কিছুদিন ধরেই একটা ব্যাপার মাথার ভিতর কেবলি ঘুরপাক খেয়ে যাচ্ছে। এই আন্না হাজারে সংক্রান্ত। জানি, যে বিষয়টা ইতিমধ্যেই বহুল চর্চিত সে নিয়ে আবার করে কথা বলা চর্বিত চর্বন। তবু আমার কিছু বলতেই হল। আর, আমার ধারনা, হুজুগে বাঙালি দেখে অভ্যস্ত আমি যখন টের পেলাম যে বেসিক্যালি গোটা দেশটাই কি ভীষণ রকম হুজুগে, এখানে যা কিছু উল্লেখ করছি, তা হয়ত দু’চারজনকে ভাবার রসদ জোগাতেও পারে।
আর হ্যাঁ। দুঃখিত, এই একটা লেখা ইংরেজিতে। আসলে ফেসবুকে যাঁরা আছেন, তার মধ্যে অনেকেই বাংলাটা পড়তে জানেন না। সেখানেও লেখাটা রয়েছে। তাই একবারে ইংরেজিতেই লিখলাম। আশা করি এটা মার্জনা করে দেওয়া হবে।
Yes, I will talk about Anna Hazare. I too will talk about Anna Hazare. I know that by the time this piece gets posted on Facebook, at least one million (if not more) posts and infinite comments on them are already there. Everyone everywhere seems to be talking of this man and his war against corruption. War against corruption! An end to corruption in India! Well, that sounds too good. After all, is there a single person among the mass that wants or has some philia towards corruption? I bet none. And, is there a single person among the mass that does not know how corrupted our entire system is? I bet none. As MK Gandhi had once said, “Corruption and hypocrisy ought not to be inevitable in any democracy as they undoubtedly are today” (Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, Vol. 3, p 301). Now, why bring Gandhi here? Is it because the Anna, that is so very ‘in’ with the so called GenY, appears to be a Gandhian in his modes of protest? Am not very sure about the reason.
Anyway, Anna Hazare is a ’65 war veteran and a revered personality. His social works are worth praise, no doubt. Even his call for an end to corruption Raj in India too is admirable. BUT, what actually does this man propose to do? How exactly does his ideal Jan Lokpal Bill read like? With all my humility, I would like to ask the hundreds and thousands who are following and lending their support to Hazare ji whether they are well aware of the exact literature in the Hazare proposed Lokpal Bill. Do you people know what exactly is written there? And, if yes, are you wholly aware of the implications of this Bill?
Ours, that is India, is a democracy. A parliamentary democracy. And we Indians, despite several games that are played in the name of democracy and politics in the nooks and corners of the country, know that ours is a more successful democracy than most other nations that too follow parliamentary democracy. One great thing about this parliamentary democratic set up is that our leaders, the ELECTED people who go the assemblies and the parliament, are accountable to the common mass of the country. True that at times they forget what they are for, where from they came… True that at times they get so stooped in immoral corrupted acts that they forget that they too got the power because we, the people of the country, granted it to them through our votes. Yes, that does happen. Yet, an element of accountability to at least their own constituencies does linger at the back of their mind. Else, they are rejected by the same people in the next election. What happened to the ‘unassailable’ ‘left’ in West Bengal in 2011 Assembly Elections?
BUT
Hazare ji’s proposed Jan Lokpal Bill wants all people in power, from the Prime Minister and the Chief Judiciary right up to the bureaucratic personnel, to be tried by a body consisting of some elite people. More so, that body would not go through some general election where the mass participates. It would be much like the existing election commission. But it would have the power to register and investigate complaints of corruption against politicians and bureaucrats without prior government approval. That would mean the elected members to the parliament and bureaucrats would be under the supervision of some extra-democratic body. Does it not mean, I ask with all my humility to the Anna supporters, a threat to democracy? Does it not go against the very spirit of the Constitution of India? And, don’t we know the dangerous implications of bestowing so much power in the hands of a body that is not elected through an election process where the common people of the country too can participate? Have we never felt its heat in form of one ISI in our neighbouring nation state and have we never realised how the elected government of that nation state too at times fall second fiddle to the whim and dicta of that extra-democratic body called ISI?
May be, my concerns appear illogical, incoherent and, at times, too far fetched to you. But then, we are not thinking exactly in the same line. Isn’t it?
……
And yes, by the way, have you heard about a person named Swami Nigamananda? It is the same person who died while on fast to save the Ganga. How many of us, the “proud” “Indians” “fighting” against “corruption”, and lending support to the Hazare led campaign, know about this already forgotten person who was fasting for almost four months to protest illegal mining and stone crushing along the Ganga near Haridwar breathed his last on June 14. for the last few weeks most of the bytes of all news channels have remained occupied with this war against corruption and that smiling face of Sri Anna Hazare ji. But… how much media attention could that man – Swami Nigamananda – draw? How many among us spared even a minute thinking about that man; his cause and his dedication?
