In my previous post, I mentioned that
So, when Anna Hazare stood up one day to fight corruption, India was stunned. Here was a man in his 70s, barely 5’5’’, wearing a Gandhi cap, declaring a war against corruption-his weapon, a previously unheard and unrealized form of protest, a bill, the Lokpal Bill. People were mesmerized by the simplicity of the whole process. There was awe about Anna that attracted people to Jantar Mantar and protest!
But on second thought, all this was way too simplistic. What were these people protesting against; the government, the Congress party or the inability of the government to draft the bill? Or they were just supporting a guy whom they thought will bring a change, without putting too much thought into what that change might be?
There is something in the history of this country that should teach that a movement, without a clear agenda for the future, can go haywire, despite an active participation of the masses. In 1974, the Gujarat Nav Nirman Movement, was a social movement against corruption. Chimanbhai Patel became the CM of Gujarat in 1973. But his reputation for corruption combined with the general undercurrent of the J.P movement, led to a widespread movement in 1974. This movement was solely led by college students and their teachers. Within a year, they managed to make Indira Gandhi ask Patel to step down, make 95 out of 167 MLAs to resign and finally getting the Assembly dissolved. For a student movement this was a huge success. But in the hindsight, it did not answer the issue of corruption at all. Nav Nirman was the buzzword for students and teachers but their value system was not different from the people they were protesting against. So things were back to square one! Patel became the CM again in 1990 with BJP’s support and the movement also saw the arrival of Narendra Modi to the political scene from the backyards of RSS and ABVP. This movement let reactionary forces to flourish!
In the present scenario, everything looks the same, may be a bit toned down and the new buzzword “Lokpal”! The point being, corruption is not just the failure of governance, it is an ideological failure. While Anna Hazare, like J. P, would have addressed the ideological issues also, but the arrival of “celebrities” is shifting the focus and diverting the attention of people. When every social figure is trying to become a social activist, the message is lost.
To take a vow to make this country corruption free is good, but a directionless pursuit is not going to lead us anywhere. With an over-zealous and politically naïve Baba Ramdev jumping on the bandwagon, the whole movement has lost its mass appeal. Baba Ramdev is a perfect example of how much wrong a person can go if he blindly follows a set path, in this case the path being, Fight by Fasting. He is also an example of how people can be misled if they don’t realize who their leader is and what are his goals. Ramdev, literally, undid whatever Anna had achieved just a month ago.
Ramdev shifted focus from the cause to himself (with the disturbing images of him clad like a woman, he probably scarred some impressionable people for life too!). Anna’s fast was an appeal for people’s support, Baba’s fast was a cry for attention. Baba Ramdev appears to be a man who thinks (??) he can correct everything that is wrong with this society. He thinks he has people’s support and even in his mindless pursuits people will stand by him.
What did the images of him being forced out of Delhi conveyed? Certainly, government’s cruelty (no saving grace there). But it also portrayed that the man, who was supposed to take on the government, was running, hiding and changing into woman’s clothes to save his life. He was in tears in the press conference. That conveyed weakness. Baba looked as if he has put foolishly himself in a whirlpool of political mishaps and now, just after a day, he desperately wanted to leave. This image was so contrary to Anna that it hurt the movement.
Things would not have been this bad had he realized that this is not his cup of tea after that night. But he continued his naïve tongue wagging to the point of making statements of raising an army against corrupt people! He seriously needs a better PR and a political advisor. Based on his embarrassingly short fast, shorter than Anna despite being a master Yoga Guru, he probably needs a physical trainer too! (P.S. Shilpa Shetty! are you listening?) This is not the first time he has made such senseless and childish remarks. Remember, when he wanted to treat Homosexuality "virus" by Yoga !
At the end of the whole drama, he looked no different than a celebrity in a wrong reality show. When the messenger becomes bigger than the message itself the cause takes the backseat. Anna never tried to grab headlines and that’s why even the government had to take him seriously. Finally, Anna had to dissociate himself from Baba to continue his movement.
Corruption is not just moral depravity; it has become a state of mind and a way of living. Corruption has always plagued the growth of developing (read: third world) countries. The choice between one’s nation’s growths vs. one’s personal growth is not an easy one to make, especially for those who are deprived of basic amenities of life. Does that justify corruption? How much ever controversial this statement may be, but this attitude of “me first-country later” does justify corruption at least at the grass root level. Can any government or any P.M. be held responsible for such attitude? No. This is not going to change regardless of the government or the coalition in helm. In our “fight against corruption”, this is the most basic point, we all have conveniently forgotten.
Lokpal Bill is no panacea for corruption. And though, I may be misconstrued at this point, read this post later and you would know that the idea is not wrong. Lokpal Bill gives unreal powers to one particular person or committee, termed the Lokpal to deal with corruption. That may create a Marshall Law sort of situation, if it goes in inept hands! I don’t oppose the bill, but we must see beyond this movement into the right execution of the bill when it becomes a law. Corruption cannot be dealt with a blanket law. We need to look beyond this agitation. Democracies are not about agitations, they are about accomplishments through the agitations.
How this society will change by a Law needs to be seen.
(Photo Courtesy: Google Images directed to NDTV.COM )
10 comments:
i dont know where to start. before u started ur blog u were convinced about ramdev's image. its a very opinionated take on him.
1) how does it matter if he escaped in a women's attire. i mean why are u demeaning women's attire here.thats not even an issue.
2)even if he is using this corruption as a platform for his political gain i dont c any problem in that. ppl use matter like "rice for 1re a kg" i think his point is better.
3)the buzz word is not lokpal its corruption.
4) i totally agree about ur para. about PR and homosexuality.
let me give u an advice. stop demonizing everyone who wears a saffron, he never talks about religion always about country. that is stereotyping.i personally support him for his coz and not as a political leader.
sopport him for what he is fighting for and that black money. i dont care what his PR is he is fighting for a major problem in india and i support him
What we have here is a stand off between waiting patiently to draft meaningful legislation and the urge to do something immediately to remedy the situation of graft in the Indian subcontinent. If incorrectly drafted, it could come to bite us in the rear! So we need to stifle the media circus that is fueling this situation to dizzying heights and calmly consult lawmakers so that the goal is reached, but not at the expense of making mistakes that could cost us in the near future. And as far as the spiritual gurus and others are concerned, they are just playing the emotions of the people to further their private agenda and receive their 15 minutes of fame. If people blindly believe that the black money is just sitting in Lichtenstein banks waiting to be found and Wiki-leaked to the Net, they are wrong! People need to start a grassroots movement to discourage corruption, they need to introduce a transparent system where it is easy to report and (more importantly) to follow up on these claims of corruption, they need to break the cycle where black money is turned into legit money and back to black again. We need good solid legislation that will undo the damage of years past. Hurrying and playing into the hands of spiritual charlatans will only hamper and impede progress, not hasten it.
Cheers.
On a different note: Could this reality show played by Babaramdev be more than a mere cry for attention? Could it have been more like it was done to divert the attention of the people from Anna Hazare's strong movement and also to reduce the support from the public Anna might have otherwise had??
This is a disgusting attempt of trivializing a noble intent. I would rather give a thought to Cindrella's thought in last comment than falling for your Indian Media like stereotype political commentary that you insanely copied from some foolish television news/soap channel.
There are three important things that we need to understand and keep in mind before we say anything -
1. This is not fault of Baba Ramdev or any other person who tried to fast in support of the "cause". There were students sitting in there colleges with a banner.
We Indians have such a short term memory that we forget everythin over a period on 17 days. Anna Hazare's attempt to revive Indian society and fight against corruption fell prey to our that mentality that nothing gets stuck for longer than 17days.
Check this with an example- after Hazare started eating how many of "you"s posted anything against corruption let alone do anything about it. So blame yourself first before you go and blame someone who is actually doing something , no matter how foolish.
Baba Ramdev ,no matter what kind of attention seeker he is, brought the issue of black money in India in the eyes of the world that he himself became a straw in eyes of many. Thus the defamation and by your post you are doing nothing but.
In this country where people have simply run out of leaders to follow I am sure the Baba Ramdev is one of the options regardless of the fact that he is almost uneducated, has a bad PR and probably a bad political advisor. But he is somebody to look up to , you are knowledgeable you understand politics why not write him a letter suggesting something better than trying to insult all that he stood for and worse made a mockery of himself. Here comes the second point -
2. Start respecting the intent and get one for yourself and all your likes. You need an intent to do something about it, writing a political commentary which is diluted by all sorts of things that your mind is processing round the clock in nothing compared to what those thousands of people faced in those days of fasting no matter who their leader was. They were trying to do good, you can expect better from an uneducated society. Hazare had the vision, had already been part of bigger movements, the inexperience of Ramdev is excusable.
So stop writing silly things from the comfort of your American couch. Try to understand what a poor uneducated feels when he is told that politicians are stealing from country and there is a guy named Ramdev who is going to fight against it. A point here to mention would be these poor are not only people who followed him.
Coming to third point –
When you say no government and PM can be blamed you are mistaken my friend. European countries got their money back from SWISS and other such banks, how? Through exactly same type of movements and a forced thus motivated government. I heard Poland has a similar story when I was there. There is lakhs of crores of money, bring that, use that. Get people educated. Make a better system, many countries have done it, so can we. We just need intent, courage and a resolute government.
Only one line which made sense in your article was - When the messenger becomes bigger than the message itself the cause takes the backseat.
Lets pray that we get more people like Ramdev and of course Hazare who can at least stand up against the system. Lets extend our support to them who are fighting against corruption.
politically naive yes.PR fail yes but i dont think his movement is about him or should be(to sane indians) its about the point(black money). c today's news news even supreme court sais the the govt is not doing enough about and had asked several questions.
i think he should be appreciated for adding a larger number of ppl outside of anna's target followers into the movement.
about the lokpal bill i thow it inside-out but its not about the bill any more in a country like india its about the fact that we apathetic indians need to win this for more and more ppl to have fath in the fact that we can do better and change the system and stop saying "kuch nahi change hoga".
about ramdev as politician & as a man i think he is the man who never talks about religion in any of his yoga sessions the topic he talks about is either yoga or india. but that dosent qualify him to be able to rule a nation. i like him as a person(if he is not evading taxes which we dont know about) but not as a politician.
@ cindrella
i think thats not possible things like that sound in the consperacy theories but in real life i dont think thats true coz
1)govt and ramdev cannot be on the same side as ramdev wears saffron which congress will never want to associate themselves with.
2)all of this has brought shamr to the govt rather than anything else.
Well written!! Wit and sarcasm appreciated!!
very clear!! message conveyed...
Nice post machan.. Baba Ramdev getting involved was indeed a half baked plan. And totally agree about the fact that Lokpal alone isn't going to be a silver bullet that can solve all of corruption.. In fact it reminds me of a quote I liked.. "By making people feel good without actually doing anything meaningful, it might actually discourage understanding, undermining the search for better detection, safer treatments, causes and cures for a disease"
- This was actually about a cancer awareness campaign, but I think it is equally appropriate to this situation. Many have an outlook that if they just push hard and get Lokpal through now, they can rest easy having solved corruption. Lokpal might help.. yes, but there s a lot more that needs to be done too!
Dude definitely this blog is making you the best suitable candidate for NDTV or IBN7 job where they just need a one quality except basic journalism qualities and that is saffron basher. Instead appreciating the efforts of Yoga Guru Baba Ramdev who stood against the mighty corrupted congress ,You are just blackening his name. His demands are very simple like nationalize all the black money and corrupt official should be punished severely. Congress Government demolished his arrangements brutally and undemocratically because they knew this guy could made a difference because masses were with Ramdev unlike Anna who sat with sophisticated and classy persons that obviously attracted media.
Dude just think of it.,,Congress unleashed his police on Baba Ramdev followers mostly all Hindus and just gathered against corruption or u say political convention and doing peacefully whatever they doing. If it Had been some other community gathering had congress had the courage even speak against their deeds.So stop saffron bashing and start thinking ..
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