Corruption is worse than prostitution. The latter might endanger the morals of an individual, the former invariably endangers the morals of the entire country. -Karl Kraus
In a country that has been ravaged with corruption to an extent as in India a single man has sparked hope and provided inspiration to multitudes who had until now just voiced concerns about corruption but had done precious little in this regard.
Who is Anna Hazare?
Kisan Bapat Baburao Hazare,(born 15 January 1940), popularly known as Anna Hazare , is an Indian social activist who is especially recognized for his contribution to the development of Ralegan Siddhi , a village in Ahmednagar district,Maharashtra,India and his efforts for establishing it as a model village, for which he was awarded the Padma Bhushan by Government of India, in 1992.
From April 5, 2011, Hazare has started a ‘fast unto death’ to exert pressure on the Government of India to enact a strong anti-corruption act as envisaged in the Jan lokpal Bill, a law that will establish a Lokpal(ombudsman)Â who will have the power to deal with corruption in public offices.
His official Biography can be read here-
http://www.annahazare.org/biography.html
But in brief-Anna Hazare started his career as a driver in the Indian army.He spent his spare time reading the books of Swami Vivekananda, Mahatma Gandhi and Acharya Vinoba Bhave that inspired him to become a social worker and activist.
After voluntary retirement from the army, Hazare came to Ralegan Siddhi village in 1975. Initially, he led a movement to eradicate alcoholism from the village. Next, he motivated the residents of the village into shramdan (voluntary labour) to build canals, small-scale check-dams and percolation tanks in the nearby hills for watershed development; efforts that solved the problem of scarcity of water in the village that also made irrigation possibile. He helped farmers of more than 70 villages in drought-prone region in the state of Maharashtra since 1975. He also motivated the residents of the village to build a secondary school in the village through voluntary labour.
In the early 2000s, Anna Hazare led a movement in Maharastra state, which forced the Government of Maharashtra to repeal the earlier weak act and pass a more stronger Right to Information Act, which was later considered as the base document for the Right to Information Act 2005(RTI), enacted by the Union Government. It also ensured that the President of India assented to this new act.
In 2011, Anna Hazare led a movement for passing a stronger anti-corruption Lokpal(ombudsman) bill in the Indian Parliament. As a part of this movement,N.Santosh Hegde, a former justice of the Supreme Court of India and Lokayukta of Karnatka,Prashant Bhushan, a senior lawyer in the Supreme Court along with the members of the India Against Corruption movement drafted an alternate bill, named as the Jan Lokpal Bill (People’s Ombudsman Bill) with more stringent provisions and wider power to the Lokpal (Ombudsman). Hazare has started a fast unto death from 5 April 2011 at Jantar Mantar in Delhi, to press for the demand to form a joint committee of the representatives of the Government and the civil society to draft a new bill with stronger penal actions and more independence to the Lokpal and Lokayuktas (Ombudsmen in the states), after his demand was rejected by the Prime Minister of India Manmohan Singh.
The Lok Pal Bill Mentioned –
The bill by government-
http://www.annahazare.org/pdf/Lokpal%20Bill%20by%20Government%20of%20India.pdf
The Jan Lok Pal bill by the Public-
http://www.annahazare.org/pdf/Jan%20lokpal%20bill%20by%20Expert%20%28Eng%29.pdf
This is a golden opportunity for the much vaunted youth of India to follow a true revolutionary to clean the gutters that Public offices have become.
Money and corruption are ruining the land, crooked politicians betray the working man, pocketing the profits and treating us like sheep, and we’re tired of hearing promises that we know they’ll never keep. -Anonymous
But what can we do?
We can sign online petitions,spread the message,for those in Delhi go to the Jantar Mantar,others to rallying points in their cities,and most importantly let us not let this slide into the recycle bins of our memories.Let this be just the spark of bigger things to come.We need a peaceful revolution for inclusive growth and to overcome the diseases that cripple our progress and our very psyches.
More now than for the cricket World cup-Come on India-De ghooma Ke!!!!
Some of his biography is sourced from Wikipedia-
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_Hazare
