up liquor vendors and beat them with his army belt if they continued to sell. Since his motives were noble, all this passed off as a display of passion and resolve. But can he do the same nationally? It also hints at a weak character when it describes the way Anna left the army after the war with China. Was he not strong enough to handle the pain and suffering? The story then points out the difference between Satyagraha and “duragraha” a term that Gandhi had coined to describe “a romanticized and extremist point of view without regard to constructive democratic politics”. So it called Anna’s movement duragraha, not satyagraha. Likewise, the Indian Express has been on Anna’s and the Lokpal committee’s case for a long time now. There have been many damaging articles in the papers rubbishing the proposals of the Anna panel. And now even the TOI has started taking a neutral stance.

The Congress also must have got comfort that all the drama around Ramdev’s eviction has subsided so soon. No one cares about Ramdev now. Media is hardly interested in covering what he’s up to. The fact that he had to break his fast in a few days was a matter of surprise to the nation. After all, the yoga guru was expected to go on for much longer. I was surprised when Kapil Sibal attacked him frontally.....and said that the government had “exposed” him. The fact that he could not fast for even a few days would affect Ramdev’s business as well, he argued.

Somewhere, Anna seems to have made a tactical mistake. By latching onto the expected frenzy that Ramdev would create, Anna has strayed. By never ever complaining about the RSS and BJP, he has shown that his is a political movement. By going to media at every single opportunity, he and his team now look like they are performing for the sake of media. All this has made media wary. CNN IBN has been a critic of the government for long and for them to put the Karan Thapar show was a message being sent. Karan was almost suppliant when asking Kapil questions. He was more than willing to accept even the not-so-convincing answers that Kapil was providing. Like I wrote in yesterday’s post, the media is changing sides.....and if that happens, Anna’s movement is dead. A movement propped up by media would surely die if media pulled out the support.

Probably that’s what prompted Sonia to write a terse reply to Anna’s letter. He complained to her that her party folks were calling him an RSS “mask”. But this is the problem with Anna. That’s why Anna is not Gandhi. The same Anna was saying nothing to his panelists who went to media complaining that the government was made up of “cheats” and “liars”. Sonia’s earlier letter to Anna had been respectful.....now she was terse. She accused him of having leaked his letter to the media. Bang on!

Calling the all-party meeting is a good idea. It will help all parties discuss points and come to unanimous decisions. If nothing, the Congress will at least know how much support the bill has got. What if the bill is defeated in Parliament? The government will have to quit. Is that why the BJP is not offering its viewpoints to the government while it is readily relaying them to media? Even now, they have said that they will “participate” but they won’t give their views until the Congress gives its views. What else does “participate” mean? This kind of political behavior must be condemned. Sitaram Yechury has already spoken about the Left’s views on Anna. I covered that in an earlier post.

So what happens on August 16^th? Ideally, good sense will prevail and Anna will show he is not that stubborn. His own party colleague Santosh Hegde has said that he doesn’t prefer the fasting option. But what if he does go on a fast? I for one would urge the government to give him a few days, but make its intentions clear that on the 4^th or 5^th day, he would be force fed. Media should be kept in the loop and the authorities must act with great sensitivity. The support for Anna has faded. Everyone knows that the bill cannot be passed by August 15^th. The bill has to be referred to the Standing committee of Parliament. Public views have to be obtained. Parliamentary debate has to happen. All this takes time. Pranab Mukherjee slammed Anna by saying “only parliament will decide when the bill will be passed”. Can Anna afford to go ahead with his fast? My own bet is that he won’t. Surely he realizes that if he does, all his support will vanish.

The real truth is that this “back channel” BJP strategy is starting to backfire. The BJP has again shown itself to be a weak party that cannot be trusted. That’s not the same as saying that the Congress can be trusted. What it shows is that this corruption movement was not a people’s movement but a political movement. I had written earlier that it should be dealt with politically. Looks like the Congress has understood that message!

What’s happening? Is media now changing sides????

A lot of the recent government bashing has been aided by some important sections of the media. I have been noticing a gradual and calibrated shift of this slant for the last few days now. A look at today’s TOI – one of the leading critics of the government – is indicative of exactly this.

First, the story about NAC offering a version of the draft Lokpal bill which seems uncannily similar to what the government wants. This story is generally in line with what the TOI has been putting out in the past. However, the story is written in a well balanced manner. It goes on to allow the NAC to explain its position. “NCPRI (National Campaign for People’s Right to Information) member Venkatesh Nayak said, “There is no conscious design to draft a bill according to the government’s views. These views are coming from NCPRI after consultations. We think this is a reasonable way to deal with the issue of corruption.””. It also then elaborates on what the NAC feels and where it also differs from the government’s version. All in all, it paints a fairly decent picture of the NAC. A few weeks back, the NAC would have been tainted as a Congress mouthpiece and its reputation sullied.

Another story in the same paper also allows the government a fair chance to explain itself. It quotes Kapil Sibal and gives him a fair amount of “footage”. Congress, like many others in the political class, is against putting the PM within Lokpal’s jurisdiction as it fears that it would expose the crucial office to incessant mudslinging by vested interests, undermining its authority. The crucial words are “like many others in the political class”. When did the TOI become so neutral in its reporting? This is surely a reference to the BJP’s double standards? This last piece in this story certainly wouldn’t have been there a few weeks back: Sibal also claimed that government could change its stand on whether the PM should be put within the scope of Lokpal if the civil society representatives gave a “compelling argument”. Contending that it was not the question of an individual but an institution, Sibal asked,“Which PM in office anywhere in the world has been prosecuted in the world? Please tell me, please give me an example.”  This last bit would surely have been edited out a few weeks back....

Then there is this article written by Swaminathan S Anklesaria Aiyer titled “Our black money is here....not in Switzerland”. Aiyer conveniently blames the media for its lack of knowledge of the issue “But i am astonished that the media endlessly repeats the myth that enormous hoards of black money are lying in Swiss banks. Wow.....considering that Aiyer was a bitter critic of the Congress government for so long, this certainly looks like cutting the government some slack. Is Aiyer – a part of the media establishment himself – now accepting that the Ramdev and Anna and all of their ilk have been wrong in their understanding of black money and that media also has failed to understand the issue? Aiyer himself seems to have realized very late in the day that the black money is not stashed abroad....it’s stashed right here inside the country. Also, he finally realizes that there is no point in chasing governments abroad as the black money would move from one country to another.....and finally, the TOI allows him to write “But if Ramdev, Anna Hazare and the government are serious about tracing black money, looking for it in Swiss banks cannot be a high priority. They need to look first and foremost within India. Most black money never leaves India, and much of that does come right back”. Now that’s remarkable! When the government kept saying the same thing till a few weeks back, TOI didn’t print that at all....

Finally, a write-up by Swapan Dasgupta in the same paper (TOI). Swapan Dasgupta writing this following passage is quite unexpected “A fear of decision making has gripped the system. Since no one wants to be dubbed a corporate dalal, have charges pressed against him by ombudsmen who can’t distinguish between plodding and innovation, and be jailed by a judge fearful of public opprobrium, non-decision has become a hallmark of wisdom. The Cairns sale of its equity to Vedanta is hanging fire for nearly a year because no one wants to risk admitting that the government is being cussed and shifting the goal post in mid-play. The Posco project is being derailed by politics. And Lavasa is being harassed because no one wants to earn the ire of ‘green’ activists chasing abstract principles. Between a NAC that wants to outlaw land sales to corporates and a ‘civil society’ that wants business to be regulated by a kangaroo court, India is entering a phase of despondency and decline.” Has Swapan forgotten that he is a BJP representative (well.....almost always)? That Kangaroo court statement is particularly harsh, isn’t it???

Apart from all this in today’s TOI, there has also generally been widespread coverage of the BJP internal fissures and the Munde story.....

So has the tide turned for the government? Has the media relaxed its misplaced and wrongful pressure? Has the civil society finally undone itself? Has it finally become apparent that the civil society is chasing an agenda that is untenable? That Anna is behaving like he is a stooge of the BJP? Or is all this some sort of a diabolical deal between the government and the media???

The real truth is that the powerful role of media is becoming clear all over again. By first supporting blindly and raising the pitch to a feverish level, the media created despondency in the country. A country growing this rapidly....and finally starting to come into its own....did not deserve this. Sure, corruption is rampant.....and it needs to be weeded out......but surely, things are improving, not worsening. The RTI forces more transparency. Nandan Nilekani’s UID project will cut corruption drastically. The 2G and CWG scams are there – but the values are much lower than what media projected (even though the CAG estimated). If media now changes sides.....then a different perspective will emerge. Public opinion will change. Anna will be at least as discredited (at least his team members will be) as Ramdev has been. And hopefully, the country will be back to what it should be doing.....focusing on economic growth and better distribution of wealth. Else what Swapan writes at the end of his piece “The 21st century could still be Asia’s. But the resurgence could yet bypass India” could well come true.....

In the end, the difference between Europe and us is in the quality of people....

There is no point in saying that there is a huge difference between Europe and India. Everyone knows that there is just no comparison between the two. That’s why we all rush out of India whenever we can get a chance to. There is no doubt a huge difference in the quality of infrastructure....and yet, much more than infrastructure, it’s the difference in the quality of people that stands out.

As soon as I landed at the airport in Bombay last night, this became clear. The cabbie I had engaged to pick me up at the airport was sleeping on his watch. Four phone calls to him and he refused to pick up my calls. Just as we were about to hail another cab, something must have woken this man up. So he calls up. Instead of accepting that he had slept off and admitting to his mistake, he lies and says that he had called me four times and I didn’t pick up the call! His cab was dirty, the seats never dusted in the last several months. He honked loudly. He swore at people on the street. His shirt buttons were open and he was smelling lousy. You get the picture! Just a few hours back, the cabbie at Barcelona came sharp at 4.30 am, mouthed some pleasantries, helped place the heavy bags in the cab and professionally went about doing his job. He was dressed smartly, his cab was clean, the radio was working and most importantly, he obeyed all the rules on the road and didn’t honk even once in the 25 km long journey to the airport. I had no choice but to make the comparison as I landed....

Sure, the roads in Europe are much better. The signals work. Everyone else behaves well; so the provocation on the driver is much lesser. Agreed. But, I have seen many narrow streets even in London. I have seen dark alleys in Rome. I have seen big crowds in Barcelona.....none of that makes Europe even a little bit less lovely than it is. The difference is not in the infrastructure alone. The most important difference is that this European driver was definitely much more cultured; probably better educated even. I remember that Economic Times ad of a few years back “One day you are reading the paper; the other day, you are in it”. Much in the same way, this European driver was a mere driver one day; on a different day, he could be a tourist in another country himself. Also notice, how I instinctly said “mere driver”.....that’s how our society is different from theirs. No one in his country would say that of him. There is a pride in the work that he does; something that doesn’t exist here in our society at all.

Usually, there is a financial explanation to better services in Europe. You pay a lot more and hence get a lot better service. Not in this example. I paid 45 euros to this Barcelona cabbie....some Rs 2,500 or so. I paid about Rs 1700 for this Indian cabbie.....frankly, given the kind of service I got, I shouldn’t have been paying even Rs 170.....I tipped the cabbie 5 euros.....I usually tip about 5-7 euros to my driver on late Saturday nights. So really, it’s not the money in this transaction that was responsible for the shoddy service.

What’s true of this cabbie is true of 99% of the people in our country. We are uncouth; in many cases downright rude. We speak loudly. We chew and spit paan, we make aweful sounds from our throats, we shit and urinate on the streets, we honk incessantly, we leave our bathrooms dirty, we stare at people (especially women) and when we are not doing all this (rarely), we are still extremely impolite, arrogant and aggressive. This is true of 99% of our society. Leave out a few PLUs (!) (People like us), and we can make that statement of the rest of our country.

In large measure, it is to do with our 200 years of Brit rule and the thousands of years of inequality and repression of the previous times. Our caste system makes many citizens second and third grade the day they are born. Entire job classes suffer the same fate. Why do we complain about dynasty in our politics.....when we have the rule of dynasty in almost all jobs that exist in our country? A farmer’s son will likely become a farmer; a car cleaner’s, a car cleaner. Unfortunately, while untouchability has disappeared (at least in the urban areas) from the country, this version of untouchability has stayed back. We simply haven’t been able to accept our people as our own.....irrespective of where they come from.

Our education system is pathetic. I read that Spain is accused of having the worst education system amongst the developed world. What about our education system? Do we even care to teach our students basic decency and conduct in our schools? Do we even bother to teach our students basic courtesies? Basic discipline? Or do we just spend time in mugging up syllabus? We all know the answer to that.

There is also this huge difference in the attitudes of people to sharing wealth. I have written about this earlier. Rich people in our country simply refuse to voluntarily part with their wealth even in small doses. They set salaries of their domestic help based on “market forces”; setting it at the lowest possible figure. There is almost a sense of pleasure we get at having negotiated the figure down to as measly a sum as possible....sometimes, it becomes the topic of discussion between friends! We spend thousands of euros buying things for ourselves when we go abroad......yet when it comes to buying something for the driver or the domestic help, we cringe. Distribution of wealth is a serious issue. Many would say that since we have ourselves come out of deprivation only some years back, we are insecure. But in a country that’s growing at 8-9% per annum, why do we have this insecurity? Is anyone in this country really afraid that they will lose their jobs or their annual increment will be less than 15-18%? I think it’s just an excuse....deep down, we practice our caste mentality with respect to our sharing of wealth also. We pay huge margins to wealthy distributors who sell costly goods.....but when it comes to poor people, we squeeze out the last bits. This is the reason why there is some merit in considering a compulsory CSR charge for corporates.....This is also the reason why I hate to call Anna Hazare a Gandhi. In his time, Gandhi often went on hunger strikes against his own people. Would Anna even think of doing that????

The real truth is that we are a hundred years behind Europe in terms of the quality of people. We’ve pretty much caught up in absolute GDP terms......but we have a century to go before we start becoming at least a little polished (in the past I have written it will take three generations for us to see the difference in quality.....and I do still retain that more logical number). Even our GDP needs a qualification. It’s per-cap GDP that matters more than absolute GDP.....given our population size, we will need to be a $50 trillion economy to compare favorably with the developed world. That’s at least a century away! Even that figure will be breached one day.....but whether our minds will become more progressive or not is a certainty that at least I won’t survive to tell.....

A short post from Paris.....

Just two small points to repeat really:

1) Make a law to ban hunger strikes which threaten the democratic process of law making or any such thing. No matter how good or relevant the cause, hunger strikes till death cannot be permitted. Of course, hunger strikes for a short period of time to protest should be allowed.
2) Government should enact a strong law of its own. And then move on to the several other problems facing the country. I read the Wall Street Journal - Europe edition today and there is not a single mention of India in the entire paper. We need to focus a lot more of "work" rather than on distractions like the most recent ones.

More on this later.

Ignore Anna’s panel.....but show resolve to kill corruption

It’s going on expected lines. Anna’s meetings with the government are making no progress. There is a huge disagreement on basic issues. The Anna camp is trying to give an impression that a disagreement means poor commitment and hidden motives of the government. This is partly true..... not entirely. There is a genuine disagreement on some of the clauses and we need to pause and think of what options exist at this point of time.

But first let’s look at the disagreements. I am not looking at the defense put up by the government. It is bound to defend its own turf. I am looking at different opinions expressed in media by different types of people. And the feeling I get is that there is no unanimous support for Anna’s demands. As would be expected in any democracy, there are divergent viewpoints. It’s not entirely clear if Anna’s suggestions are all the “perfect” ones and that their rejection reflects bad intentions on the part of the government. Many have expressed that the Lokpal would become a super authority and that would corrupt it before removing corruption elsewhere. Many have questioned the wisdom of having anybody over the Parliament in a democracy of our type. Many have stated that the PM should not be included within the Lokpal during his/her tenure.....post that, its fine. And so on and so forth.

My own suggestions have been simple. Include the PM and the ministers and higher judiciary all under the Lokpal. But have a filtering committee to decide which cases to prosecute and which not to. Clearly, not all PILs can be allowed to start prosecution. I sometimes feel we have too much freedom in this country. And that freedom is blatantly abused by many. That’s why, a filtering committee is so important to have. That committee itself should not be headed by a single person – the Speaker at the moment. It must include a wider representation of society....including a few “civil society” members as well. It should include the leader of the opposition, the CVC, and others like them. Already, the Prevention of Corruption does include all politicians in its scope. So there is no disagreement really on the concept. The difference is on the structure of the filtering committee. I do agree it should not be a single person decision like at present.

Let’s now look at what options exist. If civil society feels that its demands are being unjustly denied, then what should they do? Should they go on a hunger strike en-masse and threaten the government? After all, any government that acts against such protesters would face the wrath of the nation. If this happens, should the Anna movement allow the BJP to gain advantage of the situation? Or should civil society fight the elections? If their following so really that big, surely they can raise funds and fight elections in at least a few seats? Can they win Delhi and Bangalore to start with? Surely, that would be a slap on the face of the government? In these two cities, it appears they have a lot of supporters.....why don’t they contest in these two cities? Or are they so disillusioned with elections that they are openly saying that it’s a flawed system? Or is the reality this that they are not sure of their own following?

I am suggesting they contest only a few seats and make it a prestige issue. Let Anna enter Parliament through a fight in Delhi....right under the nose of the central government. Likewise, let Prashant Bhushan enter the Parliament from Bangalore....right under the nose of the BJP government. And Shanti Bhushan from Ahmedabad.....right under Modi’s nose. Ahmedabad and Bangalore should be easy wins....given the overt support they are getting from the BJP. Right or wrong? We’ll soon find out! Or in Chennai where the old “corrupt” government has been booted out?

I am also repeating my earlier suggestion that a bill be introduced in Parliament which re-states that suicides are illegal; especially the ones that threaten a duly elected government. The courts should step in “automatically” if a complaint is launched against a practitioner of  hunger strikes. Hunger strikes should be time-limited and should automatically cease after 5-7 days. If the intention is not to threaten, but just register a point of view, surely 5-7 days are more than enough? Maybe, they can have “relay hunger strikes” so that the movement lasts longer? Maybe Prashant Bhushan and Arvind Kejriwal can start where Anna leaves it and then they can repeat the chain? That’s what happens in Spain. Almost every day, there are protests outside the local government’s office. And it’s very innovative. They sing and dance and raise banners and voice their complaints. But they never terrorize the government. Threatening a government with a hunger strike should be treated on par with a terrorist hijacking a plane and making demands of the government.

The real truth is that civil society has gone too far. It lacks credibility. It should be chopped in size. The good man, Anna Hazare, has either been hijacked by people with agendas or he has over-reached himself. This civil society is hardly representative of the real civil society. The government needn’t worry too much about it. It should fight it politically with aggression, rather than try and be gentlemanly with these self-consumed and arrogant activists....

The Left must unite....but what they do after uniting is more important

There is some speculation fuelled by Left leaders themselves that the two major Left parties, the CPI and the CPM may merge. Let’s see if this strategy of merging will help revive the two from almost certain death.

Merging under distress is nothing new in the corporate world. Companies often merge because many times both are more viable together than separate. In fact, both may be unviable separately, but viable together. Obviously, this is not always the case....and hence it’s important to go back to the basics to understand if this merger will help.

First and foremost, are the two parties genuinely realizing that they have both become irrelevant? Most times, companies find it extremely difficult to accept such realities. They think of their past glories and somehow hope and pray that those days will return. In reality, the world has moved past them; and they have failed to realize that. In such a situation, merger will be useless as the raison-d’etre of both parties would still remain flawed. I suspect it’s the same with both these Left parties. Honestly, no one really knows nor cares what the difference in the ideologies of the two parties is. As far as common knowledge goes, both have always been working together in a coalition for more than 3 decades. After so much joint working, there is no difference left between them. In public perception, both have lost relevance.

I think the Left ideology is outdated. The CPI was the original Left party and it gained roots after independence when the terrible economic plight of most in the country provided a fertile territory for a Left movement to move in. And the CPI did some radical things to gain instant popularity. They focused on the rich landlords and in essence....stripped them off their land. The land was redistributed to the peasants who became the biggest supporters of the Left. At that time, there was also a wave of socialism and communism sweeping around the world as the Russian economy was soaring after WW2, while the West was generally in trouble. The condition of Indians being what it was, the government of India chose the socialistic route and aligned with the Soviet Union in the days of the Cold War. Apparently, the CPI was a rabid critic of the Congress in those days....and the Soviets played a big role in making them less critical of Nehru and the Congress. The CPM went ahead and stayed anti-Congress. This was the main reason for them to separate. Today....they are both rabid anti-Congress parties and that should bring them back together.

That’s all right. Now back to the raison-d’etre question. Today, in a world of economic modernism, socialism as a model is on the decline. Both the original communists – China and Russia – have adopted full or partial capitalistic models of growth. Unfortunately, the Indian Left outfits have not showed the flexibility required. They have chosen to remain anti-capitalism, but have failed to realize that there is no other model left really. There is only so much that land reforms can provide. In the end, its jobs that people want. And if it is the private sector that can give the jobs, it should have been welcomed with open arms. Like Modi has done in Gujarat. Like the rest of the country has done after the 1991 reforms began. But the Left has remained stuck in its ideology. This often happens when old ideologues continue to head the parties.....and they have too much invested in the old ideology to let it go. Jyoti Basu in many ways blocked any moves of reform. Buddhadeb Bhattacharya has been pushing for reforms. Prakash Karat is a nobody really.

So even if the two merge, it won’t make any difference to the people of the country. Unless, they can reform and present a different economic model to the country. Even when they do this, they must retain their image of being pro-poor. The poor need someone to focus on their needs and its a moot point if any other political party is positioned that well as the Left in this area. The Left needs to be realistic. Everyone needs foreign capital. Capitalism obviously has its flaws. It leads to higher disparities in income levels between the haves and the have nots. But there is no other option really.

The Left should focus on modernizing the industrial sector. They have done enough in agriculture already. Kolkata is still a city that can contribute enormously to the intellectual and industrial capital of the country. It’s the biggest port in East India (or at least it was). If it adopted an aggressive industrial policy.....actually welcoming industrialists with open arms, it would see its fortunes revive. Instead of throwing out the Tatas, they should have welcomed them....while still protecting the needs of their people. A strongly industrialized WB will bring the Left back to power. They must surely realize that they have a weak opponent in Mamta. She’s a destroyer, not a creator.....and she’ll soon realize that running an administration is way more difficult that opposing everything. The BJP realized it too in their six years.

So if the Left modernized its economic policies, and become more industry friendly, created more jobs....then the merger would be good. Else, it will be just the addition of two zeroes....which will still add up to zero.

The real truth is that the Left needs younger leaders who have actually fought elections. Buddhadev should be made the President of the newly formed party.....not Prakash Karat who has no understanding of grassroots politics and who has a big ego. There is still space for a Left ideology.....but a modernised one. I doubt if that will happen any time soon. It may take a decade or so of being out of power to realize that there is no future without reforms......

Political momentum against Anna’s panel growing......

Today’s papers mention two important developments. First, the hardening of the Congress’s stand against the demands of the panel of civil society activists. And second, the statement by Sitaram Yechuri of the Left that the Lokpal panel needs to be checked. That Parliament is supreme. Etc. He’s also written a very good piece in the Hindustan Times elaborating on the issue of corruption – claiming the high ground for the Left while still lambasting the Anna panel.

One has to give it to the Left. They have always represented elevated thinking. Sitaram Yechuri is a prime example of the Delhi School of Economics kind of thinking. The Left has never exploited religion to come to power. Even when they have lost WB and Kerala (and now have no state to call their own), they have shunned the politics of religion. And caste. The Left movement started off and even today represents the aspirations of the poor classes....not castes. Where the Left went astray and which is why I can never support the Left is in their outdated economic policies. If the Left had its way, India would still be in a world devoid of industrialization and privatization. The government would control everything including resource allocation. There would be better distribution of poverty - everybody would be uniformly poor. What takes me further away from the Left is that they are stuck on their ideology – even though their mentors – the Russians and the Chinese – have both moved towards capitalism.

Coming back to the main point of the post, Sitaram Yechuri’s stated pretty much the same things that I have mentioned often in this blog. The Lokpal concept cannot solve everything. The PM must be included under the purview of the Lokpal. The judiciary must be excluded but there must be a Judicial Reforms Committee. The Parliament is supreme. Unelected members cannot dictate to the duly elected government of the day. Etc etc etc. For me, what is important is not what Yechuri stated. What is important is that the Left has publicly aligned with the Congress on this crucial issue. They are both uniting to recover the ground lost by elected representatives to the unelected ones. Many more parties share the exact same opinion. If voting on the recommendations of the Anna panel happens today, it will be defeated in Parliament by a resounding majority.

The other aggressive statement is the one made by the Congress. That if Anna’s panel represents civil society, then who do they (MPs) – the voter’s choice represent? The un-civil society?! In many ways, this is a very exact definition of the problem I have with the Anna panel. It has assumed self gratuitously the mantle of representing all of civil society; trying to divide the country into civil society and the elected class. Their apathy towards the elected class has been apparent from the beginning.....and they have exploited the good image of Anna to somehow hide their real motives.....disdain for democracy and the process of elections and the voters in general. They have behaved as if only they have the intellectual capacity to decide what is good for the country. Their approach as been carefully calibrated to read “Either you are with us ..... or you are corrupt”. In one of the responses to one of my earlier posts, an “anonymous” person asked me if my family members were politicians or we had been beneficiaries of the 2G scam. I had to clarify neither of this was not true. But Anna has polarized society in such a harmful way that any divergent viewpoint from his is considered anti-national. Their attitude has been dictatorial. Five arbitrary members of the panel have demonstrated such haughtiness which can be called worse than that demonstrated by the politicians.

Let me repeat my point of view on corruption. I believe that there is about 10% corruption in almost every government contract. So 10% of the Rs 2000 odd crores that Kalmadi spent would have been usurped. 10% of almost all roads contracts are siphoned off. So on and so forth. In many ways, this 10% gives money in the hands of government officials in a way that the system is unable to give them legally as salaries. But since we won’t address the salary problem directly, the system has found its own way. When the corruption level becomes much higher – like in the NREGA scheme or in the PDS system – then it really angers the people. Else, people realize that this is a kind of a tax the haves have to pay to enjoy what they have.

Removing corruption will take several steps. Increasing salaries of ministers and IAS officers (and other government services) is a good starting point. This will encourage smart and clever people to join government. Today, they shun these jobs because they don’t pay enough (legally). Then there is need for electoral reforms. Pulling down a government before five years should be made difficult (though not impossible). Removing the 3% education cess and replacing it with an equivalent election cess can be a way of generating monies to fund elections. This way, rampant election related corruption could reduce. The Lokpal itself is a crucial part of the cleansing operation. It must be made as independent as the Election commission. But under Parliament. We need the UID scheme (and other technological interventions) to remove corruption in schemes like NREGA and PDS. In short, many things need to be done.....this is what the Anna panel has forgotten. Apart from the fact that they have become a front for BJP’s devious tricks department.....

The real truth is that for once, I do agree with Sitaram Yechuri. He’s stated today what I have been stating in my posts for long. Parliament indeed is supreme, no matter what the kind of MPs we elect. Anna’s panel hardly represents civil society. Most of Anna’s “crowds” can be assumed to be businessmen who avoid taxes illegally and are hence corrupt. And yes.....if it hadn’t been for media’s dangerous flirtation with Anna, there would have been no movement to start with. In any case, the timing is what irks me the most. It is been suggested that all corruption started during the last 10 years....and surprising skipped the 6 years of BJP rule. This is ridiculous. This is what shows that Anna’s is a political movement. By aligning with a party, Anna has either been misled by his motivated panel members, or has willingly let himself be driven off the right path. Either way, the movement is now on its path to shutdown.....Anna’s hazare’s threat of hunger strike till he dies nothwithstanding....