Lokpal Bill: A draft to beat the graft

As India battles corruption like never before, it is extraordinarily symbolic that anti-corruption crusader Anna Hazare’s ascent in the socio-political landscape has coincided with the almost proportionate descent of one of India’s foremost politicians, Sharad Pawar.

The all-pervasive cancer of corruption in the body politic is the battleground and the spectators are a billion strong. The moment is historic and both, Anna Hazare and Sharad Pawar, have emerged as the defining symbols of this battle.

Once a strong prime ministerial candidate who had challenged 10 Janpath, Pawar has been openly accused by Hazare of encouraging corruption by Hazare and became the first victim of the Jan Lokpal agitation. It didn’t help one bit when days later, the tainted PR handler Niira Radia named Pawar as the godfather of Shahid Balwa’s DB Realty empire.

The mass support that Pawar easily drums up, especially from his rural followers, has always been cited as the crown jewel of his five-decade long political career. Even that now virtually pales into insignificance in front of the mass outpouring of support, from Kashmir to Kanyakumari and Gujarat to Assam, in favour of Hazare.

There’s deep symbolism in the fact that both are from Maharashtra — a land that has been at the forefront of social reforms and offering iconic leadership to India. From the 17th century king Chhatrapati Shivaji who took on the mighty Mughals, to Babasaheb Ambedkar who pioneered the Dalit movement in the modern era, the intervening period saw social reformers like Jotiba Phule and Maharishi Karve, and political giants like Lokmanya Tilak and Gopal Krishna Gokhale.
 
Will Hazare join this league as the architect of India’s anti-corruption crusade?

The Gandhian Hazare’s village, Ralegan Siddhi, in Ahmednagar district and Pawar’s hometown Baramati represent two models of development, both with their sets of admirers.

As the youngest-ever chief minister of Maharashtra, Pawar served four terms before focusing on national politics. He propelled Baramati’s development through a three-pronged strategy: he strengthened the cooperative movement for sugar production and dairy development, influenced industrialists to establish plants, and established infrastructure through his control over the government.

Thus, while the Baramati taluka is a leader in dairy and sugar production, the Kalyanis, Goenkas and Thapars have their big industries in this small town. The Anil Ambani-led Reliance Airport Developers Ltd is privately developing the Baramati airport as a general aviation hub while Vijay Mallya’s United Breweries Group has established India’s largest winery in Baramati.

Pawar also established, again in Baramati, the massive Vidya Pratisthan educational complex which, in keeping with his vision, offers advanced courses in information technology and biotechnology. In 2004, Reliance Industries CMD Mukesh Ambani inaugurated Vidya Pratisthan’s School of Biotechnology and offered all-out assistance, as did Kiran Mazumdar Shaw of Biocon India.

Anna Hazare, 72, who is almost as old as Sharad Pawar, 70, never had any of these advantages. He was a truck driver when he left the Indian Army and returned to his chronically drought-stricken village in 1975 to try and lift it out of poverty. He focused on character, values and principles, walked the talk, motivated the villagers to undertake water-conservation projects through shram-daan (voluntary labour) and, through community action, forced the closure of liquor shops.

The hard work paid off and his village became an oasis of self-sufficiency, and a model for others to follow. While only powerful politicians and regional satraps could try to replicate Pawar’s Baramati model, many self-driven, but otherwise ‘ordinary’ villagers have replicated the Ralegan Siddhi model. Popatrao Pawar’s village Hivre Bazaar is a famous example.

Once admired for his administrative skills as chief minister, quick grasp of complex issues, grassroots popularity, and a progressive predisposition (Pawar has publicly spoken of his vasectomy after the birth of his only child, a girl), a new chapter opened in Pawar’s career after he chose to move to Delhi. He was effectively sidelined by the Congress high command.

As the political scientist Ram Bapat told this correspondent in an interview, the move to Delhi was a blunder. Pawar should have focused on the development of Maharashtra. Another view suggests that it was the compulsions of Delhi politics and his personal ambitions that brought Pawar closer to corporate biggies and the consequent controversies.

Hazare and Pawar have clashed previously. Hazare has openly accused Pawar of collaborating with the builder lobby, and his anti-corruption campaigns in Maharashtra caused the resignations of three NCP ministers. Another NCP politician and a close relative of Pawar, Padamsinh Patil, had to bite the dust when he was arrested in a murder case and accused of plotting to murder Hazare.

Recent years have seen Pawar embroiled in serious controversies involving mega-construction firms such as Lavasa and now DB Realty.

In his larger crusade against corruption which has the support of the entire nation, Hazare has clearly outpaced and overshadowed Pawar. The Hazare-Pawar battle is now just a side-story and has perhaps reached its denouement.