Anna,team end fast,set table for party

Ending the hunger campaign at Jantar Mantar in the capital,Kejriwal asked the public to suggest a name for their political party,its structure and manifesto,and said they would take the “fight” from the streets to Parliament. At the same time, Kejriwal said that he did not “have any desire to fight elections” if the UPA government enacted a strong Lokpal bill,the right to reject/recall elected representatives and empowered gram sabhas before the 2014 elections.

On Thursday,the activists had asked for similar feedback and set a deadline of 48 hours but could apparently not wait for that deadline to expire before making the announcement. Friday’s announcement about the “people’s” party was made in the presence of just about 3,000 people and IAC volunteers,who had been the mainstay of the agitation so far,were conspicuous by their absence.

Hazare declared that he would neither fight elections nor would he be a part of the political party that would be launched. “I will keep an eye on my team from outside,” he said. He would also tour the country and campaign for the candidates who would be put up by India Against Corruption’s new political party.

Hazare has been fasting for the last six days and his three aides Manish Sisodia,Gopal Rai and Arvind Kejriwal for 10 days,pressing for the Lokpal bill and demanding a Special Investigation Team to probe their allegations of corruption against 15 cabinet ministers.

Friday’s event was marked by the presence of former Army chief General V K Singh,considered a silent supporter of the campaign so far. Singh helped all four men break their fast and set the tone of the proceedings by quoting Jayaprakash Narayan: “Singhasan Chhodo,janata aati hai (leave your throne,the people are coming)”.

Singh blamed poor governance for the economic and other woes of the country and asked why governments could not perform if the army could. “Whenever there is a need for swift action – say a bridge collapse or a child falling into a well,it is the Army that is called in. If the Army can do it why can’t the government? You need to adopt the philosophy of the Army,” he said.

He thanked Team Anna for accepting his suggestion along with those of several prominent citizens,that the country needed a political alternative rather than continuous agitations.

Explaining the reasons for the decision to go political,Kejriwal said that during the last 16 months of the agitation,the group was trying to first cleanse the system through a Lokpal bill and then purify the cabinet.

“But it has now been proven that changing the system is possible in no way other than by uprooting the present dispensation and getting the rule of the village in place. That is what we will now do in a completely transparent way. We do not need money and will be completely transparent. We will put our accounts on the Internet and challenge others to do so. We will get people to choose our candidates and question the nomination process of political parties,” he said.

Clearly in a hurry,he promised that Team Anna’s political alternative would “change things in three years,otherwise you will not get such an opportunity in 30 years”. Kejriwal said he did not need money to fight elections when he had people with him. But when he urged the crowd to repeat a poem by Dushyant at the end of his speech,hardly anyone obliged.

Team Anna claimed that the announcement was advanced as “within the first 2-3 hours,10 lakh people had responded to television channels and 95 per cent of them had said yes to a political option.” Kejriwal said the aim of the movement was not to capture power but to ensure its decentralisation. He also appealed to people who are “suffocated” in parties such as the Congress and BJP to join the movement.