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Posted on 01 October 2012
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Back to politics, old style
No matter what symbols of national sacrifice or patriotism Anna or Arvind choose, they sound increasingly like the parties they’ve been railing against
Revati Laul
New Delhi
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Arvind Kejriwal (left) and Anna Hazare at Jantar Mantar in August this year
Photo: Shailendra Pandey |
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It was an irony that Anna’s team missed entirely as they fended off a curious media in Delhi Monday, 1 October. The camera crews and posse of journalists were waiting hawk-like as Anna Hazare sat in a huddle inside ND Tiwari Bhawan to discuss the next stage of the anti-corruption movement. ND Tiwari – a name that has come to symbolise all the old world corruption, sleaze and dishonesty in politics, as he was dismissed as the governor of Andhra Pradesh after a sleazy sting operation showed him soliciting women in the governor’s house in 2009.
The Anna movement in September 2012 then is a far cry from August this year and light-years away from the throng of the last; this time, there was barely a trickle. From hogging the headlines and the space for self-righteousness, the Anna movement is now a shadow. The man behind it searching for a new space as the old movement was split wide open two weeks ago. Now on the eve of Mahatma Gandhi’s birth anniversary, as Arvind Kejriwal and his team are set to launch their political party, Anna’s team says they want to hold on to the political high ground — the space of resistance movements. And not sully their hands in “dirty party politics". But the words find few takers outside his home town of Ralegan Siddhi in Maharashtra.
In Delhi a dubious gaggle, some curious, rally around his new core group. Kiran Bedi – seen last in Arvind’s team has switched camps post the August split. So has sportswoman and former core team member Sunita Godara. Amongst the media handlers are Shivendra Singh Chauhan – former keeper of the India Against Corruption Facebook page. And journalist turned anti-corruption activist turned Anna camp follower, Sharmistha. Some of Anna’s old team are also gone. Like his close aide Suresh Pathare. Officially, his new team is tight lipped about why Anna’s right hand man left (or was asked to leave). Unofficially, they concede Anna was unhappy with Pathare’s alleged leaking of his meeting with Baba Ramdev to the press in Delhi two weeks ago.
But the real question is this: why was Anna’s meeting with Ramdev meant to be secret? In a movement that is about transparency and accountability, what does Anna want to keep out? “We are not being funded by or supported by the RSS or Ramdev,” Kiran Bedi explained. And added, “Anna ji and Ramdev have been working together against corruption since the very beginning. They shared the stage in April last year and supported each other in August this year. So what’s new?” Glossing over the controversy a year and half ago when Ram Madhav of the RSS was escorted off stage in April 2011, causing Baba Ramdev to be thoroughly miffed with the anti-corruption team. And glossing over also how Arvind and his new team have repeatedly positioned themselves as anti-right wing, and therefore, against any association with the RSS.
Where Anna’s movement will go from here is not at all clear yet. What is amply clear is that the man from Ralegan Siddhi may just be back to where he began. Political agitation in his home state — Maharashtra. But in positioning himself stridently against Arvind, Anna has not left without raising even more questions than ever, about Arvind, and his reputed top-down style of functioning. Of leaving the middle class masses wondering if the man in the Gandhi topi was being pushed by Arvind in a direction; much against his will.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the fence, Arvind’s team has attempted to recover from Anna’s very public outburst against them by telling the press, including an exclusive interview to Tehelka’s Atul Chaurasia that the idea to go into mainstream politics was, in fact, Anna’s. On Gandhi’s birthday, they gear up to launch their political party, based largely on Arvind’s take on Swaraj. By which he is using the metaphors of the Indian freedom struggle and appropriating them to his own brand of patriotism. Strengthening Panchayati Raj institutions, socialism aka the JP movement are the expected order of things. But the big question Arvind has to tackle before all of that is: who will he finally take along with him? So far, a robust team of advisors have included eminent political scientist from the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies – Yogendra Yadav and journalist Madhu Trehan. Stalwarts from the grassroot movements such as Medha Patkar, who were once on his side, have now preferred to keep their distance. But the questions Anna has raised against Arvind rise like a phoenix from the ground – how will Arvind set up a 'clean set of political candidates' or even 'clean sources of funding?' And in joining the mainstream, what will separate him from the rest?
These are, however, questions that equally plague Anna, even as he chooses to stay out of Arvind’s political formation and protest loudly against his face and name being used for the party. For observers from a distance and the temporarily mesmerised middle classes, the sheen of Gandhi-giri has worn thin on either side of the wedge. And whatever symbols they choose – Gandhi, Bhagat Singh, or the JP movement – to the increasingly skeptical masses, they have begun to sound almost exactly like the parties they’ve been riled up about. To them, it all reads clearly like politics old style.
Revati Laul is a Special Correspondent with Tehelka.
revati@tehelka.com
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