Octogenarian Sita Devi was in tears when district magistrate of Gonda, Ram Bahadur, handed her the land ownership title. She was five-year-old when her family was forced into bonded labour by British forest officers posted in Gorakhpur. The family was given a piece of land for planting trees and to grow crop for its survival. They family was shifted to other place after five years for the same job. From...

The 1985 Lokpal Bill destroyed the raison d'etre of the institution of an ombudsman, but all successive governments copied it. PUBLIC anger was understandably aroused over the gross delay by Parliament in the last 40 years to enact a Lokpal Bill and with the toothless one that the government sponsored. It is not widely known that the delay was aggravated by deception and fraud in 1985. It was, however, emulated by...

Anna Hazare and the civil society won a crucial first battle in the war against corruption. There is a possibility that the Lokpal Bill could be passed by Parliament by August 15. However, that is by no means assured: a number of politicians, a part of section of political establishment and a section of bureaucracy will try to derail the Bill or dilute it so much that it is rendered...

Expectations of changes resulting from a movement bereft of a clear political and ideological thrust would be far-fetched. FROM the vacuum left by mainstream politics to the confusions of ideology and practice emerging out of half-baked socio-political engagement – the political trajectory of Anna Hazare's “anti-corruption” satyagraha movement demanding early introduction of the Lokpal Bill in Parliament can well be summed up thus. The wide support that the movement received from...

Anna Hazare succeeded because he tapped into a deeply felt anger against corruption and systemic gang-up. But the campaign must define itself ideologically or risk appropriation by right-wing usurpers. A future historian attempting to document the Anna Hazare fast at the Capital's Jantar Mantar will likely confront contrasting images: of multitudes enthused and galvanised by one elder citizen's crusading zeal, of Mr. Hazare's almost single-handed ability, within days, to bring the...