Corruption Hope You Are Vanquished

With the government having passed a resolution accepting the three points raised by the Anna Hazare Team and thus having ended the public display of strength by Anna Hazare, the immediate stalemate has been averted and the Government can get back to business as usual. However, the Government can not rest easy on the issue of corruption and other pressing matters which Anna Hazare plans to take up in the days to come.

It will be befitting if the Government, in consonance with the opposition parties begins to act on its own accord and cleans up the system before another public showdown. The Government is well aware of the issues which require attention and does not necessarily need to be prodded by Anna Hazare, unless of course they can come to a consensus only when pushed to a corner and under a threat.

Now that the precedence has been set it will take little time to build up public pressure on the Government on burning issues which catches the imagination of the masses. The masses, which are often fickle in a crowd enjoy this new found sense of power to pressurise the Government and make it succumb to its diktats.

The legislation to set up a Lokpal as was forced on the Government by public pressure, may not quite have the magical effect on ground as is being envisioned, however it will instill caution on the various players involved in corruption. Greed and lust are a part of human nature and no legislation and change that. Less than a week had passed after Anna Hazare ended his public drive against corruption, when an Income Tax official was nabbed for accepting a Rs 5 lakh bribe in Mumbai. Perhaps he must have had a thought that he can get away as of now since Lokpal is yet to be appointed.

A few years back when Narsimha Rao was the Prime Minsiter and the Cash for votes scam broke out, I was getting air filled in my car Tyre at one of the road side puncture shops. The small boy at the shop while filling air in the front tyre informed me that the valve needed to be changed. I asked him to do the needful. he went into the shop and came with a valve and replace the one in my tyre. He then went to the other tyre and once again tole me that the valve needed to be changed. I told him to go ahead and started watching him. he removed the second valve and replaced it with the valve he had taken out of the first tyre. I immediately got out of the car and scolded him admonishing him for cheating. His mother who was sitting near by and watching came running and started arguing with me. When I told her that as a mother she should be teaching the right things to her son, she replied "Jab Pradhan Mantri karoron rupaye ke baimani kar sakta hai toh mera beta do char rupaye ke liye kyon nahin kar sakta?" (When the prime Minsiter can get away with crores of Rupees of dishonesty, why can't my son be dishonest for a few rupees?)

The other day there was a short circuit on the electric pole opposite my house and we were without electricity. It was 6 PM at that time. I went and lodged a complaint at the complaint cell. He said "Abhi thik karwana hai toh do sau rupaye lagenge." (If you want to get it repaired now it will cost Rs 200/-). I asked if I do not pay when will it be done, he said it would be done the next day. I asked him why it could not be repaired immediately, he said that the lineman had gone home. I asked him if there was no one on night duty and he replied that the night duty lineman is only for small repair jobs and does not climb the pole. I had two options. Either I pay Rs 200/- or spend a night without electricity during the peak summer month.

While I was sitting in the complaint cell, there was a call to the complaint cell from a cycle factory in the near vicinity and immediately three men were despatched to rectify the fault in the transformer supplying electricity to the factory. When i tried to find out why the complaint from the factory was attended to with such alacrity while my complaint was being ignored, I learnt that the factory pays equivalent to a months wages to the SDO and some other officials of the Electricity department to ensure that there is no power failure and any failure is attended to immediately.

There are umpteen examples of corruption all around us and a vide variety of ways in which it is carried out. It has earned the name of "Sahuliat shulk" (Comfort tax). There is some form of corruption in almost every transaction or dealing. If teh Lokpal was to be burdened by all these cases, there will be a never ending line of complaints. Most people will not take up the cases with the Lokpal as it would be easier to pay the money and get the job done than to waste time over complaining. Yes where the sum of money involved is large, the complaints will certainly be filed.

i don't think that corruption will be vanquished so easily at the lowest levels, but yes high profile cases will certainly get sorted out. The common man will still have to shell out those extra bucks to get small tasks done.

Anna ji We Want Much More Than Just Protests

One thing is absolutely clear from the methods being followed by Anna Hazare - He wants to build up a hysteria with the aim to topple the government. I hope Anna Hazare has the courage to take over the reins of the country too and live up to the expectations of the people who support him. People are saying Anna ji give us good governance. Give us a corruption free Government. Make India the power that the world will envy. Rid India of all the travails and tribulations that plague us. i hope you have a magic wand Anna. The way you have mobilised people to protest is amazing. In the same way you must mobilise people to work harder and longer hours to make India a prosperous nation. Tell the masses that the best form of protest is to work four hours extra per day as the Japanese do, so that the production goes up, work gets completed faster than the normal pace and we have surpluses instead of shortages. That will make India truly great under your leadership.

Anna ji I know that it is easier to mobilise people to protest but extremely difficult to mobilise people to work hard, but given your ability to motivate people, i am sure you will ensure that once you topple the Government and rid India of the Congress, the BJP and all politicians of the old ilk, you will provide sound leadership to take India on the path of progress. If you feel you are too old to lead, you can install your young protégées like Kiran Bedi and Kejriwal. If they are as capable as you, then India can embark on the pat h of progress. There will be no need for reservations. There will be no caste based allocation of resources. Hard work will be rewarded and lethargy and laziness will be penalized.

However, if you chose not to take on the mantles of leadership to led the country and only insist on leading for protests, then I will consider you to be a loser. A LokPal bill is not all that the nation needs. You are only going after creation a deterrent or a stick, to whip the erring masses into submission. You want to create a mechanism whereby anyone who digresses from the right path will be brought to justice at the fastest without the cases lingering in courts for years. That is fine. It is required. But that is not the solution for what ails the country. We have much larger issues which need to be sorted out.

We need food to eat, for that farmers have to work harder. We need machines, for those workers have to work harder in factories. We need good quality ingeniously manufactured armaments for our defence forces, and not imported stuff which comes at 10 times the cost. We need good dams to harness water to produce more electricity. We need housing for the millions, we need good quality roads for transportation. We need people who are honest and will not take a bribe and will not accept commissions. If the people are not corrupt, where is the need of a LokPal? Our needs are unlimited. Can you motivate the masses to work towards achieving these ends? Anna can you make India truly great by bringing in Ram Rajya? Good luck to you and God Bless you. May God give you success in this direction.

A father who failed

i received this from a dear friend of mine. These are his personal views and I concur with him.

A father who failed -- Pritish Nandy( Was the editor of The illustrated weekly and a very prominent journalist)Parenthood is fascinating. You live through excitement, joy, guilt, worry, hope, concern in quick succession and before you know it your children have grown up into young a..... BLA! BLA!! BLA!!!..... and more Bullshit!!!

But...

Former Member of Parliament, and Last Editor of Illustrated Weekly...
Saying "Everything I taught my children has, in effect, handicapped them. It has made them inadequate to face the world they are in. Unfortunately I knew no better. But that does not absolve me from my sense of guilt." ... is confusing because he at no stage admits that Armed Forces yet maintains a very high "human dignity and value system"
If he had produced healthy and intelligent children, with the values he claims to have given his children... surely Armed Forces SSB is ready to welcome such "products" into Services.
With the OLQ his children would demonstrate, surely they would have led a meaningful dignified life.
He then would have been a proud Father, today he is NOT.
Surely he is 'responsible' for his own state...
His mental state is still SAD!!!
Only because defending the country's Dignity, Borders, Democracy, Freedom...etc... is something for Pritish Nandy, what other's KIDs should do, NOT HIS!!!
I declare him "An Image hungry, FRAUD"