Walk Alone Anna

Of late an sms has been doing rounds where the blue-eyed boy of Indian cricket, our very own M S Dhoni thanks Anna Hazare and his acolytes for drawing all the pats as well as the brickbats the country has on offer. Otherwise, being flayed for recent rubber debacle in England would have been inevitable. Not that the cricket experts have gracefully abstained from subjecting our innocuous, overworked cricketers to derision. Still, the critics are a handful and irate supporters have sobered down to the extent of venting their angst by burning effigies only. On the contrary, team Anna rides on the support of gagged denizens in a democracy, unwilling to let go of the this blessed opportunity to vent their ire over irregularities in pension disbursal or dipping interest rates in banks. To cap it, Dhoni and his premier blue-blooded lot have been exempted from the scathing opposition's umbrage, much to Ajay Maken's delight.
The power of one is what our democracy seems to be at home with. As and when one has escalated to many, as in the star studded, venerated National cricket team, the outcome has wavered from the preset objective to a superfluous one. Take the septuagenarian Gandhian. Remodeling Ralegaon Siddhi into an exemplary village amidst rural hinterlands bequeathed with crude chauvinists, hence wife-beating, philandering drunkards was a humungous job done clinically well. Not entirely on the lines of Gandhi though as a no-nonsense Anna slipping into his army bearings with effortless ease to flog the errant men have made it to the local folklore. But, then it was Anna alone with a team of women and children sickened by their daily dosage of the stick. However, with a stage bigger and target monumental, in came the Bedis, Sisodias, Bhushans and Kejriwals. Then followed the megalomaniac opposition parties baying for the Prime Minister's blood and chair. Close on wheels were the ever speculative, TRP and circulation hungry media. And the country was served a platter of a beaming Anna, reaping a rich anti-corruption harvest. Close by were the co-crusaders, hell bent on carving a necropolis for the red-taped bureaucracy for a more accountable one.
The hullabaloo comes dear. According to newspaper reports, team Anna foots a bill of around Rs six lakh per day to satiate gastronomical requisites of the anti-corruption crusaders. A 15-day phenomenon is likely to cost around a crore. Anna, you would rather dole out the cash to the millions who languish in penury in the squalid nooks of the country rather than feeding truant students with a foot in India an eye on US or the oleaginous MNC employees seeking a break from the monotony of corporate decorum.
Swami Nigamananda would have been an ideal apostle of anti-corruption outbreaks to the millions who will be marauded by the Reddy brothers, Kalmadis and Rajas in future, had he got equivalent media coverage in the days leading up to his death by fasting. Anna, remember the late freedom fighter Jatindranath Das or even our modern day icon Irom Sahrmila. Nigamananda, Das and Sharmila did it alone and did it well. They neither hogged the limelight nor gave opposition parties the leverage to up the ante against the Government and degenerate their initiatives to a political circus.
Even the corrupt manages to fool around with efficacy when alone than in company of share- mongers. Be it Telgi, Harshad Mehta or the barons of Bellary- the Reddy brothers, all succeeded in evading scrutiny longer than their counterparts-the Rajas and the Kalmadis whose follies were facilitated by a barrage of prominent corporate honchos. Or at least, a mention of their accomplices did not ring a bell with the prying police or inconspicuous public, unlike Anna's band of brothers and sisters. The taciturn ate their dough before being incarcerated.
All it would take Anna to silence the foul-mouthing detractors is to refrain from rhetoric and resort to tangible demands. It would not require a raised platform at any public place, negotiations with the Government or Delhi police over fast venue, offering homage at Rajghat at the drop of a hat before shutterbugs or a celebrated team of acolytes. A sequestered corner is what it takes to embark upon a hunger strike and such coordinates are available aplenty. In addition, it requires an honest urge to denounce public adulation with a single minded sense of purpose and a realization that the minors bandaged with anti-corruption logos riding on their parent's back in the tedious rallies do not give two hoots about Anna Hazare and his anti-corruption campaign. Probably, a dearth of nannies has done them in. Otherwise, with substantial news encroaching the inches dedicated to the Anna saga in newspapers with every passing day, 'the answer my friend is blowin' in the wind.'