Democracy is all about “people’s power”: Lesson from Anna movement

It only gives credence to complete absence of touch with ground reality that all Delhi's armed-chair ivory tower experts like Kapil Sibal were left to deal with Anna Hazare crisis. The arrogance of power had blinded them so much that Dr Manmohan Singh's 'wise team' also forgot that Anna was essentially a Maharashtra-based leader and has been hndled earlier by Maharashtra politicians.
It is left to Sibal and Chidambaram duo that even two former chief ministers in the union cabinet Sushil Kumar Shinde and Vilasrao Deshmukh were completely ignored in handling the crisis.
Both are with mass-base and also more experience in real polity as compared to know all Sibals and chidambarams.
The streets of Delhi, Mumbai and various other parts of the country are the proof of an angry India these days. The anguished Indians have found a voice in the 74-year-old Anna Hazare as they are “exasperated” with the existing system where political masters take shelter behind men-in-uniform or behind a debate on the supremacy of parliament and are bent upon crushing a crusade against corruption.
Dr Singh had lost the initiative when he sought to dismiss Anna's letter to him seeking a location in Delhi to stage his satyagraha.
A non-political and out of touch of ground reality man in Dr Singh prevailed so much that he shot off a missive to Anna directing him to go the concerned authorities for staging the satyagraha.
That was the turning point when the PM lost the initiative in the episde. What followed was only a listless list of mistakes and blunders -- punctuated with "smugness and arrogance of power", to borrow the phrase from BJP leader Arun Jaitley.
L K Advani is absolutely right when he says, the mandate of 2009 has exhausted for the UPA.
The Congress has simply failed to appreciate how Anna has able to strike the extraordinary chord with the people of India, especially youth.
The balloon over so called Rahul Gandhi craze amongst youths is finally pricked; and instead the 74-year-old frail and someone who does not utter a word in English has now become a youth icon.

The attempt by the Prime Minister to tell countrymen that his government was trying to take sincere steps against corruption has no takers. Neither there are any takers of his misguided thesis albeit egged by compatriots Kapil Sibal and P Chidambaram – both men of law – to turn the dispute on Anna’s arrest as a war between supremacy of parliament and those who agitate in making laws did cut ice anywhere.

“The PM saying law can't be made in maidan, law cannot be made through satyagraha..they are misleading the people. We are not making the law. We are only giving suggestions”, said Justice Santosh Hegde.

The Congress has simply failed to appreciate how Anna has able to strike the extraordinary chord with the people of India, especially youth.
The balloon over so called Rahul Gandhi craze amongst youths is finally pricked; and instead the 74-year-old frail and someone who does not utter a word in English has now become a youth icon.

The attempt by the Prime Minister to tell countrymen that his government was trying to take sincere steps against corruption has no takers. Neither there are any takers of his misguided thesis albeit egged by compatriots Kapil Sibal and P Chidambaram – both men of law – to turn the dispute on Anna’s arrest as a war between supremacy of parliament and those who agitate in making laws did cut ice anywhere.

“The PM saying law can't be made in maidan, law cannot be made through satyagraha..they are misleading the people. We are not making the law. We are only giving suggestions”, said Justice Santosh Hegde.


The Congress has simply failed to appreciate how Anna has able to strike the extraordinary chord with the people of India, especially youth.
The balloon over so called Rahul Gandhi craze amongst youths is finally pricked; and instead the 74-year-old frail and someone who does not utter a word in English has now become a youth icon.

The attempt by the Prime Minister to tell countrymen that his government was trying to take sincere steps against corruption has no takers. Neither there are any takers of his misguided thesis albeit egged by compatriots Kapil Sibal and P Chidambaram – both men of law – to turn the dispute on Anna’s arrest as a war between supremacy of parliament and those who agitate in making laws did cut ice anywhere.

“The PM saying law can't be made in maidan, law cannot be made through satyagraha..they are misleading the people. We are not making the law. We are only giving suggestions”, said Justice Santosh Hegde.
Today, symbolically, if the Gandhi cap, the hitherto considered right of the 'Nehru-Gandhi family' and the Congress party has slipped away from its hand; it is the Congress party only who is to be blamed. Perhaps, it is high time, 'virtuous heir apparent' Rahul tries to firmly draw up at least the team of spokespersons and replace the present one led by egoistic Janardhan Dwivedi by a better choice like Jaipal Reddy. There is a theory about cold war between Chidambaram and Pranab Mukherjee and even between Chidambaram and Kapil Sibal.
Rahul's perenial silence along with talkative loose canon Digvijaya Singh during last week is another story.
Lalu Prasad-led RJD, which took government line and flayed Anna stir in the name of supremacy of constitution and the parliament, is now faced with internal differences. Its Delhi MLA has flayed Lalu's vitriolic attack on Anna during the debate in Lok Sabha.
Sadly, the Congress leadership was so much lost in a trap of its own creation that in the Lok Sabha last week only a latent voice of support for them came from RJD’s comical star Lalu Prasad, who vehemently harped on the government “thesis” reiterating the supremacy of parliament. Little did the Congressmen including an otherwise politically alert P Chidambaram could realize that Lalu is not only a politically spent force in Bihar, it is also a fact that Lalu’s credit in terms of honesty was seriously in test during the infamous days of fodder scam.
The Delhi RJD legislator has rightly called the groundswell of support for Lalu as 'sailab (a resurgent wave)'
In the debate on the rights and wrongs about the right to sit on fast and the arrest of a Gandhian, the real message of the people’s outcry should not get lost. People are getting restless against mis-governance and they see corruption as a major ingredient of that misfortune. “From ration office to traffic police, people face the problem. Corruption has become a way of life. Therefore, they see a ray of hope in Anna’a agitation that things would change,” said G K Bhargav, one of the million supporters who took to the streets of Delhi.

(ends)