QUO  VADIS  DOMINI?

PULIN DUTTA

As I wrote in April, 2011 elsewhere,that we needed a  septugenerian man of humble origin to stir up our souls against corruption. Indeed, no matter how many comfortably placed middle-class critics from their arm chairs are expressing scepticism, we have to admit it shook up the mass, like never before since 1942, when Gandhiji launched the final Quit India movement. The beauty of Anna Hazare’s movement is that it demonstrated, still the Gandhian ways of protesting and mobilising the mass is working. It is not a small demonstration and if someone is not seeing its significance than it is time for them to wake up., especially our young generation. This massive mandate can not be ignored.  Otherwise, it will mean supporting corruption in our nation’s life as an acceptable option.

I agree, there were a few unelegant, even crude aspects this time, trying to run the government and the parliament from the outside and verbal spat. For, today we really do not have a great saint like Mohandas KaramChand Gandhi, well articulated, so pure and so loving and forgiving, leading the Satyagraha and yet respecting an adversary, not using offesive words! Even then, during the Struggle for Freedom movement the middle class by and large the elite working for the British and the rich class like the Rajas, Nawabs, Zamindars etc., were not in favour of Gandhiji’s movement. Few anarchists even killed some Britishers, some indulged in communal riots etc., thereby casting a wrong label to the non violent movement. A mass movement can become difficult to control by one leader. Still, it becomes necessary at times.

According to one historian, hardly 35 per cent Indians, mostly the youth, villagers, lawyers etc., were true to the movement. Many more were opportunists to grab the limelight. Yet, Gandhiji’s methods worked wonders.

Much before then, one lone teacher at the Ferguson College, Pune, for the first time, publicly announced, “Swaraj is my birth-right and I shall have it”. Do you think the educated middle-class, apparently intellectually bright lot in Pune supported him? No! Instead, he was ridiculed by his own friends and colleagues! Now, do you still believe he was wrong?

The same argument holds good even now with Anna Hazare. I for one am prepared to honour him even with some faults, for standing up and giving a voice to the people at large! I did not do it, you did not do it. We only cribbed eternally within the four walls. Didn’t we? We were the cowards and that makes Anna the hero. That happened to Swami Vivekananda too in Chicago when he was invited to give a talk at the ‘Parliament of Religions’. One night he was stoned, while he was asleep in a bench in the park. The next morning in a crowded hall, he began, “Dear  Sisters and Brothers of America..” . He conquered all those present and was hailed as a true saint, after his eloquent unprejudiced forgiving words for those who attacked him the night before. The Americans could not believe that such a man in flesh and blood was talking to them! They saw in him the like of the Christ. Such people make the difference, despite rude remarks from the faint hearted ones . May be it is another law of nature!

I am particularly sad today, because I felt the young would be leaders in the country, could have shown their courage of conviction by taking Anna’s cause to every nook and corner and explain to the mass what are the options before them. I wished young Rahul Gandhi, for a change to support Anna and make it a success. I thought he was a strong anti-corruption crusader, not just another youth congress man! I was wrong, which saddens me.

People saw our so called youth leaders shouting hollow slogans and taking out torchlight processions in few cities for the TV crew was a cruel joke! There was no sincerity and honesty of purpose, one could see through. Some of those hogging the limelight, I was told, were involved in the extortion of shop-owners and vandalising if protection-money was not paid. If that is true, then they are making it a mockery of Anna’s movement. The media and the good public at large should wake up and must not allow such corruption in the future. We owe it to ourselves!