The paradox of Anna Hazare’s anti-corruption campaign is that, for the tremendous across-the-board support it has evoked, it has also provoked widespread debate and vociferous disagreement. In his crusade to unify a broad spectrum of public opinion are sown the first seeds of disunity. For who, among the thinking majority, doesn’t wish a vigorous clean-up of the body politic? But why is Anna Hazare dramatically dividing opinion?
Because he comes across as sanctimonious, intolerant and undiscriminating. Apparently Gandhian in mould, and saintly in his achievements and aspirations, there is a holier-than-thou streak to his personality. Only he knows what is right, he won’t easily brook dissent and he is open to favouritism. He is both chief nominee and nominator to the membership of the joint Lokpal panel. He grudgingly backs some chief ministers (Narendra Modi, Nitish Kumar) but says he will “call them 100 per cent good only when they accept the Lokpal system”. And he is given to making sweeping, thoughtless generalisations: Indian voters, he says, are as easily corruptible as elected representatives, their votes won by blandishments of cash, liquor and clothes.
Many Indians may be blameless in finding such ideas wrong, insulting and even offensive. Others may think that here is a saint-in-the-making, so eager to be canonised, that he is being subtly manipulated.
To take just two examples in the Indian tradition of leader-activists, Hazare has none of Gandhi’s psychological shrewdness and puckish humour to defuse tensions, nor Jayaprakash Narayan’s ideological beliefs and grass roots appeal. Were it so, there would be thousands flocking to replicate some of the commendable reforms that he has wrought over 35 years in Ralegan Siddhi and other villages throughout the country. His version of a satyagraha or “total revolution” is still awaited. A few hundred mombatti-wallahs at India Gate, or a few thousand emails, texts and Facebook messages, do not make a national movement. The media loves a circus but many left Jantar Mantar wondering if his is a grass roots or dew drops movement.
Hazare is certainly the right man at the right moment to capture the public disillusionment with corrupt governance. His problem is that he has overnight become all things to all people. Thanks to a four-day fast in the capital’s political heartland, with the media machine going full blast as in the movie Peepli [Live], he has brought a government, caught on the back foot at election time, quickly to its knees over the composition of the Lokpal panel and Parliament Bill. In the process, his bandwagon has lured political opportunists, activist-operators, god men of impious provenance and celebrities longing for 15 seconds of fame. Like many heroic figures consumed by the fervour of their zeal, he is a crashing failure in separating the wheat from the chaff.
On paper at least, his draft of the Lokpal Bill, with its incredible authority and autonomy, state-wide scaffolding and punishing deadlines, appears wondrous. Everyone with an iota of authority, from the Prime Minister and his Cabinet down to the traffic constable, will be held accountable; we will get our ration cards and passports without hindrance or bribes; MPs, MLAs and panchayat heads will be “recalled” if caught or complained about.
Beware, the labyrinth of babudom! Beware, secretaries to government (who sign dodgy files leading to hundreds of crores of rupees of losses to taxpayers) or millions of safai karamcharis (who refuse to clear mountains of garbage leading to squalor and disease)! “Off with their heads,” as the Queen of Hearts declared in Alice in Wonderland.
No right-thinking person can deny that the Lokpal and Lokayukta system is a good idea and should be taken forward. It is the ambition, machinery and implementation of the scheme that will take time and be painful in a functioning democracy. As for 71-year-old Baburao Hazare, as a good Gandhian, he might wish a contemplative retreat to his spartan quarters in Ralegan Siddhi. Or why not take occasional vows of silence that Gandhi practised, all the while passing witty chits to interlocuters?
