(CHAKRA) The current upheaval in India over the brutal gangrape in Delhi on the night of December 16 Sunday has evoked a spontaneous uprising all over the country that has not been witnessed so far in the history after independence in last sixty five years. Even the top leaders like ministers in UPA II have remarked at such outrage, “He admitted that the developments of the last one week showed a “new phenomenon” of “flash mobs” resorting to protests and that the government was not fully prepared to deal with such situations.”  The Hindu reported Mr P. Chidambaram uttering in a press conference in New Delhi on Wednesday, 26 December 2012.  I only presume that the Indian polity post independence had carried forward the colonial baggage of taking people for granted and astride, which is being rightly questioned and called into action in the garb of these street protests.

Earlier in April 2011, Anna Hazare with a team of activists e.g. Arvind Kejriwal, Kiran Bedi, Manish Sisodia etc and now joined by retired military chief General V K Singh had started a public movement or call it a crusade, in the name of ‘Corruption’ that caught these leaders in their high rising luxurious posh offices and inaccessible priceless palatial bungalows, never did they dream of. These movements were initiated by these few anonymous figures in Delhi once again after the era of Late Jayprakash Narayan in Bihar in mid 1970s during the regime of Indira Gandhi.

Anna movement as it is called widely, was frittered ultimately by deceive and divide technique but it did serve a definite purpose, the purpose of a reawakening call in the vast number of oppressed people in the country without any hope, hope for living, hope for any apostolic deliverance coming like bursting of clouds. Although the so called governing class in India had taken the people for granted, Anna reaction may have been contributory to this spontaneous outrage by the young, the elderly, the male, the female alike without any provocation or instigation. Perhaps the police force also got caught in the same euphoria reminiscent of imperial mentality. No wonder that the entire higher echelons are caught in their frenzy of ‘damn care’ attitude and the Delhi police commissioner Neeraj Kumar did his best to interfere in the genuine investigation and even did not hesitate to humiliate the magistrate who was called in to record the testimony of the victim before being flown out. It is out of conception that such unholy events took place right under the nose of the double capital of governments harnessed in the same place – Delhi, the strongest powerhouse of the nation. There was an unfortunate fatal incident of death of a cop on duty in the middle of this fracas by the peaceful protesters, the police department tried their best to implicate this death to the protesters needlessly; only to further expose their insensitivities and callous manhandling of these young boys and girls physically, by lathicharge, water cannons, teargas shells and thrashings that was inconceivable. All this shabby administration by undue excessive force reflected in the intemperate and ‘who cares’ outdated imperial mentality.  It was highly despicable. The entire media were agog with the manner in which the peaceful protests have been mishandled.

The victim of the inhuman brutal gangrape in Delhi was admitted in government run Safdarjung Hospital on the night of 16 December 2012 in a serious condition. She received emergency medical care in ICU and had three surgeries carried and also sustained cardiac arrest once or twice. Her physical status kept waxing and waning in a serious state. Finally she was transferred on 27 December Thursday in the middle of the cold wintry foggy night in an Air Ambulance to Singapore to bear with the stress of that arduous journey, many including some senior experienced Delhi surgeons like Dr Samiran Nundy contended that her transfer to Singapore was triggered by reasons other than medical.

Did the UPA government, smeared into a multitudes of controversies and governance deficit issues one after the other, got panicked by the unprecedented show of live demonstrations on the street, as were also seen after the treacherous barbaric 26 November attach on Mumbai Taj orchestrated by the rogue Pakistani ISI agents via their infamous nonstate actors as they call them to hide their shabby guilt.

This young 23 year old brilliant dynamic girl belonged to a poor village family who can barely meet their daily ends. The family told, “Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar who visited When their daughter was fighting for her life in a Delhi hospital that they hardly have enough to eat at home. Their meals, they reportedly told her, are often “roti and namak” (bread sprinkled with salt for flavour).”  Yet her cacass of vibrant spirit prompted the 80 year young PM M. M. Singh and his sixtysix year young supposedly cervical cancer afflicted boss Ms Sonia Gandhi aka Antonia Edvige Albina Maino to go to IGI Airport, Delhi in the late night at about 3am to receive her when she was brought back by special Air India flight. One wonders curiously, “How come this anonymous village bud became so VIP in her valiantly fought undignified death”?

Then again, “She was cremated in Delhi against the surrounding mystery in Dwaraka after the plane was received at 4.15 am in the midst of the thick foggy sombre night hours with bare minimum visibility, the plane was taken to its technical area and her funeral planned under the highest secret mysterious circumstances with heavy police and security guard, remain a burning question mark the government has to clarify to the people and the nation”. Initially the ceremony was officially planned at 6 am but delayed for Hindu rites to be carried out after the Sunrise, ultimately at 07.30 am.

Minister of State for Home Affairs R P N Singh, West Delhi MP Mahabal Mishra, Delhi BJP chief Vijender Gupta were present at the cremation. Why was it hushed within a few limited hours under tight security and secrecy remain best known to the Delhi and UPA Governments without a plausible cause? Ajmal Kasab was one with in similar circumstances! It is highly impropriety and further humiliating her sacred and valiant undeserved end.

This entire filthy episode has evoked a worldwide condemnation and condolences with the head of the nation plunging in shame. There were heavily emotionally charged rhetorics with all claiming, “We also have daughters, sisters, wives etc only under duress of the volcanic public anger piercing the hearts of the ruling classes with a trembling fear of unprecedented mass unrest they had witnessed in last few years. Time will tell, if it is sense of democracy forced down the gullet of callous insensitive elected representatives of the people, by the people and also for the people as envisioned by eponymous US late President Abraham Lincoln. Better late than never.

 (Dr. O. P. Sudrania is a senior retired teacher in surgery and a medico-legal counsellor; now also engaged in research of spiritual and socio-political analytical science as a part of service to humanity. He retired as Emeritus Professor in Surgery from Edinburgh Royal Infirmary. )

2012 Time 100 - Narendra Modi

Voting is on for the 2012 Time magazine Top 100 list. Time’s 100 list consists of leaders, artists, innovators, icons and heroes you think are the most influential people in the world. Several Indians are among the contenders in this list.

They include IAC leader Anna Hazare, touted as the Future PM of India by a section of Indian public and acclaimed worldwide for his exemplary development, Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, Bihar Chief Minister and another icon of development, Nitish Kumar, Bollywood actress Vidya Balan, Salman Khan founder and executive director, Khan Academy and the ‘God’ of World Cricket for his fans and others, Sachin Tendulkar.

Voting is on till April 6th. You can vote both in favour of and against a person with “Definitely” or “No way”.

To vote for/against Narendra Modi

To vote for/against Anna Hazare

To vote for/against Nitish Kumar

(CHAKRA) As many nations  in the Middle East were busy with the ‘Arab spring’, India also found itself occupied with nationwide anti-corruption protests. New faces and heroes emerged into the spotlight with names like Anna Hazare and Baba Ramdev making daily headlines. We also confronted emerging government scandals and accusations such as the ’2G Scam’, helping to snowball the anti-corruption movement against the Indian government.

Fast-forward to the end of the year, December 2011, a new spontaneous movement has surfaced. Only this time it is a viral movement of slapstick comedy and stereotypical integration of western and traditional Indian music called ‘Why this Kolaveri Di?’. In less than 3 weeks this song has taken over India. Songwriter and singer Dhanush made this song for an upcoming Tamil movie ’3′. This song can be seen as healthy and as comical relief for Indian society, which was flooded by corruption-related news all year. However,  a statistic pulled from Google’s search engine tells a sad and uninspiring story.

In short, when looking back at all search results typed on Google India; searches related to ‘Why this Kolaveri Di’ in the month of December were more than the entire year’s worth of searches related to all Baba Ramdev, 2G Scam and other anti-corruption protests.  Also,  in the start of December, Kolaveri Di’s highest point in searches was twice as much compared to the highest point of searches for all  of Team Anna’s protests and news (see below).

Thumbs up to the Indian youth. India’s connected generation definitely have their priorities straight and should expect their own spring and defeat of government corruption,  just like Egypt, Tunisia and Libya.

Graph - Kolaveri vs the Year of Anti-Corruption

Anna Hazare - I support Anti-Corruption

Shimla, India – While acquiring a mass following to stand up against the Indian governments corruption, Anna Hazare has aided in boosting the sales of Swami Vivekananda’s books. The Hindu monk has preached and spread the message of Indian spirituality throughout the world but books are flying off shelves faster than ever after Anna has referred to the swami’s teachings as the core reason for all his inspiration.

Parul Sood, a management student at Himachal Pradesh University, said she purchased Vivekananda’s book, “Vivekananda: A Biography by Swami Nikhilananda,” to understand the ultimate motives of human life. Sood was inspired to purchase the book after seeing how much Anna changed after reading Vivekananda’s book. Sood is in awe of Anna’s transition from an ordinary soldier to a crusader against corruption. Sood is determined find out answers to what the aims of human beings are and that is partly why she bought the book.

At the age of 25, in 1963, Anna Hazare joined the army as a driver and his real name is Kisan Baburao Hazare. He experienced a life-changing experience in 1965 during the India-Pakistan war, when his vehicle came under heavy aerial fire, causing everyone in his vehicle to die except him. This experience left him with many questions about spirituality life and death whereon he considered suicide.

This consideration of suicide is what brought him to a slim book by Vivekananda in a New Delhi railway station. It is after reading this book that Anna learned that serving the poor is equivalent to serving God and he repeatedly credits the book for giving him this mindset and ultimate realization.

Ashok Kumar Kinger the owner of Asia Book Depot, one of the oldest bookstores in Anna’s town, said that he has never seen a book sell at such a fast pace. He said biographies of Swami Vivekananda have been in demand since the movement with Anna started. On average one to two Swami Vivekananda books were sold per month compared to 20 in a week after the movement. He has been ordering additional stock every month. Kinger said not only are the town people buying Vivekananda books but tourists are seeking his books in high numbers.

Steve Daves, an American tourist near the shop said he read many of Gandhi books in the past and they were eye openers and now he is searching for Vivekananda books but they are sold out everywhere. He hopes to find one in Delhi.

Majority of the buyers of Vivekananda books are University students, says Ramesh Thakur of the Thakur Book Store located near the campus of Himachal Pradesh University.

Many students are being motivated by Hazare and thus inspired to learn the teachings of Vivekananda to learn his influential messages of spiritual democracy, spiritual humanism, and world unity.

Anna Hazare with Swami Ramdev at a Rally

Delhi, India (CHAKRA) – As the protests continue, the anti-Anna brigade and the staunch Congress Supporters are creating more and more rumours about the Janlokpal Bill and Anna Hazare. They usually repeat the same old arguments that Congress leaders put on the media. Following are the few criticisms and rumours that one may find from these few people :

1. It is Anna’s fight.

No. It is ‘Team Anna’ consisting of Kiran Bedi, Bhushans, Arwind Kejriwal, Sri Sri and many  more, supported by millions across the world.

2. Anna is inflexible

Its not about Anna. He pioneers the movement with his team and the issue is thoroughly discussed by the team and suggestions are made on social networking sites like Facebook. Moreover, there are pages and websites like India Against Corruption where people can bring in their suggestions too.

3. Civil society is adamant

The Civil society knows how the so called ‘democracy’ has been working for the past 60 years where kasab gets lavish food and Anna’s supporters don’t get even basic amenities like washrooms or food in Jail, where Congress took months to arrest corrupt leaders like Kalmadi and minutes to arrest freedom fighters like Anna and forget about anti-nationalists and separatists like Syed Shah who are still roaming free and giving anti-India speeches all the time.

If corruption is controlled, then the police would be able to do its duty properly and the government would be denied its corrupt vote bank policies which lead to a direct hike in terrorist activities. Many high level politicians, as exposed by media, have direct links with the terrorists and the underworld and hence no quick or concrete actions happens against the terrorists. Following are some of the features of JanLokpal Bill :

-        Power to probe into allegations of corruption by Members in Parliament like MPs taking bribe to vote.

-        Today, CBI comes directly under the Prime Minister. So, unlike Lokpal, CBI is not an independent organization in this scenario. Therefore with the Janlokpal it will have the authority to investigate allegations of corruption against the Prime Minister and the Anti Corruption Branch of CBI will be merged with Lokpal to give it more independence.

-        Lokpal will give permission to tap phones of people suspected to be involved in corruption

-        If Lokpal finds that business entities are involved in corruption, then Lokpal will have the right to ban such companies from taking part in future government contracts and to black list them

4. Anna is forcing the implementation of Janlokpal Bill by all means

No. Its the “introduction” of a strong lokpal bill like Janlokpal bill in Parliament from where the talks would be taken further. This is the key elements that critics of Team Anna and Janlokpal usually ignore in their criticism. The whole fight is for the introduction of a strong lokpal bill in Parliament and implemention of a strong lokpal bill for which Janlokpal Bill has been created as an example by the reputed people in India, because of which people are constantly exposing the difference between the government’s lokpal bill and the Janlokpal bill.

5. Anna is corrupt

Anna is 74 year old freedom fighter who had a bullet on his head, who is disconnected from his family for the past many years, who made his village self-sufficient, who lives without any major bank balance in a small room in a temple and today is fighting for the nation to get back those lakhs of crores looted by politicians in scams. What political motive can Anna have?

In a hypothetical case, even if Anna is corrupt,

a) then what about Kiran Bedi, Arwind Kejriwal, Bhushans, Justice Hegde, Award winners, IPS officers and millions who support team Anna?

b) Then, via the implementation of a strong Lokpal Bill like JanLokpal Bill, Anna too can be tried!

c) What about Rahul Gandhi, hailed by the same critics, who violated Section 144 of CrPC in Uttar Pradesh when he visited the villages of Bhatta-Parsaul earlier this year. The move was not just supported by the Congress but was positioned as the party lending its voice to the ‘aam aadmi’.

d) Going by the track record of Congress who tries to shut anyone who speak against it, he would have been jailed by now if he really was corrupt.

6. People are blindly following Anna

‘People’ include IITians, students from DU, educated middle class, employees, national award winners, IPS officers etc and millions across the world i.e globally and not just limited locally to India and hence the argument that “people are following it blindly”, becomes void!

Ironically, the people who criticize Anna are not able to hold the debate further and they themselves do not know the difference between Government’s lokpal bill and Janlokpal bill. They can be found plagiarizing secondary criticisms instead of reading themselves, the text of Janlokpal Bill, and expressing their own doubts. It is rather surprising that a 74 year old patriotic freedom fighter is fighting for the nation and people are busy analyzing his personal character unable to look at the bigger picture.

By Sagarika Kapoor

References :

Government Lokpal Bill, Jan Lokpal Bill and their differences : http://www.indiaagainstcorruption.org/downloads.html

http://www.hitxp.com/articles/politics/differences-comparison-anna-jan-lokpal-government-bill/

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/A-different-law-applies-to-Rahul-Gandhi/articleshow/9629637.cms