Corrupt Government Succumbs to People's Power

I AM ANNA, YOU ARE ANNA, WHOLE COUNTRY IS ANNA - SO SANG THE BIG ASSEMBLY OF PROTESTERS WHO HAD COME FROM ALL OVER AND ASSEMBLED AT JANTAT-MANTAR, NEW DELHI. tHE PLACE HAS A 18TH CENTURY PROTECTED MONUMENT TRACKING CELESTIAL BODIES LIKE SUN AND MOON AND WAS BUILT BY MAHARAJ JAI SINGH OF JAIPUR, RAJPUTANA. 

While protesters sang and listened to short speeches of the septuagenarian ex-Army bachelor truck driver known for patriotism, honesty and integrity, the corrupt ministers, politicians and bureaucrats closed ranks to ward off the biggest ever assault on their fiefdom of corruption. The bigwigs of the ruling Congress party do not enjoy a good reputation and have gone down many notches in the estimation of the general public. Most of them have a financial success story of rising from rags to riches.. Anyone may make an intelligent guess where the money came from. No prizes for guessing successfully. 

PUBLIC ANGER 

Sharad Pawar, head of another political party and an ally of Sonia Gandhi's party was slapped by an angry young man who gave vent to his anger against rampant corruption that way When the new-age Gandhi as Anna Hazare is known for his protest fasts, insistence on TRUTH and taking a vow of Silence for a specific period, asked a question on hearing the news of slapping, "" just one slap", thereby indicating that one slap was not enough. Sharad Pawar too does not enjoy a good reputation and is considered by many people as a corrupt builder of a township named Lavasa. 

It is feared that even the leaders of the highest rung of the Congress party may meet the same fate as that of Pawar recently or Kapil Sibal a few months back. 

In my opinion the politicians are receiving what they deserve.

GOVT BUCKLING UNDER

The People’s Power is the strongest and no State or Government is powerful enough to resist the People’s Power. This fact of life is equally true for countries in the East or the West. Let us take a peep into the past of China. The First Emperor, known as Qin Shih Huang Di dispossessed the people of all weapons that they had. All books were burnt. All sources of knowledge were destroyed so that people do not make new weapons and attack the Imperial Army. Thus the First Emperor wished, though mistakenly, to  perpetuate the rule of his dynasty forever and ever. When his successors rule was so autocratic and despotic that people groaned under the oppression of the army and the bureaucracy, they rose in revolt and made lethal weapons out of bamboos available in rural China in plenty. They defeated the Imperial Army as their morale was sky high and thus overthrew the dynasty that wished to rule the country for many a millennium.

Moral of the story is: People’s Power is supreme and no other power on earth can match it.

In India we have a weak and corrupt government at the Centre. There is no central power of authority. The Prime Minister is a titular head of the government and the real power centre is elsewhere. Thus the bureaucracy is a confused lot besides being as corrupt as the political class from top to bottom. The weak government of a meek PM will not be able to bear the onslaught of People’s Power and is likely to give in. This may be the beginning of the end  of corruption that is impoverishing the nation. The earlier this government is removed from power the better it would be for the Common Man.

By Chitranjan Sawant