Corrupt - Shun

Its one of those rare times when something other than cricket has taken precedence in Indian media. I think it can be safe to say that this time, Anna Hazare stole even the Independence Day's thunder. With due fairness, he kinda deserved it. After all these years, it was known to be a national holiday where people are forced to attend flag hoisting events, sing a few songs and distribute sweets.

Its nice to see people from all walks of life uniting for a cause. Even the dabbawalas of Mumbai stopped their operations for a day to show their support, the first time these guys have bunked work in 120 years. Its even nice to see people in other countries as well involving themselves and atleast spreading the message.

The fight against corruption has surely united the country and one probably gets a glimpse of what the freedom struggle might have look like. While the whole Annagiri and a strong Lokpal Bill might be the right weapons to fight corruption, they might not just be right for this moment. I'm not being cynical or pessimistic but we all know the root cause of this problem.

Its always very easy to blame the government and the politicians for everything, even though I must admit this time someone really has to put the 'Man' into 'Mohan' and make him a real Singh. The solution to eradicate corruption isn't a bill or a protest. For all we know it looks like a huge tangled fur ball and we are of the illusion that pulling the two ends with a bill and a protest will solve the issue. As citizens, each and everyone of us have found ourselves atleast once among this food chain of corruption.

The reason why corruption exists in such a huge proportion is because whether you accept it or not, in many cases it becomes a necessity and more often than not makes matters easy for all the parties involved. Why do we pay 50 bucks to the PC and avoid a Rs.300 fine for driving without a licence. For once, you would like to get away by paying less and the less paid constable wouldn't mind some pocket money.  Put yourself into the PC's position. The guy probably has a family and has to take care of his kids' needs but is paid a meager 5k per month. So does he have any other option? The solution lies not in just education but in bringing about the right economic reforms. Bump up their pay-scales to a respectable number, something on par with what is paid for freshers in private firms and then see the difference. The necessity to put the hand under the table will be eradicated. But the again, I've also seen people earning 6 figure salaries every month resorting to cheap antics like the one mentioned above which talks a lot about filthy people trying to remove filth. 

All I want to insist is that the change must come from within. Once the big fishes are devoid of  small fishes to feed on, a shift in the chain will take place. Stop bribing the agents to get your passport or licence done and please stop bribing the poojary to get a better glimpse of a stone structure.

P.S - I'm off to the Oval to hopefully witness the 100th 100 and have those "I was there" moments.

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A for Anna, B for Baba, C for Corruption

Over the last couple of months or so, it seems like everyone has developed a taste for the fight against corruption or thats what its been portrayed as. Suddenly, put-on accent, tattoos, piercings, smoking Rajini style, guzzling ten beers and still saying "I'm stable" and even going vegan aren't the cool things to do. While the fight for environment still seems to be the ever green trend, Google trends and social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook are quick to mirror that fact that everyone seems to be trying to act cool, by saying no to corruption.

Anna Hazare started it right after India won the WorldCup and planned it right in the gap before the start of IPL 4. Well I'm not going to talk about the credibility of his motives or actions as he looked like a nice guy who didn't look for any funding and had a clear set agenda. Fair enough. While his efforts were commendable, there were lots of others who were looking to use that incident as a springboard. One of them was Baba Ramdev. 

With the IPL 4 also ending, and with a confirmed fact that nobody is going to watch the Ind WI series, there was no doubt that it was the perfect time for Ramdev's to do a Poonam Pandey i.e grab attention.  Before I actually dwell into his recent attention seeking acts, let me just shed some light on what everyone knew about him till then. He was a dude who taught Yoga and as a result of which influenced a lot of people. As a result of this I was forced by my parents to to Kapalbhati and his other asanas which MS Word doesn't recognize. While it didn't last long enough, I still give him some brownie points for promoting the brand Yoga in India.

I had seen one of his shows where some people pick up the mikes and start talking about how Ramdev's Yoga changed their lives and all that crap. OK, that was his way of promoting the classes and shows and is still fair enough. For a guy who didn't want to get laid, this was probably his way of finding a release point. Next he went on the record, saying his yoga will cure cancer and AIDS and said that sex education should be replaced by yoga. As long as he taught Kama Sutra, I really didn't have any problem with that!!! Recently, he even said that homosexuals are sick people and should be sent to the hospitals for treatment. Somewhere in this statement I felt that he was trying to come out of the closet indirectly. For a guy who has hair which would cause envy to any woman, wore a sleeveless saree all the time and who openly said that he didn't want to sleep with a woman, that statement sure looked like an expression of jubilation while still hiding behind the hypocrite mask. I even got to know that he owns an island in Scotland. I so want to visit that place to see if there is any leather shop selling ahem..,ahem.., toys in his name!!!

He started off his fast by saying its going to last for about 14 hours. My granny still goes on day long fasts on some days to impress the god and the media hyped Ramdev so much for a 14 hour fast. Guess you can go on for more than that without any media attention if you have a bad hangover. The news channels like always were providing Ramdev's pulse rate as breaking news every minute. With due respect, who is really bothered about all of this? It was crystal clear that Ramdev's fast was more of a political charade and TRP for media than the fight against corruption. So his demand was to bring all the black money from swizz bank to India. OK, what next? I'm sure he would have wanted a piece of that cake as well with his current assets legally valued more than 1,100 crores.

With everything said and done he broke his fast day before yesterday and I'm sure will be ready to hog like a pig today. The moral of the story is don't bite off more than you can chew. I really don't think general public backed his movement and had any faith in him and his motives. Guess that was the difference between Anna and Baba. The former's thoughts were put into action by the public and the latter's put into action only by the political parties. On an objective level, guess it was a move by BJP to get back into power next time around just like Osama's fake killing to help Obama run for another term. Its high time people stopped believing all these babas and so called godmen.

P.S - Doesn't a fast till death, count as an attempt to commit suicide? In that case shouldn't that person be arrested immediately?

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