Importance Of Being Anna

So finally the day has arrived on which I think I will complete my first post on the blog. For last 5 years I started, promised to finish and stopped without finishing several times. Tried with many topics varying from technical to non-technical which can be subcategorized to philosophical, political, "cricket"ical and many more. However none of those topics were compelling enough for me to bring any of the write ups to be brought to completion. Bottomline, this is the first time I am writing so many words without any greed of academic marks to be obtained.

Having said all this let me tell something about myself before coming to the topic I want to discuss or share with you here. I might sound political at some points but this write up is neither against nor in favor of any person, political party or organisation. In last 12 years or to put in different words after I got the biggest right of a democracy as we call it I had never been part of any political campaign or rally. And the "biggest right" I just talked about in the previous sentence was meant to mention "Right to vote". I got an opportunity to exercise this right of mine four times in last 12 years which includes 2 assembly elections, 1 general election and 1 ward elections. Out of these 4 opportunities I voted for two different parties on different occasions and once to an independent cadidate too. Hope that should be sufficient enough evidence for me to claim to be a apolitical person. Afterall you can't blame me to be a political person for voting atleast, right?

So what happened suddenly today that I am compelled enough to write. I am writing because I am happy to be Anna today. Though I don't know whether me being Anna or even Anna being Anna will bring a strong Lokpal bill in near future (or even if far future for that matter) or curb all the corruption in the nation or anything sort of that. Inspite of being amid certain personal crisis which is not important to be discussed in this post I was happy enough to be at Freedom park in Bengalooru and spending some quality time there. I saw something in the eyes of people which is not seen to often. I realized that this movement is much more important than the issue of Lokpal bill or even corruption for that matter. This movement's importance is in challenging the apathy of the political class. I repeat "Apathy" of the political class. I am shockingly surprised on the claims of the ruling party regarding a simple question i.e. who is behind this movement. How funny this can be that the same movement has been termed by different highly skilled leaders of ruling party to be funded and organised by RSS, BJP and worst of all, USA where the leader of the ruling party is recuperating after a medical condition. I am surprised on this movement not being claimed to be funded and organised
by ISI and Pakistan. Had the party in opposition ruling the nation, they would have done so I reckon. The simplest of fact that they still can't see that the common poor people of the nation are behind this movement shows the intellectual bankrupty of the political parties at least from the ruling party front. How many times we have seen people buying snacks and medicines for other unknown compatriots in this nation? Only 3 things can bring this in us. During extreme patriotism generated in the course of wars or while bribing our respective gods in want of something and third to say the least is Cricket. As far as euphoria is concerned I saw similar one on the day we won the cricket world cup few months back but that too was short lived given the start of IPL and shift of loyalty to the clubs from the nation. None of the above was or is as path breaking as the success of this movement could be for our future. One key change and immediate impact we can see right away is that parliament is funcitoning almost daily this monsoon session after "I don't remember" how many sessions. 

 

To all the great white collar intellectuals and knowledgeable political leaders of the nation here are the answers of some of the questions you ask repeatedly. You say that don't bribe and don't accept bribe and there wont be any corruption in the nation. Well said but that is much easier said that done. And these kind of things work much faster and in entirety when a top down approach is taken rather thank taking a bottom up approach.You say mere Lokpal bill can't curb the entire corruption from the nation. I am wondering who claimed that it will. They say that such a strong Lokpal can become anarchic. So what??? even today the democratically elected government has become archaic at least for 5 years. They say it can't be done in a week or two. Wasn't 42 years long enough? How many minutes it take for them to pass a bill for their salary and perk increase? They say Anna is blackmailing government. Isn't this blackmail is much more religious than our own government blackmaiiling us for the glory of the nation in the name of CWG and filling their own pockets. They say that people who are supporting Anna's movement don't even know what a Lokpal bill is. I say this too is Government's and political class's failure that they could not educate people about this in 42 years to say the least. My question to them is do they ask how many of their own voters know that there are 543 MP seats in the nation and they need to win 272 to come to power. Does that matter to their voter or them? Will they say that if you don't know this fact don't vote because you are not educated enough to vote. The worst of all, they say if you are not happy and think government is not doing it's duty come and contest election from so and so constituency and know who is more popular and right in the nation. What ridiculous! Might is not always Right boss. Do I need to know where a silly point fielder stands in the ground to enjoy success of world cup win. Or do I need to face 10 balls of Anderson to say Indian team is doing bad in England. I am doing my duty may be not with perfection but will face the consequence of my wrong doings. Likewise you need to be ready to face the consequence. And believe me it could be much bigger in impact than you think.

Time and again they give an statement that they themselves are victims of this rampant coppruption many times. Thanks for you honesty dear political class and let me with the same honesty accept that I too am a beneficiary of this corrptions many a times. But the difference lies in the fact that who is more of a victim and who is more of a beneficiary.

You are a beneficiary more than a victim of a curruption and hence you are not Anna today.
I am more of a victim today than the beneficiary and hence I AM ANNA today. 

 

With much content I will finish my first blog post "though short one" today and hope that all the intellectuals won't question me saying that writing on internet won't curb corruption from nation. I know this fact but with due respect to all the readers did not all the "Veer Ras" poets like Dinkar had a role to play in India's independence??? The last statement or question is not to compare myself with Dinkar as this could be as laughable as comparing a zero to infinity. My point of view while mentioning Dinkar here was to emphasize the importance of being Anna wherever you are and in whatever capacity you can be.