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Anna Hazare and his band of merry
men are back. After a spell of rest and recuperation in his native
redoubt of Ralegan Siddhi, the crusader is back on the road to
fight the corrupt.
But it is possible that he will find the latest round harder than
the earlier ones. For one, the government may have learnt from its
blunders. It is unlikely to repeat the mistake of blowing hot and
cold, jailing him and then praising him as a man to be emulated.
For another, Anna's own team may lack cohesion. One of them -
Swami Agnivesh - has already dropped out after having been accused
by members of Anna's team of being the government's "mole".
Another member, Justice Santosh Hegde, is nowadays somewhat
lukewarm in his attitude.
As for the others, Anna's comment to the New York Times that some
of them have developed "ego problems" will be jarring despite his
subsequent clarification that he had been misquoted.
Arguably, Anna still enjoys widespread middle class support - the
twitterati and the Facebook crowd - but it remains to be seen
whether the level of their enthusiasm continues to be as high as
before. It is possible that at least a section of them has
realised the futility of their earlier belief that all that Anna
had to do was to lay down his terms - bring the prime minister and
the higher judiciary under the Lokpal's ambit - and the government
will meekly follow.
Similarly, it is more than likely that his present deadline -
passing the Lokpal bill in the winter session of parliament - will
not be kept by the government, perhaps deliberately. In any event,
it won't be Anna's version which will be considered by parliament,
but whatever draft the standing committee will lay before the
house.
But, apart from such nitty-gritty, what will be crucial for the
movement is to sustain the earlier momentum. Much of the
enthusiasm during the first phase was a result of Anna's resolve
to fast unto death and the government's bungling. Although Anna
has decided to launch the latest round with a three-day fast, the
impact may not be as great as his earlier hunger strikes,
including the short ones, if only because the same tactics are
rarely as successful the second or third time around.
However, it is the overt political angle which may undermine the
campaign. As Anna has said, his exhortation will be to ask the
people not to vote for the Congress if the bill is not passed
during the winter session. But, it will not be the Congress alone
which will be responsible for the bill's passage. It will be the
entire House.
What is more, there are likely to be speakers other than those of
the Congress, who will probably be even more critical than the
Congress MPs who, in fact, are likely to be restrained in their
utterances. Among the vocal non-Congress MPs will be those of the
Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), the Samajwadi Party, the Janata Dal-United
and the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) who tend to see every issue
through a backward caste or Dalit lens.
The Dalit czarina, Mayawati, for instance, has asked Anna and his
team to fight elections to prove their mettle. Besides, she has
let it be known that her party will not support the bill unless
Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe members are included in the
drafting panel.
The two Yadav chieftains, Lalu Prasad of the RJD and Sharad Yadav
of the Janata Dal-United, have also been critical of Anna and his
colleagues for their denigration of parliament, with Lalu even
saying it was baffling how a septuagenarian could fast for 12 days
and yet be active. The third Yadav, Mulayam Singh of the Samajwadi
Party, wants a mixture of Anna's and the other versions of the
bill, such as that of Aruna Roy, the National Advisory Council
member.
While the Congress will be guarded in its criticism of Anna for
fear of offending the middle class, the RJD, the BSP and others
will have no such compunctions if only because they seemingly
regard Anna's movement as largely an urban middle class
phenomenon. Moreover, since their stakes will be higher in view of
next year's Uttar Pradesh elections, they are likely to be far
less restrained in their comments than otherwise.
The only unstinted support for Anna will be from the Bharatiya
Janata Party (BJP), which has expressed its "zero tolerance" for
corruption, which apparently made it belatedly remove the
Karnataka and Uttarakhand chief ministers. But the target of its
admiration will be cagey about the BJP's backing lest he is
projected as a closet saffronite - an impression which has been
backed by the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh's (RSS) confirmation
that its followers backed his movement and actively participated
in it.
Amulya Ganguli is a political analyst. He can be
reached at amulyaganguli@gmail.com
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