“Lack of accountability a major concern” Speakers dissatisfied with ‘sweeping provisions' At a meeting held on Saturday, civil society voices from across a wide spectrum urged broader and multiple consultations to precede the drafting of the Lokpal legislation, warning that in the absence of a mechanism to hold the institution accountable, it could potentially turn into a “Frankenstein's Monster.” Organised by the National Campaign for People's Right to Information (NCPRI) and the Nehru...

Gandhi resorted to some 30 fasts, of which one-third were directed at himself, for ‘atonement’ or self-purification, one-third were directed against the raj and one-third at India’s social mores. A more honest trinity cannot be imagined. The latter two kinds of fasts were meant to make an impact on the ‘other side’; they were part-fasts and part- hunger strikes, part anashan and part bhukh-hartal, though he derived from each a sense...

The brief gap between the World Cup and the Indian Premier League would have been painfully boring but for the display on national TV of the collective meekness of the Congress/UPA leadership in the face of the challenge to India's parliamentary system mounted by Anna Hazare and his bandwagon. The bandwagon comprises civil rights activists, RSS/Hindu Mahasabha/Baba Ramdev foot soldiers, ex-bureaucrats in search of a cause, sections of the urban...

We should be grateful to Anna Hazare for dedicating his life to the people and battling for accountability in governance. Millions look to him for inspiration and guidance. We are all sick of mismanagement, venality and the lack of accountability that plague not only governance but also other institutions, including many NGOs that call themselves “civil society” institutions, the term made fashionable by international donor agencies. The support base of this...

Anna Hazare and his supporters appear to have come to an agreement with the central government over forming a joint committee to draft the Lokpal bill.  We can all agree that corruption in India is a cancer eating away at the very core of the nation. Amidst the frenzied coverage of the hunger strike, and the exclamations of support for Hazare on social networks, there has been scant discussion of...