The first story i filed for a mainstream paper, while interning at The Hindu, Puducherry

6th May, 2007
Second round of French Presidential polls

Hectic politicking in Puducherry

Reporter



PUDUCHERRY: France went to a second round of presidential polls today. The final contestants in the fray are Segolene Royal of the socialist party and Nicolas Sarkozy of the Union for the presidential majority (UMP). The latter is the incumbent Interior [Home] Minister of France. The French Consul General's office here is the voting centre for Puducherry. There are more than 5000 voters on the electoral rolls of Puducherry. The turnout is expected to be lower than the first round which took place last week, in which Ms. Royal led with a slim majority in Puducherry but was second overall.

The electorate here is sharply divided and both parties have been campaigning vigourously for their votes. The UMP has even advertised in Tamil dailies and pasted posters declaring victory for Sarkozy. Most young voters appeared to be in favour of Royal, due to Sarkozy's alleged racist leanings. A young female voter, from Auroville, said, "He's [Sarkozy] racist. Look what he's doing to the country! I voted [for the] Socialist." Yet, there were other youth, like Vijayan from Puducherry town, who was impressed with Sarkozy's punch line, 'Everything is possible.' He supported Sarkozy's tough stand against illegal migration.

Many senior citizens, even those infirm, turned out to vote. Among them were Gaullists who owe their allegiance to the UMP. Most of these individuals are ex-service personnel. One such Gaullist, Thiru Bichat Balaraman said, that the Socialists are dividing the country on basis of economic status. With the UMP, everyone would prosper. He criticised the youth supporting Royal without having a proper understanding of history.

The presence of Socialists in front of the Consulate was prominent. Thiru Bhupathi Bernard, the treasurer if their Puducherry unit said that the incumbent UMP's handling of issues like migration, racism and citizenship would prove to be its death knell. He added, "Over 1000 applications for citizenship for spouses of French nationals in Puducherry are pending in the consulate. This is due pressure from the French government to exclude those of non-European origin from France." Socialist youth were observed tearing off UMP posters pasted opposite the consulate.

The Muslim backlash against Sarkozy in France is absent in Puducherry. Even the UMP organiser here is Muslim, viz. Lieutenant Colonel Mouhamad Moustafa, a former intelligence officer in Armee de l'Air [French Air Force].

One voter, Thirumathi Camatchiammane complained of his lethargic attitude towards the campaign. As the fate of their presidency in far off France is decided, the French nationals of Puducherry will have an anxious night ahead.

Karuna comes to town

Karuna keeps mum, Kani consoles cadre

New Delhi, May 23: He’s angry, he’s hurt and he’s is no mood to chat. DMK chief M. Karunanidhi flew in to the capital today only to meet his daughter Rajya Sabha MP Kanimozhi, DMK MP A. Raja and DMK-backed Kalaignar TV’s chief Sharad Kumar. The trio is under-trials lodged in Tihar Jail for their alleged roles in the 2G spectrum allocation scam.

Kalaignar (scholar of arts) - as the 87-year old leader is addressed by his supporters- headed straight to Hotel Taj Mansingh from the airport. The wheelchair bound leader got into an ambassador, with deeply tinted windows, on the tarmac itself and sped out taking the press by surprise. All his party’s MPs, who were chatting near the ceremonial lounge, dashed off behind him.

The press smarting after the airport no-show got back with an incandescent vengeance at

MK as his car stopped at the portico of the central Delhi 5- star hotel. The leader, seated beside the driver had to be carried out by his staff to his mechanized wheelchair. But, not before the camera corps broke through the special branch cordon around the convoy and smothered him with flashes, leaving the old patriarch gasping and his eyelids twitching.

Minister of State for Information and Broadcasting S. Jagathrakshakan had to rush forward with National Security Guard black cats, shoving photographers aside, to save MK. Watching the commotion MP Dayanidhi Maran laughed out loud, but had to abruptly stop, when he realised no one else was.

Dayanidhi refused to answer any questions about the excerpts from wikileaks, published in an English daily today, in which he criticized his party for corruption and giving freebies.

The former CM remained closeted inside the Taj, with party faithful, before leaving for Tihar in the evening. Party leaders who met him described him as shocked. “He kept asking as how we would feel if our daughters were taken off to prison like this,” said former Tamil Nadu minister S. P. Sarguna Pandian who met him. His daughter’s incarceration perhaps it reminded him of his many innings in prison- innings that ironically contributed to his popularity.

Kanimozhi on the other hand encouraged supporters in court to continue party work fearlessly despite losing power in the state. “We are all so disturbed, but she kept asking us to be bold,” said former MLA Shankari Narayanan.

At the jail, he met Kanimozhi for 20 minutes in camera, along with her mother Rajathi, husband G. Aravindan and son 11-year old Adithya. MK met Sharad and Raja for 15 minutes after that. “We allowed the meeting after visiting hours because he is wheel-chair ridden,” said DG Prisons Neeraj Kumar.

MPs like T. R. Baalu who accompanied him stood outside the meeting hall, while others like Tiruchi Siva posed for pictures with Tamil Nadu Special Police personnel stationed at Tihar Jail. Neeraj Kumar clarified that he has no doubts on the loyalities of the TN cops.

Speaking to The Telegraph, a head constable with the TN contingent said that Kanimozhi and Raja were very courteous. “Raja’s lunch comes from Tamil Nadu Bhavan canteen (as he has a stomach ulcer). Akka (elder sister Kanimozhi) had the dal-roti in jail for one day, but now gets one meal from her family when he attends court.”

“Seeing such big persons of our state living in such a small room with an open bathroom, within the room, makes us feel sad,” said a constable. “She’s very friendly with women constables. Raja always asks us is we’ve had our meals on time. Once we were joking with Sharad that out timings are long. He said that your lives are easy. Look at me.”

Karuna gets more lebensraum, while cadres catfight

New Delhi, May 24: Perhaps feeling as stifled as his daughter Kanimozhi- who is in a 150 square feet cell with an open toilet within it- Karunanidhi shifted out the two rooms allotted in Taj Mansingh to a presidential suite at ITC Maurya in Delhi’s Diplomatic Enclave of Chanakyapuri.

His supporters and security detail kept funereal huddles in two other executive class rooms of the hotel, which has a known South Indian restaurant called Dakshin.

A source said that it was uncomfortable for Karuna to eat and sleep in two different room. The two-lakh-a-day presidential suite was large enough to accommodate him and his wife Rajathi Ammal.

“He hasn’t spoken much today,” a former DMK MLA said. “He only says he’s missing his daughter.”

Karunanidhi stayed perched up in his spacious suite all day, while Congress leaders Ghulam Nabi Azad and Jayanthi Natarajan called on him. Even Renewable Energy Minister Farooq Abdullah who stopped to say hi, after his lunch at the hotel, couldn’t recharge the Kalaignar.

MLA and DMK Deputy General Secretary M. K. Stalin, who came here last night, left this afternoon after his sister Kanimozhi and party colleague A. Raja in court. As Karuna prepared to leave for his 440 PM flight to Chennai, Kanimozhi’s mother Rajathi Ammal- her eyes red and moist- came to the lobby accompanied Kanniyakumari MP J. Helen Davidson and other women leaders of the DMK.

Looking at former state minister K. Ponmudi she said in a tearful voice, “What injustice is this (imprisonment of Kanimozhi)?” He pacified her by saying that it’s all for greater good.

“In jail, Kani asked me to be courageous. She said she didn’t know when she would come out. What could I say to her,” said Rajathi to The Telegraph before her voice choked up.

On the sidelines, an ugly verbal duel broke out in full media glare between Helen and Rajya Sabha MP Vasanthi Stanley in front of a visibly shaken Rajathi. Helen is believed to have commented that it wasn’t proper for a DMK MP to wear salwar-kameez. All other women leaders wore sarees. Incidentally, Kanimozhi also usually wears salwars.

Rajathi tried to pacify an agitated Vasanthi who replied, “If senior leaders like her (referring to former state minister S. P. Sarguna Pandian who was also present) tell me how to dress it is fine. But who is she (Helen)? Since when is she in a position to teach me?” Ponmudi had to step in and take Vasanthi aside.

Helen and her husband have been driving Rajathi to and from the Patiala House Courts where her daughter is being tried. She is considered close to Kanimozhi while Vasanthi is believed to have drifted away for the “daughter of the party.”

Karuna soon came down with a simple white cotton towel on his shoulders, instead of his trademark yellow shawl. The womens’ brigade switched from their drama over Dravidian sartorial sensibilities to slogans offering their lives “to protect to Kalaignar of the Tamil-speaking world.”

Kani plays truant to press amidst murmurs of cop out

New Delhi, May 6: DMK Rajya Sabha MP Kanimozhi refused to speak to the press in the capital today, where she is being tried for her alleged role in the 2G scam. Her Pilatesque defence in court, pinning the blame on DMK-backed Kalaignar TV promoter Sharad Kumar, has set the tongues of her party cadre waggling about the party’s interest being allegedly sacrificed for “the daughter.”

A pall of anxiety prevailed over Tamil Nadu House, this morning, before Kanimozhi left to court. An old issue of Deccan Herald headlined “CBI raids Kalignar TV office” lay at the temple-chariot like entrance of the building. Tamil Nadu government drivers spoke in hushed tones under a streetlight bearing a tattered DMK banner.

Tight-lipped DMK-cadre in trademark black-red bordered veshtis, led by Ministers of State S. Gandhiselvan, S. S. Palanimanickam and D. Napoleon, diverted the press to the main entrance as Kanimozhi exited from the back door. Scribes who got the wind of it rushed to the back, even as she shielded her son Adithya from camera flashes with her dupatta.

Her school-going son had come down the stairs to wish his mother luck, before she left to court. She immediately whizzed out with her husband G. Aravindan in a Toyota Corolla.

DMK supporters huddled at a tea stall in Patiala House Courts Complex, as the trial dragged on inside. Most of them were Ariyalur, a district bifurcated from jailed DMK MP A. Raja’s home district of Perambalur.

“Party seniors have told us not to talk to the press. You people have created all this trouble. We do not want to be misquoted,” said an elderly DMK town secretary.

Another party elder added that they had primarily come to Delhi to see “their son Raja.”

“We saw him in the jail van. He waved at us,” he added. “Many North Indians ask us if we gave voters a lot of money. I can assure you that I haven’t given anyone a paisa in my ward.”

At noon, North Chennai DMK MP T. K. S. Elangovan stepped out of the courtroom for tea. He wore the same calm smile that he sported at the counting centre after trouncing CPI stalwart D. Pandian in the previous parliamentary polls.

“This case is not a political issue for us,” said Elangovan coolly. “We are all here in solidarity and are ready to face whatever comes.” His words seemed to calm the jittery DMK faithful present.

Back at the Tamil Nadu House canteen, waiters discussed the bits of news on the case that they were getting from text messages. They too had been advised against indulging journalists. Any case related query was replied with an offer of more filter coffee.

A Tamil Nadu bureaucrat came in with his wife for lunch. After speaking to a junior official, before entering the canteen, she exclaimed loudly, “You know the media is here because Kanimozhi may be arrested.” “Shut up!” her husband muttered under his breath.

The case which was expected to wind up after lunch dragged on till sunset. When news that she had left court came in, scribes split up in two teams guarding the front and back entrances. True to instinct, Kanimozhi’s Corolla went straight to the back entrance. She stepped out, visibly shaken up, as party leaders pushed TV cameras aside to make way for her.

Later, a DMK MP came out of a huddle with Kanimozhi and called a few journalists aside. “Everyone says what they want without thinking about the party, “the MP said on condition of anonymity. “Just yesterday she (Kanimozhi) said that she doesn’t want any concession for being a woman; now her lawyer asks leniency in the name of motherhood. The blame of the scam has now been shoved on the party, to save her.”

On being asked whether the DMK would break their alliance with the Congress if Kanimozhi was arrested, the MP said that it was all up to the Congress now. “We knew we are in trouble when that drunkard (referring to actor-politician Vijayakanth) joined the ADMK alliance. But even if we lose the election or the Congress leaves us, the party can still face it.”

Website builds bonds among Delhi babus

New Delhi, April 21: Five-year old Kushal (name changed) wanted to play the tabla. His father, K. K. Funda- an assistant director at the Ministry of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises, bought the boy a pair, but couldn’t find an Ustad to teach his mentally challenged son.

“I saw a govtservants.com sticker in our ministry toilet. It is not normal for me to use online forums. But I posted a message on the site, and Ustad Vimal came to my house within a month to meet my son.”

Funda’s online message didn’t mention his son’s medical condition. “After Vimal ji spoke to my son, he offered to teach him for free. He had heard about my message from his bureaucrat friend. I had to force him to take some honorarium. I am so grateful to this website.”

Govtservants.com was the brainchild of a Mines Department section officer, a Supreme Court advocate who retired from the Comptroller and Auditor General’s office and, a deputy secretary of Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Food & Public Distribution- all of whom didn’t want to mention their names. The Central Civil Services (Conduct) Rules prohibits babus from managing publications or electronic media without sanction.

The website, which started a couple of years back, allows anyone to post messages for car pools, furniture, medical needs, queries on service matters and almost anything under the sun. The site made primarily for government employees also filters messages according to the building the bureaucrat works in.

No unionizing is allowed though. A few weeks back an under secretary at the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting requested the site to have a small box with notices of the Central Secretariat Service Forum. His request was declined. “We want to be in the good books of the government. This will not be a lobbying platform,” said a founder who has been sticking bills with the site’s URL near lifts and toilets at government buildings.

“There was no platform for government employees to interact. The site makes our lives happier and we will never charge users a paisa. We got to host the site for only Rs. 3000 for nine years and will look for ads only after five years,” said a founder. Initially they were helped by staff from the National Informatics Centre. The site is now managed by IT professionals Gaurav and Sudhanshu Tyagi in the United States.

A founder added that babus are generally trustworthy. “Even for a car pool we like to have some safe person. This site doesn’t allow ads from any agencies. Only users post messages and we vet them.” He adds that real estate companies have already been approaching the site to advertise.

The site, which was re-launched with a user friendly interface last week, gets around 200 hits a day. The owners plan to expand it to other metros as well.

For the women in men working in behemoth-like tube-lit offices, this forum is also connecting them to employees in other departments who’ve probably been working on the same floor for years without exchanging a glance. The site’s moderators don’t mediate and users can directly contact each other.

Coming soon on the site is an option for home-stays as well. “An officer in Udagamandalam can offer to host the family of his compatriot in Delhi, at a nominal rate. That way we can go for holidays which we can’t afford otherwise,” said a founder.

India finally makes it to Venice Biennale, sets stage for delayed triennale

New Delhi, April 15: India’s first ever national pavilion at the 54^th Venice Biennale will assert a view of Indian art which will be a counterview to the kind of Indian art that the west has been exposed to, said art critic Ranjit Hoskote, who will curate the pavilion.

India will finally find a place among 94 other countries at this 116-year-old show. This comes after many missed attempts for national representation at the prestigious international art exhibition. Selection to it is globally recognised as a coming-of-age of a nation’s contemporary art.

Ashok Vajpeyi, Chairman of the Lalit Kala Akademi which is sending the expedition to Venice, indicated that this would set the stage for the Triennale in India which is scheduled to take place next year. The XI Triennale in India was held in 2005.

New York based mixed-media artist Zarina Hashmi; painter-sculptor and video artists Praneet Soi from Kolkata and Gigi Scaria from Delhi and; Guwahati’s Desire Machine Collective’s Sonal Jain and Mriganka Madhukaillya’s works will be featured at the pavilion. The Venice Biennale is from June 4 to November 27.

“Much of Indian art that has been exhibited abroad has gone there through the market route,” said Hoskote who added that the pavilion will showcase the country’s non-commercial contemporary art.

Vajpeyi justified the discretionary selection of Hoskote as curator, saying that the number of curators in India was disproportionately smaller than the demand for them. Other exhibitions would feature different curators who will also be chosen at the Akademi’s discretion.

The selection of artistes was done so as to showcase the cross cultural nature of contemporary art from diverse locations. The rich art practices that run parallel to the gallery circuit will be displayed.

The rent for the pavilion, at the Arsenale in Venice is Rs. 60 lakhs. India’s art adventure to the Adriatic will totally cost the exchequer almost Rs. 2 crore, “a cost too small for India’s pride,” confirmed Culture Secretary Jawhar Sircar. There would be three important art conferences in Mumbai, Delhi and Guwahati while the Biennale is and a delegation led by the culture minister would visit the show, he added.

He emphasized that the recent Anish Kapoor exhibition at the National Gallery of Modern Art in Delhi, India’s entry to Biennale and, a waiver on import duty for art and antiquities to galleries in India- are the ministry’s attempts to back art and make things easier for exhibitors and connoisseurs.

Mani report finds Zonal Cultural Centres completely out of sync with their objective of taking culture to the aam aadmi

New Delhi, April 12: A report on Zonal Cultural Centres (ZCCs)- which were set up 25 years back to disseminate India’s varied cultures to audiences who did not have access to them- says these bodies have completely deviated from their objectives. More than Rs. 288 crores has been spent by ZCCs since they were formed.

The three-volume report on the seven ZCCs was authored by a committee- established by the Central Advisory Board on Culture in August 2010- chaired by Rajya Sabha Congress MP Mani Shankar Aiyar, actor Amol Palekar and Oriya poet Sitakant Mahapatra. They found that ZCCs have focused on cultural performances at their headquarters and middle-class urban venues, instead of disseminating the cultures of the region across the zone.

The ZCCs were set up in Patiala, Thanjavur, Santiniketan, Udaipur, Dimapur, Nagpur and Allahabad, and not in state capitals to prevent them from being state-oriented instead of catering the region as a whole. The governors of the host states chair the ZCCs, to keep them free from state politics and domination.

Yet, exactly this has happened. While most centres had seen a rise in the number of programmes they conducted, these mostly took place at the state capital or the headquarters of the centre.

The Eastern Zonal Cultural Centre now has headquarters both in Santiniketan and Salt Lake. The report notes that in the last 15 years, with a sizeable increase in funds, “…the concentration of programming at the two Headquarters of the ZCC in Salt Lake City and Santiniketan becomes even more marked.” It adds that little has been done for the poor of Calcutta or other urban centres like Siliguri.

In her deposition for the committee Danseuse Leela Samson, Director, South Zone Cultural Centre (SZCC) stated, “I think if the SZCC is only serving the Governor of Tamil Nadu, then they should equally be serving the governors of all member-States. This is a very partisan kind of situation. It really was not working because there is obviously very high pressure from the Governor’s Office.”

The committee also found that the ZCCs were regarded as a limbo for bureaucrats waiting for a posting. Danseuse Sonal Mansingh stated, “There a lot of aims, lot of money, lot of opportunities, but there is a confusion of aims.”

The committee has recommended that the corpus fund of ZCCs be raised to Rs. 50 crores to prevent them from being dominated by governments of host states, like has happened to the SZCC where all infrastructure funding was done by Tamil Nadu.

It has also recommended that ZCC director posts not be reserved only for bureaucrats.

Structural changes have also been proposed to distance ZCCs from the government, and to give the cultural community as sense of ownership over them, said Aiyar.

An independent Indian Council of Zonal Cultural Centres, integrated with the three national academies and the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts. ZCCs must be linked with local bodies and youth clubs.

For Naxalite-hit areas, the committee has recommended police action against ultras to be combined with participative development by promoting tribal artistes. “Cultural troupes matter at least as much as armed troops in the struggle,” says the report.

A Folk and Tribal Arts Akademi and museum, along with livelihood security for tribal artistes is an imperative to protect the dying cultural repertoire of tribals, the committee found. Cross country cultural yatras culminating in a silver jubilee Apna Utsav yatra in Kolkata or Chennai coordinated by Amol Palekar, has been proposed for this year.

ED attaching properties of Koda and Co worth almost 130 crores, tip of the iceberg say officials

New Delhi, April 12: The Directorate of Enforcement has started attaching properties of former Jharkhand CM Madhu Koda and his associates Binod Sinha, Vikas Sinha and Sunil Sinha.

They have begun doing so after getting an approval order on April 6 from the Adjudicating Authority for cases under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) - a finance ministry body. The properties- land and apartments- are located in Jharkhand, Bihar and Maharashtra have a registry value of around Rs. 130 crores according to 2007 revenue department valuations, say Directorate sources.

“This is the largest attachment made under the PMLA from any politician,” said a senior official, “You can expect another couple of orders, but this will take at least a month’s time as we are busy with 2G cases.” The total value of the properties identified may go up to Rs. 300 crores.

Many companies, including Rohitas Krishnan’s Quantum Powertech, Ranchi and Manohar Lal Pal’s Smridhi Sponge Limited, Jamshedpur, have also been attached.

While Krishnan was arrested by the CBI for money laundering last year, Pal and former Jharkhand CM Shibu Soren’s son Mrinal were questioned in February by the Directorate in Delhi.

Krishnan is also allegedly involved in Jharkhand’s rural electrification scam along with Binod, who was arrested by the CBI in Delhi last October. On April 1, the Jharkhand Vigilance Bureau revealed that Binod and Krishnan had given Koda Rs. 90 lakhs to fight the 2009 parliamentary polls.

Other companies on the list also include Kolkata- based Lacky Projects, IAG Co. and Shivans Steel, Jamshedpur-based Kolhan Trading, India Cars and Motors, Emmar Alloys and Ranchi’s Khalari Cements.

“While the companies will be allowed to function, to protect the livelihoods of their employees, they cannot be disposed off, altered or destroyed,” a Directorate source said.

He added that they would need the assistance of Jharkhand’s government, district officials and police to attach the properties, but assured that the directorate would lose no time in doing so. “We are also examining if there are properties under benami ownership, in which case they also will be attached. Investigations are still on.”

Directorate sources suspect they have not got “fair assistance” from other investigating agencies like the Jharkhand Police.

He added that this has been a “quite a tough case” as many of the defendants, like Sanjay Choudhary, Dhananjay Choudhary, Indonesia-based Anil Vastavade and Pune-based businessman Ajay Bafna are at large and have non- bailable warrants on their heads.

“Binod could only be examined by November. Until then he has managed to continue his secret proceeds of crime and he may have destroyed incriminating documents,” the official added.

The Directorate had on March 4 filed a charge sheet at a special court in Ranchi against Koda, Binod, Vikas, Manoj Punamiya and hawala trader Arvind Vyas. Mumbai based precious-metal trader Punamiya’s revelations, under interrogation in Delhi last month, are said to be critical to the case.

The directorate is awaiting replies to its Letters Rogatories (LRs) sent to countries like Dubai, Sweden, Thailand, Indonesia and Liberia to probe illegal investments.

Koda and his associates are being probed by the Income Tax department, the CBI and Jharkhand Vigilance for a range of financial crimes.

Back home with Japan lessons

- Indians recall how people worked calmly amid quake devastation

PHEROZE L. VINCENT

Dr Abhishek Kaushik at Nishitaga Hospital in Sendai New Delhi, March 17: Indian expatriates arriving from Japan following the earthquake and tsunami say that amid all the devastation, they have learnt a lesson from the Japanese: how not to panic but to go on working. Air India and Japan Airlines have begun ferrying scores of Indians along with a few Japanese tourists. The national carrier’s flight AI 307 arrived with 309 passengers in Delhi last night. Most looked a bit shaken but were full of praise for the resilient Japanese who took the tragedy in their stride and worked at clockwork precision to get their lives back on track. Two young IT professionals working in Tokyo, who gave their names only as Rohit and Vishal, said they saw no chaos on the streets. Zubair, who too works in Tokyo, said it was mostly the foreigners who panicked... Click to follow link

Remains of the day- resentment over father-son duo in drafting committee

New Delhi, April 9: The music’s over, but unlike The Doors song, they aren’t ready to turn off the lights yet. The acceptance of Hazare’s demand of a joint drafting committee of both government and non-government representatives has opened a pandora’s box of questions from participants of his 98-hour fast.

Many refused to break their fast at 1045 AM along with 72-year-old Hazare until they were offered an explanation as to why ex-cop and activist Kiran Bedi was excluded and father-and-son laywer duo Shanti Bhushan and Prashant Bhushan were included in the committee.

Much of the 4-day street show featured activists crying hoarse over dynastic rule. Irate fasters got into verbal duels today afternoon with Swami Agnivesh, Arvind Kejriwal and Medha Patkar- whom Hazare had left behind to face the people. People jostled for the mic claiming that it was their right to ask questions after the 4-day fast.

A man got hold of the mic and asked who had elected the members of the committee. “You had the names ready when the government asked for it? You kept us in the dark about it. How can two members be from the same family,” he shouted at Agnivesh.

Agnivesh replied that Bedi had herself requested not to be part of the committee. “We couldn’t conduct polling to chose the members under the circumstances of the agitation. Chidambaram, Salman Khursheed and Sibal are big lawyers. We needed equally strong lawyers to shut them up in the meetings.” It is only a coincidence that they are father and son, he explained. Shanti Bhushan had represented Raj Narain against Indira Gandhi in 1975 and his pursued many PILs for free. Besides, they were instrumental in framing the bill.

Speaking to The Telegraph, Prashant Bhushan said that he would’ve preferred to stay out of the committee. “I wanted it to be more broad based. Retired Judges could have been included along with activists. It was Hazare and Kejriwal who insisted on my father and I being part of it as they needed legal inputs on the committee as the government has included many good lawyers.”

Those who hadn’t broken their fast in the morning, did do after Agnivesh’s speech at 330 PM with khichdi and curds. One such faster Mahipal Arya said that the challenge now was to get the bill, in the form they want, to be passed. He was sad that Bedi wasn’t in, but then “picture abhi baaki hai,” he said. At the clebrations at India Gate in the evening, many people carried posters with “Picture abhi baaki hai” written on them along with the uncharitable jibes- against Sonia Gandhi and the PM- which was characteristic of this campaign.

Agnivesh announced a conference in Delhi on June 4 and 5 of all anti-corruption activists to review the passage of the bill.

Medha bats for more power to the “people”

New Delhi, April 9: Having tasted success after the fast-unto-death led by social activist Anna Hazare, activist Medha Patkar- who has been leading the campaign against big dams on the River Narmada for 22 years- now wants a greater role for “people’s organizations” in lawmaking.

“It is not just us (activists) who want a greater role in framing laws, society as a whole wants that,” she said after the Hazare fast wound up today. Though Patkar wasn’t willing to specify if she wanted social activists nominated to the Lok Sabha in addition to the Rajya Sabha, she said that “people’s organizations” were already playing a big role in legislation, either in their drafting or lobbying or both.

“To avoid conflict the government, we want a joint drafting committee for the Development Planning Act too,” she told The Telegraph before heading to Swami Agnivesh’s office for a meeting.

The act, she said is a combination of the Land Acquisition (Amendment) Bill and the Rehabilitation and Resettlement Bill which the union government is working on. Patkar wants a comprehensive bill on both the issues.

Patkar’s demands found resonance with participants of the celebrations at India Gate and Jantar Mantar today. Akhilesh Rawat, an independent film producer, who usually supports the left parties said that he would vote for the leaders of the anti-corruption movement if they would contest for polls. “I don’t see any party that fully represents us. These people are known to be clean and I will definitely vote for them. Even if they don’t form a party they should have a greater say in law making as we don’t trust the Congress or BJP to make honest laws.”

It seems that the acceptance of a joint drafting committee will be used as a precedent, coupled with street shows to compel the government into submission. Akhilesh says that volunteers involved in the fast, will be regularly meeting. “We need to be vigilant and support whatever causes that may arise in future,” he said. Hazare and Agnivesh also exhorted the crowd to be ready for a long battle ahead.

“This is only the beginning. We cannot be complacent. As Swami Agnivesh said, there are many more struggles ahead; there are more reforms to be made,” said Hersh Vardhan- a demonstrator at India Gate.