Anna draws world’s attention- Why has the middle class suddenly woken up?To answer that question you need not look any further than the slew of scams

Anna draws world’s attention

August 26, 2011 | Filed under: National | Posted by: admin

By NVONews Correspondent,

New Delhi: Anna Hazare’s fast for a Lokpal bill is now drawing international attention. The story of his arrest and subsequent release is running on the home page of New York Times. The Al Jazeera network not only has the story on its home page but also has an article by the redoubtable Sashi Throor. The Yahoo News website (news.yahoo.com) has the story as the second lead on its world page. Even the Washington Post has the story prominently displayed on its world page.

To get a sense of the importance these international news organizations are according this story, this is a day when Syria fired on its protesters (again), Aung San Suu Kyi met Myanmar’s President Thein Sein, there was an attack on British Council in Kabul, a bomb blast in a mosque in Pakistan (another one), and another incident of attack and counter attack by Israel on Gaza and Gaza on Israel.

Among all these heartbreaking, grisly news of humanity’s cruelty and increasing barbarism, the methods of peaceful protest must have struck a chord with these news organizations. After all they have been following the Arab revolution for months. In fact Anna’s fast is being compared to the protesting people in the middle east, even though India is no middle east dictatorship.

India in the words of the great economist G K Galbraith is a ‘functioning anarchy.’ Anyone who has seen the Indian parliament at work cannot dispute this, as Sashi Tharoor points out in his article.

In India the protest against corruption has struck a chord. After all this a dirty reality we all have to live with, the reality that here money and not law takes precedence. The rich are able to use their clout, their connection, and their money to extract whatever they want from the bureaucracy, while the rest are struck in the mendacity of the bureaucrats.

Anna has been waging his struggle for decades now. What is different this time is that the middle class which has long been impervious to the political process, has suddenly decided to take part. Anna strength derives from this crowd.

Why has the middle class suddenly woken up? To answer that question you need not look any further than the slew of scams and corruption cases that the UPA 2 has foisted upon the country. But perhaps a deeper change is at work. One hopes and believes that it signals a deeper awakening. A realization that prosperity will forever remain for the few till corruption keeps eating at the fabric of our institutions. That until lawbreakers remain in the halls where law is made, justice will remain an elusive dream, and that parties who have long list of known criminals in their ranks, will never move to change the system until the people unite to make them do so.

If the protest succeed in forcing the government to give a strong Lokpal bill, the civil society would have won and India’s middle class would have come of age.