Anna Hazare | Voice from the rooftop

Anna and Arvind part ways

Posted on September 22, 2012 by Vincent Augustine D'Souza

Anna Hazare and Arvind Kejriwal have parted ways. The issue was political formation. Many in IAC wanted to form a political party to fight corruption. Anna Hazare, Kiran Bedi and some others were opposed to it. The meeting on 19/9/2012 lasted nine hours. Yogendra Yadav was the moderator. Anna Hazare said those who want to form a political party can go ahead with it but should not use his name or photograph. Arvind Kejriwal said Anna Hazareâ€™s decision was shocking, unbelievable and sad.

Baba Ramdev and some other people wanted a split between Anna Hazare and Arvind Kejriwal. Arvind Kejriwal was opposed to all political parties. Kiran Bedi was in favour of BJP. Arvind Kejriwal did not want to join with Baba Ramdev as there were tax evasion cases against him. RSS people wanted to use IAC against Congress. Industrialist Sitaram Jindal had a role in arranging meetings of Anna Hazare with people opposed to Arvind Kejriwal.

Corruption in India and China

Posted on August 9, 2012 by Vincent Augustine D'Souza

In India project costs go up and the final figure is many times of that of original figure. The original figure for Commonwealth Games 2010 was around 160 crore rupees. It went up and up and final figure was around 1,02,000 crore rupees. Shunglu committee reports were suppressed. Nobody was punished for swindling. In Olympics 2008 China won 51 gold and many silver and bronze medals, India won one gold and two bronze. The gold medal was largely due to private effort. The medals India wins in any Olympics can be counted on fingers of one hand.

News and Statistics

Posted on April 10, 2012 by Vincent Augustine D'Souza

There are people who criticize media for its coverage of events. They say media ignores real issues like poverty, price rise, illiteracy and unemployment and gives importance to trivia. Farmer suicides are ignored. Death of Dev Anand and retirement of Rahul Dravid get prominence.

Those critics do not know what news is. One person dying is news. Thousand persons dying is statistics. When farmers die every day it is not news. Terrorist strikes in Kashmir are not news. When Anna Hazare fasts it is news. Irom Sharmila fasting is not news.

FIRs against 14 ministers

Posted on March 29, 2012 by Vincent Augustine D'Souza

IAC wants FIRs against 14 ministers. The ministers are P. Chidambaram, Ajit Singh, Farooq Abdullah, G. K. Vasan, Kamal Nath, Kapil Sibal, Sharad Pawar, Sriprakash Jaiswal, Sushilkumar Shinde, Vilasrao Deshmukh, M. K. Alagiri, Virbhadra Singh, S. M. Krishna and Praful Patel.

Kapil Sibal reduced fine on Reliance from 650 crore rupees to 5 crore rupees resulting in a loss of 645 crore rupees to the country. He should reverse his decision or pay 645 crore rupees.

Fight against corruption must continue

Posted on March 22, 2012 by Vincent Augustine D'Souza

India Against Corruption seems to have lost direction and momentum in fight against corruption. IAC wanted a Lokpal Bill. That did not happen. They wanted right to reject and right to recall. Both are unlikely to happen soon. Anna Hazare seems unable or unwilling to lead the agitation. Other members should resume the fight against corruption.

IAC members need not go on indefinite fast. They can go on chain hunger strike. Arvind Kejriwal, Kiran Bedi and Prashant Bhushan can fast for some hours every day. Then Shazia Ilmi, Gaurav Bakshi and Manish Sisodia can take their turn. Then some other people fast. Every day the cycle is repeated. The fight for Lokpal should be separate from fight for Lokayuktas.

Lokpal deadline

Posted on December 17, 2011 by Vincent Augustine D'Souza

Where there is will there is a way. If Congress wants to pass a strong Lokpal Bill it can do. If it does not want to pass a strong Lokpal Bill it finds ways avoid it. In that case the passing of Lokpal Bill depends on how strong is the will of people who want a strong Lokpal Bill. If their will is stronger than that of Congress they will succeed. Anna Hazare Group wants Lokpal Bill passed in the winter session of Parliament which gets over on 22/12/2011. Otherwise he will start his indefinite fast on 27/12/2011 and has asked people to fill jails and sit in front of houses of MPs from 1 January 2012 onwards. This time the fast is to be from Azad Maidan where his previous fasts were successful.

Gang of Four

Posted on November 1, 2011 by Vincent Augustine D'Souza

Gang of Four originally meant Jiang Qing, Wang Hongwen, Zhang Chunqiao and Yao Wenyuan who were powerful during the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) in China. Anna Hazare spoke of Gang of Four in UPA government without mentioning names. One of them is P. Chidambaram. Second is likely to be Kapil Sibal. Who are the other two? Some talk of Digvijay Singh and Manish Tewari but they are not ministers.

Parliamentary privileges

Posted on August 30, 2011 by Vincent Augustine D'Souza

MPs are free to move privilege motion against anyone including PM. Sometime back BJP had moved a privilege motion against PM. Article 105 of the Constitution does not define the privileges of MPs. It does not say Parliament can send someone to jail. Some MPs want to punish Om Puri and Kiran Bedi for what they said against MPs. MPs say the dignity of Parliament has been violated. Om Puri has issued a qualified apology on TV channels. He said he was offended when Manish Tewari accused Anna Hazare of corruption. Kiran Bedi has stood by her words. She said it was a game changer.

Where is the dignity of Parliament when MPs repeatedly disrupt Parliament? Days pass without doing any work. Sometimes whole sessions are disrupted. Many MPs donâ€™t attend Parliament for most of the days. Foul means are adopted to get majority in Parliament. When there is need of SP, BSP and RJD votes CBI finds no evidence in cases against Mayawati, Mulayam Singh Yadav and Laloo Prasad Yadav. MPs are not to hold offices of profit however they declare them as not offices of profit and hold them.

Lokpal Bills

Posted on August 26, 2011 by Vincent Augustine D'Souza

Anna Hazare had told that if his Lokpal Bill, known as Jan Lokpal Bill, is not passed by 15/8/2011 he would begin his fast on 16/8/2011. The government had introduced its Bill in Lok Sabha which was different from the one drafted by Anna Hazare group. That bill was sent to a standing committee. Prashant Bhushan called the government Bill Promotion of Corruption Bill.

The government did not want a strong Lokpal Bill. Monsoon session usually begins in the middle of July. The government postponed it to the beginning of August. The government hid behind Delhi police to put restrictions on the fast and when arrests backfired it released the members. Anna Hazare was not in a hurry to leave Tihar jail and left it when Ramlila Ground, famous or notorious for crackdown on Baba Ramdev and his followers, was ready for his fast.

Anna, Baba and Congress

Posted on June 9, 2011 by Vincent Augustine D'Souza

Veerappa Moily must be a happy man. When four ministers went to meet Baba Ramdev at airport he was not one of them. It was interpreted as he was losing favour. By 5/6/2011 the tide had turned, the pendulum had swung, Kapil Sibal was under attack.

Anna Hazare led a fast for Lokpal Bill and was successful. Baba Ramdev was unhappy about the composition of the drafting committee for Lokpal Bill which had Shanti Bhushan, Prashant Bhushan and Arvind Kejriwal among others. He said, father is chairman, son is member and the secret of Arvind Kejriwalâ€™s seat. Shanti Bhushan replied drafting committee needs legal experts not yoga guru. Anna Hazare spoke to Baba Ramdev and Baba Ramdev muted his criticism.