We all are Anna Hazare!

India is a country of festivals, love, peace, enthusiasm and... corruption. However harsh the last word sounds, we as Indians have accepted the reality. But what have we done to counter it? Today one man has rose to the occasion and doing it for all of us. 72 year old social activist Anna Hazare's fast unto death has entered the third day in demand of a stringent anti-corruption bill as a part of the 'India Against Corruption' movement. And its our moral duty to step ahead and support him and tighten the noose around the government to get the common man heard. 

(Courtesy: Internet)

The 'Modern Mahatma' is showing tremendous courage and determination to push through the Lokpal Bill, which will see an independent non-political body being empowered to punish all those guilty of corruption, not even sparing the Prime minister of this country. After 105 years since the real Mahatma introduced Satyagraha in the non-violent fight against the Britishers, here is one man who is using the same principle to fight against even more dangerous culprits than the firangis, our own corrupt politicians. I haven't seen the country explode with such marvelous support across all the age groups and across all the strata of the society in support of this great Gandhian. Right from the media, the celebrities, the sports people to the common office goer, the school teacher, the farmer, college students, all are showing solidarity in unison to this amazing movement of 'India against Corruption'. It only waits to be seen whether Jantar Mantar will turn out to be the Tahrir Square of India if the government does not heed to Anna's demands.

1) Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/IndiACor 

2) Twitter : http://twitter.com/janlokpal

My only appeal to all those who are reading this is to come out and support this movement in your own way. Spread the word. If Anna Hazare can... we all can! Even if we show just 10% of support that we showed towards the Indian cricket team during the Cricket World Cup, we can still win this one. It is so ridiculous how Sonia and Rahul Gandhi sat in the general stands while watching the cricket matches just to show their connect with the common man and when it came to participating the same common man in drafting the revolutionary Lokpal bill, they have ignorantly shut the door on him. People there were as many as 8 instances when the government had fooled us on passing the bill by dissolving the house when it came to clearing the bill. Stand up and say "Not This Time!". Enough is Enough!

Remember...

There is no one Anna Hazare... I am Anna Hazare too, You are Anna Hazare, We all are Anna Hazare!

How long will we let these corrupt politicians drain our nation's resources and demoralize us? It is really pitiful to hear the same politicians who hail from a party based on Gandhian principles calling Anna's satyagraha as 'childish' and 'blackmail'. I have immense respect for our Prime minister but it is very sad to see him heading a cabinet full of corrupt ministers. 

Friends and colleagues, we were not lucky enough to experience the euphoria of the great freedom struggle that our great leaders fought 60 years back. But now is the time. Its now or never! The path adopted by Anna may be a very old one, but we all need to believe in him and ourselves. We need to believe in a better tomorrow. In Anna we can see a leader, a selfless one, with no political greed. In him we can see a savior who can take us to the end of this fight against corruption. We need to stand up for ourselves and for our next generation. We cannot doubt each other any more. We have to rise and stand firm. THIS IS THE MOMENT!

Jai hind!

Egypt presses Ctrl-Alt-Del

“First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.” ~ Mahatma Gandhi

February 11th, 2011... 1102-2011... an interesting date when literally a crowd close to a few millions of young, spirited and determined youths turned the tide of their destiny back, just like the date, to start a new beginning to their future. By the time I write this post, the Egyptian Revolution that started much earlier than January 25th had resulted in ousting their President Hosni Mubarak who ruled them for 30 long years. (Phew!)

(Courtesy: Internet)

While writing this blog, I admit, before January 25th, I hardly knew anything about Egypt except about Giza, the Suez Canal and well of course the famous photoshop gimick about Hosni Mubarak. As a non-Egyptian, I guess that was the only thing I ever knew Hosni Mubarak for. And I assume there were millions others like me around the world who never particularly knew much about Egypt and its people except for the Pyramids. But as history would have it, the perception of the world towards this country with a sharp right angled boundary, changed so dramatically over the last 18 days. And no price for guessing who was responsible for that... it was the common middle class youth in his twenties, calling for their right to lead a life they deserve.

The Egyptians proved the real power of 'We the people'. This uprising will be known for the non-violent and peaceful approach that the demonstrators used to make their voices heard. It will be remembered for giving a new meaning to the word, 'Internet Revolution'. The protestors showed no sign of backing away at any time from their key demand about Mubarak stepping down.

The most important thing that came out of this revolution or uprising was that people not only in the middle-east but the whole world witnessed one's faith in humanity's spirit and its aspirations. Though there was so much to fight against - the government, the thugs, the police, yet the demonstrators remained admirably peaceful while defending themselves. They didnt show a single sign of resorting to violent means while sticking to their core demand of installing democracy in their state. In Tahrir Square or 'Liberation square' as it is called, everyone saw this tremendous spirit of cooperation amongst the people themselves. They were so much determined and illustrative towards their goal while cleaning the streets after the clashes, protecting the Egyptian museum, setting up make-shift hospitals, distributing free food and water and protecting the journalists. The spirit of the people behind this uprising showed that autocracies cannot long survive the sharp and focused glare of their own people and community.

(courtesy: blog.aljazeera.net)

The slogans and the chants like "al sha'b yurid isqat al nizam!!!" (The people want the regime down!) and "Yascot Yascot Hosni Mubarak" will be rememberd forever in people's mind. These people were no one else but the educated middle or upper middle class, responding to other young activists and bloggers well versed with blogging and other social media like the Facebook and Twitter. Wael Ghonim started it on facebook, Asmaa Mahfouz posted one dramatic self-recorded video on youtube, and it spread like a wild fire bringing down a 30 year old regime. Al Jazeera played a massive role in this uprising. Despite the fact that it's license was revoked, it quickly had other alternatives like satellite phone calls, video uploading facility through creative commons, linking a live feed through Youtube, just to keep the spark of journalism alive. The internet shutdown flopped big time in its attempt to stop protesters from communicating and coordinating with each other. The crackdown on the foreign press made the resolve of the protesters even stronger. Information was relayed in 140 characters throughout the world, faster than one could believe. Twitter proved as a mini-broadcast medium giving out information to the world who was stuck to the television to witness a revolution, one of its kind. Citizen journalism was at the summit.

All the petty attempts by Mubarak to stay connected with the Egyptian politics finally failed when on 11th February 2011, Vice-President declared that the president fled to Sharm-el-Sheikh. I would like to congratulate and thank the people of Egypt for showcasing such beautiful spirit of determination and human aspirations. The road ahead may be bumpy for you, but rest assure, the world has no doubt today that you will scale it on your own successfully. Greetings from India...