After about 240 hours of the fast of Gandhian Anna Hazare, there appears a clear sense that there is leadership vacuum in the country. The state of the affairs is such that the Parliament and government are not only paralysed but even discredited.
Anna Hazare is fighting a just cause. People in a spontaneous way have got behind Anna. Still, the government is searching for an escape route, as has been the tradition of the ruling party.
For over five years there had been quite an astonishment among some, that why the people are so tolerant. The price rise has not only broken the backbone of the middle class but has confronted them with a number of existential questions. A spate of corruption came in a way as some floodgate has been opened. Still, the government had only one or the other explanation to give to find an escape route.
It appears that the Opposition parties failed to provide leadership to the simmering anger of millions of people. The leadership vacuum appears being filled in by Anna, who swears by the name of Mahatma Gandhi, whose ideals had caught the imagination of the youth of the country in an unexpected manner by Sanjay Dutt starrer Munnabhai MBBS movie.
Anna is in the midst of a serious business. It appears that the Jan Lokpal Bill is just igniting a people's movement to cleanse the very political set up in the country, which is not only muddied but has failed the aspirations of well informed people.
There is a similarity in the state of Yamuna in Delhi, which is a dead river here, and the political class, which claims to represent the people. Every year water flows into Yamuna during Monsoon, as is the case with MPs and MLAs at the times of elections, but the massive garbage stays at the bottom of the dead river as does the rot in the political system.
A report of the Lt. Governor of Delhi Tejendra Khanna to the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh about two years back had recommended physical cleaning of Yamuna along with creating a reservoir to ensure continuous flow of water into it.
The political system too requires a physical cleaning and regular flow of people of character and integrity to ensure that the rotting democracy comes back to life again.
The sad commentary on political class is the arrogance that the MPs have irrespective of the fact that they are the product of a flawed system. They have not bothered to introspect that none of them could inspire the youth of the country nor they have any answer to the burning issues of the mass.
Anna appears to have his fingers on the pulse of the people. He has correctly diagnosed the malaise. His solutions are not only logical but much needed. A Lokpal, which can deter the acts of corruption, has to be there. Madhu Kodas, A Rajas, Suresh Kalmadis are not individuals but representatives of the rotten system.
Anna has rightly said that this is just a beginning. Much needs to be done. Electoral reform must come on the table next to ensure that politics does not remain the last refuse of the scoundrels.
The good thing about Anna's campaign is that it is blessed with right people who appear committed to their cause. An IRS officer friend of this author said Arvind Kejriwal used to tell them to forget relations when they joined government service so that they could remain clean. "If you are trapped in relations, you will fall in a pitless well of corruption," Kejriwal used to tell his fellow colleagues when he was in IRS.
One could just wish that the Anna bandwagon continue to roll till there is a complete physical cleansing of the system. May God give him long life.
