Friends, this is my third post dedicated to Anna Hazare (how I wish, it was Anna Kournikova :P ) . Every where you see, the man is present, giving his 2 cents of wisdom about anything and everything. The Sunday Times had him as a guest editor on 04/17/2011 and for once, he splurged all his wisdom in that one edition of newspaper. People call him a "naive villager" who is being "used" by the wily urban crusaders into fighting their battles. I call him plain stupid. I hear Anna Hazare was in the Indian Army, maybe he was better served remembering a thing or two about how the army operates - less talking; more walking.
When some wise man said "Silence is Golden", he was surely thinking about the likes of Anna Hazare and his cronies. Honorable intentions and plans will burn up in the political cross fire and before we know what happened, the entire "Jan-Lokpal andolan" will be derailed and the politicians will have the last laugh. Common man will again be short-changed; anti-corruption crusade will go into a limbo; people will say "man, I trusted this Anna dude, he too was one of them". Rest will be history. It has been like this and will continue to remain like this until people understand the importance of silence. Mr. Shashi Tharoor might coach Anna Hazare on the importance of silence, for it was the only difference between him getting out of the cabinet and Mr. Sharad Pawar still being inside, despite having serious corruption allegations against him. My only advice to Anna saheb and his chelas, if you want to do any good for the country, please shut up and do the work you are appointed for. I want to say there is still a chance for them to succeed, but I cant be hopeful. So many rookie mistakes in the last few days...
1. Holier than thou: If the aim is to fight corruption and bring in a strong legislation to that effect, then the people involved should focus on the task and work on it. Until the objective is achieved, they must shut out the rest of the world and have single point focus. The 5 musketeers, in this case have been babbling their mouths ever since the gazetted notification has been out nominating them to the draft committee of Lokpal bill. First, giving sermons on how government should work, then, singling out ministers and targeting them for alleged corruption charges, finally, giving out advice on whom should resign as ministers and who should remain. Snide remarks are not welcome, especially an elected government will not tolerate this for long. They might not trade charges publicly, but be rest assured that they will dig out some embarrassing information from the past that will ruin the credibility of the 5 musketeers as crusaders for corruption free India. It will happen for sure and its a question of "when will it happen", rather than "if". I wouldn't blame the government if it turns the heat on these people as no government will take a punch on the chin if someone is running them down day-in, day out. So, if I were Anna Hazare, I would stop my daily sermons on governance and giving smart-ass interviews. After all, the Lokpal bill is more important than gloating about personal achievements. "Benefit of many over benefit of few", Anna saheb.
2. Stick to the agenda: "If the aim is to get a hot girl to bed, then a man should succeed more often than not. The problem is the moment he sees her cute friend, he plans an impromptu three-way. Then on everything goes south". Like wise with our crusaders. If they stick to the demand of legislation and work only on that agenda, they will achieve their objective. In meantime, if they go picking more subjects for future crusades or try and overreach by trying to enforce too many conditionality on the government, they are bound to fail. Just because the government agreed to include non-MPs in the draft panel for an important legislation, it does not mean that the government has fallen to their knees and its okay to take a cheap shot. Every such attempt will fail and will end up showing the crusaders in bad light. In the end, government will say "Look, we tried to reach out to them, they were not serious about the legislation and only wanted to be at loggerheads with the elected government of the day".
3. Don't praise Narendra Modi: Personally, I have nothing against the Gujarat Chief minister. I don't grudge the fact that he has been an able administrator but there are other aspects of his personality and political career which are not so glowing and are awaiting reconciliation. Mr. Modi is the only leader who instantly divides the polity on communal lines. The mere mention of his name creates a political war of words. So it is wise to leave out such controversial people and not to mention them (in good or bad sense). The last thing we want is to get into a political war where the cross fire will drown the main agenda.
4. Illusions of grandeur: The fact that people came out to support Anna Hazare voluntarily does not mean that he will get the same response always. There were several "fast onto death" escapades taken up by Anna saheb and most of the people don't even remember what the causes were. The CWG scam, 2G spectrum scam etc brought the political misappropriation to the forefront and in this season of scams, people found a messiah in him and his cause of fighting corruption was supported it voluntarily. So in short, the timing was perfect. Now, Anna saheb is saying that his fasts can dislodge elected governments. He is also saying that he will continue to "blackmail" the government, if need be. This attitude will not help Anna saheb or his cause. Perfect timing is a rarity in politics and will not be always available. So its time he lets go of the illusions of grandeur. He is no Mahatma Gandhi that people will support all his causes. He should know his limitations and not overreach himself.
PS: I have no personal hatred or animosity towards Anna Hazare or any of his followers. Its just that every time someone with a capacity of change comes on the horizon, they brew a recipe of disaster by getting too involved into politicking and losing focus of the tasks at hand. It would be a shame if history repeats itself with Anna saheb.
So long....
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