3 Years of UPA2 Government: Crucial Political, Economic Policies Remain in State of Drift

The Congress-led UPA2 (United Progressive Alliance) Government completed three inglorious years in office in May 2012. Given the fact that it has all but abandoned the governance of the country, constantly harangued by allies and put on the mat by the Opposition, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s regime must consider it a miracle that it is still in power. The past three years of the government have been marked by a complete paralysis in decision-making and an erosion of stature of the prime minister. Crucial political and economic policies have remained in a state of drift because there is no leadership at the top. As Prime Minister, Singh should have been directing the battle to revive the government, but he is found nowhere in the front. That is because he now leads the government only in name, and his Ministers and allies know it well.

The prime minister is in charge of neither the political agenda of the country nor its economic agenda. In other words, he is a lame-duck prime minister biding his time before he is ousted by the electorate or replaced by his party’s high command led by Congress president Sonia Gandhi. Meanwhile, everyone in the UPA Government and outside is having fun at his cost. But the headless government’s continuance is not a matter of amusement for the country, which is paying a heavy price for Singh’s pusillanimity and inaction.

Political Front

On the political front, allies are regularly issuing threats and arm-twisting the government because the Congress as a party and Singh as the prime minister have failed to reach out to their partners or allay their apprehensions on several contentious issues. The growing lack of trust between the Congress and its partners in the UPA Government — not to mention the widening divide between the government and the Opposition — has led to key decisions being either kept on hold or rolled back. Many of these decisions which have become victims of the government’s incompetence relate to the economic well-being of the people and their security. 

No amount of chest-thumping by the UPA and its acolytes over its imagined achievements is going to change the reality that the Congress-led government has failed in every way that a government possibly can. Most importantly, the government has lost the people’s trust, which is clearly evident in the results of the recently held election to five States. UPA2 is on life-support — alive but not living.

Unattended Issues

However, as Congressmen across the board will tell you, there is no real sustained debate — or at any rate, any formal putting of heads together in party fora — on how to achieve all this. The big issues, freedom of expression versus community sentiments, market versus control, etc are never thrashed out to evolve a party view.

A senior party functionary pointed out that even the A.K. Antony Report, which analyzed the Congress' performance in recent Assembly elections to five States, including U.P., will be seen only by the Core Group (whose members include Singh, Sonia Gandhi, Pranab Mukherjee, P. Chidambaram, and A.K. Antony, and Sonia Gandhi's Political Secretary, Ahmed Patel) that meets once a week.

As for the Congress Working Committee (CWC), a more representative body, it seldom meets. It is little wonder then that the Congress is now a party where senior functionaries and ministers themselves scramble for information, where intrigue replaced any world view as ideology a long time ago, and ginger groups are a thing of the hoary past.

Optimism and Reality 

It was an acknowledgment that Dr. Singh had played a stellar role in the party's spectacular victory, drawing in support not just from middle class metropolitan living rooms but rural India as well: across Uttar Pradesh, I recall voters — cutting across caste and religious lines — saying they hoped the UPA, under Singh, would return to power and steer the country through the global economic meltdown.

But three years later, as the UPA readies itself to celebrate its eighth anniversary in power, the government and its Prime Minister have lost their sheen, swamped by a slew of financial scandals, the ham-handed response to the Anna Hazare campaign and rising prices. Congressmen, not Opposition leaders, are beginning to ask whether the Sonia Gandhi-Manmohan Singh partnership has run out of steam, and whether this unique power-sharing arrangement has led to ambivalence on policy issues, crippling effective decision-making. Finally, they are even asking whether the government needs a new face to lead it to the general elections scheduled just two years away, in 2014.

Pranab Factor 

That face could have been Rahul Gandhi, the Congress yuvraj, but his own lack of enthusiasm for taking on the job at this stage, compounded by the party's disastrous showing in the recent Assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh has ensured that he will not be taking over the reins, anytime soon. It could have been Sonia Gandhi, but she made it clear in 2004, when the position was hers, that she was not going to take it. It could also have been the party's troubleshooter, its one man brains trust, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee. But most senior functionaries and ministers rule out that possibility even though a majority agrees that of those available and no Gandhi willing, he would be the popular choice in the party for Prime Minister.

Of course, the finance minister's name is currently in circulation for another job — that of the next President, and he is certainly emerging as the Opposition's popular choice for a consensus First Citizen.

NCERT Textbook Issue 

Neither is there any system in the party that can respond to the challenges of the times. The recent NCERT textbook controversy, a cabinet minister stresses, should have evoked a considered response from the party: “Textbooks,” he said, “play a key role in a democracy. The response to the objections to the Ambedkar cartoon should not have been left to the HRD ministry.” If there is no serious internal debate, the minister said, people in the party are unlikely to own decisions: the problem with allowing Foreign Direct Investment in retail, he said, is not the opposition of allies or other parties: “We ourselves haven't made up our minds, so we talk of evolving a consensus.”

Eliminating Terrorism

The Congress-led government should not demonstrate softness in approach toward terror attacks. Unfortunately, that is what the UPA has been showing all these years. Its leaders speak in different voices on the growing terrorism menace.

How long will the current state of affairs continue? After every major terrorist incident, the instinctive response of the government is to constitute a committee or form a new investigative body on top of the existing, inefficient anti-terror set-up. In the aftermath of the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks, the government realized the need for a central investigating agency to combat terrorism. As a result, with the unanimous support of all political parties the National Investigation Agency (NIA) was created. However, this agency has proved ineffective in preventing terror attacks and tracking down terrorists in the country. The 2011 serial blasts in Mumbai followed by the Delhi High Court blasts and the German Bakery bombing in Pune the previous year could neither be prevented and nor were they properly investigated. The NIA was also accused of allegedly offering bribes to name RSS members in the Ajmer blasts case.

The UPA Government wants to create another anti-terror organization called the National Counter-Terrorism Centre. It is time the government realized that bad policing cannot be supplemented with more policing. The need of the hour is to improve coordination between investigative agencies and state governments, create a more comprehensive database of suspected terrorists and streamline the anti-terror operations, rather than encroach upon the powers of the States.

The current state of affairs makes it amply clear that these extremists have no concern for development and they intend to usurp power by first dominating the countryside and then moving toward the cities. And, hence, the soft approach being taken by the government makes India an even easier target. We cannot afford being the soft state that we are. Merely pumping funds into development is not the solution to the Maoist menace. Similarly, removing or diluting the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) in Jammu and Kashmir would severely hamper the capabilities and morale of the Army.

The country is in dire need of a more nuanced approach to dealing with issues of national security. Mere half-baked policies will not succeed. Our security will continue to be compromised so long as this UPA Government tries to politicize and pressure the stakeholders in the crucial decision-making process.

Assembly Elections 2012: SP Storms Back to Power in Uttar Pradesh, SAD-BJP Creates History in Punjab, Congress Scores Hat Trick in Manipur

The Election Commission has declared results of the 2012 Assembly elections to five States. The Congress has come a cropper despite the party’s high decibel campaign in Uttar Pradesh, which was led by Congress General Secretary Rahul Gandhi and a galaxy of senior leaders, while in Goa the party has failed to reach, leave alone cross, the double-digit mark in the 40-member House, with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) sweeping the elections.
In fact, the most disastrous performance of the Congress has been in Punjab where the party had taken its victory for granted, fed by glowing feedback about its prospects from a host of sources, not excluding sections of the media.
In Uttar Pradesh it is Akhilesh Singh Yadav, the 39-year-old heir apparent of Samajwadi Party (SP) chief Mulayam Singh Yadav, in Goa it is Manohar Parrikar and in Punjab it is Sukhbir Singh. More important, voters have given their preferred parties a clear majority.
The SP’s landslide victory in Uttar Pradesh was a reflection that the electorate had turned the tables on the Bahujan Samaj Party for non-performance just the way the latter had mauled the SP in the 2007 assembly elections. The fact that both the national parties—the BJP and the Congress—failed to make an impression in Uttar Pradesh was a reflection of the desire of people at large to throw out autocratic Mayawati for which they felt the SP was her most credible adversary. The spectacular victory of the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD)-BJP combine in Punjab where the anti-incumbency factor did not work in favour of the Congress was the result of sustained hard work in wooing the electorate. In Goa, the BJP’s impressive win was a reaction to the corrupt rule of the Congress, while in Manipur, the Congress sway was never in doubt.
Uttar Pradesh
The SP — with its campaign led by Mulayam Singh Yadav’s son Akhilesh Yadav — swept Mayawati’s Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) out of power in Uttar Pradesh and left the Congress reeling.
The SP, romped home after winning 224 of the 403 Assembly seats.The SP juggernaut reduced Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati from 206 seats in the outgoing House to just 79. The BJP’s tally came down from 51 seats to 47; while the Congress, which had 22 MLAs earlier, managed to add only six more to its kitty. Its alliance partner, Ajit Singh’s Rashtriya Lok Dal, won nine seats.
Akhilesh Yadav is clearly the man of the moment at the SP headquarters. The graduation from ‘bhaiyaji’ to ‘adhyakshji’ (state president) and now the possibility of ‘mukhya mantriji’ has been a long struggle for the three-time Kannauj MP. This was a battle he fiercely fought both on the streets and inside the family quarters, emerging the winner on both fronts.
In fact, the Congress not merely lost Punjab, but was also routed by the BJP in Goa. In the hill state of Uttarakhand, a clear majority eluded both the Congress and the BJP. Pre-poll surveys had indicated a clear victory for the Congress. The only consolation for the beleaguered Congress was its victory in Manipur, where it managed to retain power.
The Congress’ defeat was all the more severe as it could manage to win only two of the 10 Assembly segments which comprise the twin Lok Sabha constituencies of Rae Bareli and Amethi, the party’s pocket boroughs since the days of Indira Gandhi. Law Minister Salman Khurshid’s wife Louise was trounced in Farrukhabad, in third place after an Independent candidate and the BJP.
BSP supremo Mayawati was perhaps the first to suspect a huge anti-incumbency factor working against her government. She thus went to great lengths in an attempt to salvage her party with a massive ‘clean-up exercise’ involving throwing out of 23 ministers and dozens of legislators and replacing more than 100 sitting MLAs weeks before the Assembly elections.
That the SP surpassed the BJP's1991 tally of 221 seats achieved during the Ram wave speaks for itself. The BSP, which was uniquely placed with a committed core vote, has only itself to blame for squandering away a rare opportunity. Mayawati restored law and order and instituted several positive measures, especially towards the uplift of the Dalit community. But her achievements faded when measured against the corruption of the administration and her own perceived arrogance. In the end, the statues she built for herself became a metaphor for the regime's obsessive self-interest.
The belated damage control to distance her party from the corruption of its leaders did not cut ice with the state’s voters. The magic which she had woven in 2007 with so-called social engineering clearly remained an empty slogan this time.
Of the 403 seats, Mayawati had this time given tickets for 88 (21.83 per cent) to the Dalits, 113 (28 per cent) to OBCs, 85 (21.09 per cent) to Muslims and 77 (19.10 per cent) to Brahmins, 33 (8.18 per cent) to Rajputs and the remaining to those from communities like the Kayasths, Vaishyas and even Punjabis.
Among the many surprises that this election threw up was the Congress being wiped out from the party's so-called fiefdom of Rae Bareli and Amethi where the Gandhi-Nehru family had put its personal prestige at stake. The most embarrassing result was in Congress President Sonia Gandhi's parliamentary constituency of Rae Bareli where the party did not win even one of the five Assembly seats. In Amethi, the constituency of Rahul Gandhi, the party managed to salvage two seats of Jagdishpur and Tiloi while conceding to the SP the remaining three seats of Amethi, Gauriganj and Salon.
Punjab
The SAD-BJP alliance made history by overcoming anti-incumbency to retain power for the second consecutive term, thus creating history in the Punjab electoral politics. By winning 56 seats on its own and with its alliance partner BJP winning 12 seats, this will be the first time in Punjab’s history that a ruling party has been voted back to power.
By wrestling 68 of the 117 Assembly sets, the Akali BJP combine has got a formidable lead over its main rival, Congress, which has won 46 seats. While three independents have won at the hustings, the Third Front under the banner of “Sanjha Morcha” has failed to get any seat.
The People’s Party of Punjab (PPP) which was part of the third front failed to open its account and its president Manpreet Singh Badal lost both Gidderbaha and Maur seats. In fact he was third on both these two seats. The SAD-BJP alliance won the contest, but several of its heavyweights fell. This includes Vidhan Sabha Speaker Nirmal Singh Kahlon and ministers, Hira Singh Gabria, Sucha Singh Langha, Tikshan Sud, Ranjit Singh Brahampura, Satpal Gosain. Arunesh Kumar, Sewa Singh Sekhwan, Upinderjit Kaur, besides others.
It was only a one per cent swing in votes that gave the SAD - BJP alliance a gain of 22 seats. The SAD-BJP alliance polled 42 per cent votes with the Congress getting 41 per cent of the vote share. The PPP got six per cent votes that damaged the Congress more than it could harm the Akali Dal. Independents and others according to initial reports secured 11 percent votes that upset many poll calculations.
Manipur
The Congress stormed back to power in Manipur for the third consecutive time with a clear majority, helped by a fragmented opposition. Manipur came as the only solace for the Congress which clinched 36 of 52 seats in the 60-member house and was leading in five of the remaining eight seats.
Chief Minister O Ibobi Singh won from Thoubal and his wife O Landhoni Devi from Khangabok.
The Trinamool Congress, part of an 11-party Peoples Democratic Alliance which came into being very recently, sprang a surprise winning seven of the 48 seats it contested. It had a sole member in the outgoing House.
Other partners of the alliance together with the Trinamool Congress were able to secure only 16 seats. The Manipur State Congress party won four, the Naga Peoples Front three and NCP and LJP won a seat each.
The BJP which contested 19 seats drew a blank. The CPI, which was a former coalition partner of the Congress in the erstwhile Secular Democratic Front failed to win a single seat.
Uttarakhand
The Congress has been set to emerge as the single largest party in Uttarakhand, enjoying an edge against ruling the BJP in a nail-biting finish for half-way mark in the elections to the 70-member Assembly.
Out of the 60 results declared so far, Congress won 27 seats and was ahead in five others while the BJP bagged 28 constituencies and led in three.
The biggest setback for the BJP was the defeat of Chief Minister B.C. Khanduri who was defeated by S.S. Negi of the Congress from Kotdwar seat by 4,632 votes.
The BSP won three seats and three independents emerged successful, thus positioning themselves as possible kingmakers. The Uttarakhand Kranti Dal-Panwar (UKD-P) won one seat.
Goa
The Congress suffered its worst-ever defeat in the Goa Assembly elections. The BJP, riding the anti-incumbency wave against the Congress-Nationalist Congress Party's (NCP) “corruption, misgovernance,” won a clear majority with 21 seats in the 40-member House. The BJP's ally, the Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party (MGP), won 3 seats. Two Independents supported by the BJP also won.
So severe was the mauling for the ruling coalition that as many as eight of the 11 Ministers, including both NCP Ministers, were defeated. While the Congress won just 9 out of 33 seats it contested, the NCP failed to get even one of the seven it contested. Five independents, two of them Congress rebels, and two MLAs of the Goa Vikas Party (GVP), a regional outfit, also won capitalising on the anti-Congress mood.
The five independents who won are Vijay Sardesai in Fatorda, Naresh Sawal (Bicholim), both Congressmen denied tickets; Benjamin Silva (Velim) and Avertano Furtado (Navelim), both supported by the BJP, and Rohan Khavtye from Porvorim.
So decisive was the mandate for the BJP-MGP combine, following a very high turnout of nearly 83 per cent, that except for Micky Pacheco, former Tourism Minister (Nuvem), and Caetano R. Silva (Benaulim), who won on the GVP ticket, no other regional outfit or new entrants like the Trinamool Congress or independents fielded by village groups could make any adverse impact.
The BJP — which hitherto got only Hindu votes, while the nearly 27 per cent Catholic population looked at it with suspicion and traditionally rallied behind the Congress-NCP alliance — for the first time found a massive mandate from across the communities.
Other Perspective

Undoubtedly, the 2012 Assembly elections have been free and fair, and the Election Commission deserves all the kudos. But when money, caste and religion come into play and make a mockery of polls, can they be called free and fair?
The poll results for the state Assemblies of Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Punjab, Goa and Manipur cannot hold much cheer for the Congress, which heads United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government at the Centre. Barring the state in the Northeast, where the party retained its government with a thumping victory, in the other states its performance has been well below par.
The UPA government had come under considerable pressure on a variety of counts for the past one in particular — the high prices of goods of everyday consumption, the breaking of corruption scandals which fed the anti-Congress Anna Hazare campaign whose reverberations were felt throughout the country, and the political oneupmanship of UPA partners, particularly the Trinamul Congress, which stopped the government from pushing a policy quotient that might have brought credit to the government and the Congress as a party. For the Congress, the negative implications of these developments have not been politically neutralised through face-saving poll results at the state level in elections taking place approximately half way through the second term of the UPA.
Demand of the Situation
All eyes will now be on the Manmohan Singh government at the Center which has run half its term. The UPA has indeed been in a state of siege with a surfeit of corruption scandals sullying its image. If the Congress-led combine was looking for redemption from this round of assembly elections, the results are a major disappointment. The fact that the SP does not need Congress support in the State would render its support to the UPA uncertain. In the event of Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress pulling the rug from under UPA’s feet, the federal government could face a crisis of survival if the SP support is not forthcoming.
The common people have been unsparing in their verdict on several outgoing ministers, refusing to elect them. Several Congress heavyweights, including the outgoing Deputy Leader of the Congress Legislature Party, have also been rejected. Personal nominees of former chief minister Narayan Dutt Tiwari, who is said to have arm twisted the party into fielding them, have lost and so have the young faces from the Youth Congress, foisted ostensibly at the insistence of Rahul Gandhi.
However, that is not how the people will perceive the performance of the Congress whose campaign was led from the front by Rahul Gandhi. Bagging 28 seats for the party after addressing 218 election rallies in 48 days is not something that he can flaunt as electoral success.
It can be said that the present Assembly election results as stunning would be an understatement given that incredible stories have emerged in at least three of the five States that went to the polls over the past six weeks. In other words, the verdict is a devastating blow to the Congress.
Results At A Glance
Uttar Pradesh: (403) SP 225, BSP 79, BJP 47, Congress 28, RLD 9, Others 15
Punjab: (seats 117) SAD 56, BJP 12, Congress: 46, Others 3
Manipur: (60) Congress 42, AITC 7, NPF 4, MSCP 5, LJSP 1
Uttarakhand: (70) Congress 32, BJP 31, BSP 3, Others 4
Goa: (40) BJP 21, Congress 9, MGP 3, Others 7

Lokpal Bill: Political Parties, NGOs Come Under Scanner

The United Progressive Alliance (UPA)-led federal government has finally introduced in the Lok Sabha the much-debated Lokpal Bill. The Bill envisages creation of anti-graft institutions at the central as well as state levels with a provision for including marginalised minorities and other sections as members.
The government also introduced a separate bill for amending the constitution to confer constitutional status to the proposed institutions.
About New Bill
The all new Lokpal Bill has provisions to probe corruption charges not just against the prime minister and ministers but also against managers, secretaries and directors of religious institutions and political parties that receive donations from the public.
The new clause appears to imply that the Lokpal can inquire into complaints of corruption against managers of temples, gurdwaras, mosques and churches, even sports clubs or any other association which accepts donations from the public.
All NGOs that receive annual grants of more than Rs 10 lakhs under the Foreign Contribution Regulation Act, 2010 will be under the Lokpal and so will all political parties, because they also receive donations from the people. The catch-all clause would conveniently cover Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) like Parivartan,which Arvind Kejriwal, member of Team Anna, heads and even the NGO being run by another Anna colleague Kiran Bedi and others that reportedly receive funds under FCRA.
But the government has ensured some balance in the provision by offering the coverage of political parties as well. A political party under RPA 1951 is defined as “an association or a body of individual citizens of India registered with the Election Commission as a political party under Section 29 A.” The clause is wide enough to cover all sports clubs or any group of people working for any cause.
Salient Features
* The Lokpal's writ will extend to the Prime Minister (with some exclusions), Ministers, current and former MPs (except in respect of what they say or how they vote in the House), and group A, B, C, and D officers and officials of the Central government.
* Fifty per cent of the members of the Lokpal and Lokayuktas shall be from amongst Scheduled Castes (SCs)/ Scheduled Tribes (STs), Other Backward Classes (OBCs) and women. “Minorities” was added to this quota in the corrigenda circulated to MPs shortly before the introduction.
* NGOs and institutions receiving donations of more than Rs. 10 lakhs per annum from foreign sources will also be covered.
* Lokpal to have constitutional status and be accountable to Parliament
Though some of the suggestions made by social activist Anna Hazare and his supporters find reflection in the new draft, the UPA government's Lokpal continues to differ on several key points from Team Anna's version:
* Government nominees have a majority of one on the selection committee, which will choose the Lokpal's chairperson and eight members
* The CBI will continue to remain under the administrative control of the government and not the Lokpal.
* The judiciary and the citizens' charter are not part of the Lokpal but will be covered by other laws
Provisions Under Old Bill
The old Bill covered the prime minister only after he demitted office and bureaucrats of under secretary level and above. But the new draft law covers all Group A, B, C, D public servants, allowing the Lokpal to inquire corruption by lower bureaucracy, as sought by Team Anna. Others covered are MPs (except for conduct inside Parliament), ministers, government funded associations and NGOs receiving over Rs 10 lakh annual funding under the Foreign Contribution Regulation Act.
The new Bill comes quite close (except on the issue of citizen’s charter) to the ‘Sense of the House’ statement issued on August 28 at the height of Anna’s agitation. The statement had stated, “The Houses agree in principle that an effective Lokpal law must cover corruption by lower bureaucracy through appropriate mechanisms, have an in-built grievance redress system and provide enabling laws to establish Lokayuktas in states.”
The present Bill (unlike the old one) provides for Lokayuktas and the Constitutional (116th) Amendment Bill, 2011, introduced, mandates states to adopt Central Lokpal and Lokayuktas law, a provision Sushma Swaraj slammed as anti-federal and an encroachment on the rights of the states, some of which already have Lokayuktas.
Although the Lokpal will have its own Inquiry and Prosecution wings and won’t require prosecution sanction, it would not control the CBI as Anna wanted. It can ask the CBI for preliminary inquiry (PE) and investigation into complaints but the Bill clarifies, “Lokpal will have powers of superintendence over Delhi Special Police Establishment (CBI) in respect of matters referred to it for PE or investigation and can’t direct it to conduct inquiry in a particular manner.”
The Bill says the Lokpal will, after deciding on PE, refer complaints against all government officers to the Central Vigilance Commission (CVC). While the CVC will submit a report to Lokpal for prosecution of Group A/B officers, for Group C/D public servants, it will conduct its own prosecution under the CVC Act, 2003, and send periodic action taken reports to Lokpal. This recommendation was made by Congressman Abhishek Manu Singhvi-led parliamentary panel?s December 9 report on the Lokpal Bill.
The Bill also does not have an inbuilt grievance redress system as Anna wanted. It makes the Lokpal and Lokayuktas final appellate authorities in cases of non-delivery of public service due to corruption but doesn’t guarantee service delivery through Lokpal.
Opposition Against the Bill
Several parties, including the main Opposition Bharatiya Janata Party, and the Shiv Sena, the Samajwadi Party (SP), the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) and the AIADMK opposed introduction of the Bill in the current form. The RJD, the SP, and the AIADMK were also opposed to bringing the Prime Minister within the purview of the Lokpal which, they contended, would not be “accountable” to anyone. They were also vociferous in their opposition to a provision which made it mandatory for States to set up Lokayuktas, contending it was an infringement on the “federal structure” and encroachment on the powers of a State government.
The problem, though, now lies outside it. If Hazare's efforts have brought the Lokpal issue where it has now, it would be unfortunate if the same Mr Hazare, out of some millennial spite that mistakes accommodation for weakness, sets off on a different agenda altogether. For at stake here is not who won and who didn't - defining which is about politics, not law-making - but whether a necessary anti-corruption law.

Deteriorating Political Situation in Bangladesh

Two types of fear have been expressed involving Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and Leader of the Opposition Begum Khaleda Zia. Apprehensions have been expressed that Begum Khaleda Zia might be arrested. And if this happens, a big disaster might loom large in the political sky of the country. Moreover, a fear has been expressed over the life of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina. Both the fears have been expressed by senior leaders of the two major parties led by the two women leaders of the country.
Country's Political Arena
People ranging from politically conscious individuals to common masses have become worried as apprehensions were expressed about the two prime leaders of the country's political arena. Because these two women leaders are controlling the country's politics. Everything in the country is dependent on the two leaders. And as a result, the fears about the two leaders have crated unease and anxiety among different quarters.
Political parties under the leadership of the main opposition party -- the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) -- have already announced that they would build a tougher movement in the streets after the upcoming Id on the issues of price hiking of commodities, deterioration of law and order, gas, electricity and water crises, dilapidated condition of roads and highways across the country and signing of secret deals with India.
The leaders from different rallies and meetings have announced that this government will be dislodged from power through a tougher movement under the leadership of BNP Chairperson Begum Khaleda Zia. In the wake of this, BNP leaders allege, the government is conspiring to arrest Begum Khaleda Zia in connection with a case relating to misappropriation fund of Zia Charitable Trust.
Anticountry Agreement
At first BNP Standing Committee Member Goeshwar Chnadra Roy at a discussion meeting at the National Press Club said the government was conspiring to arrest Begum Khaleda Zia. He said that the government signed anticountry agreement with New Delhi during Indian Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh's visit to Bangladesh. He said that the government was planning to arrest the opposition leader so that the people of the country could not build movement to resist the agreements against national interest under the leadership of Khaleda Zia. According to him, the government is planning to arrest her to appease India.
Subsequently many senior BNP leaders have also alleged that the government is conspiring to arrest Begum Khaleda Zia. Issuing an warning in this regard, Jatiyatabadi Juba Dal president said, "The government will not be able to detain Begum Khaleda Zia in any prison of the country. If Khaleda Zia is arrested, this government will be ousted from power through a tougher mass movement."
Spreading Violence
A severe reaction was created in the political arena following expression of apprehension about the arrest of Begum Khaleda Zia. The BNP is taking preparations for building movement in the streets in the event of the government taking such a step. Political analysts believe the ongoing movement against the government might turn violent if Khaleda Zia is arrested.
Meanwhile, a more serious matter of concern than the arrest of the opposition leader and spreading of violence out of the event has been expressed by the ruling Awami League General Secretary and Local Government Minister Syed Ashraful Islam and Prime Minister's Education Adviser Dr Alauddin Ahmed.
Ashraful Islam has disclosed a more direct apprehension in this regard. At a discussion meeting he said a conspiracy has begun in the country to kill Prime Minster and Awami League Chief Sheikh Hasina. He disclosed the apprehension at a discussion meeting organized by the Awami League at Bangabandhu International Conference Centre in the capital Dhaka.
The discussion was organized under the chairmanship of Awami League Presidium Member Syeda Sajeda Chowdhury on the occasion of the 21 August 2004 Grenade attack. At the meeting Syed Ashraful Islam said a conspiracy was being hatched to prepare the grounds for killing Sheikh Hasina through destabilizing the country's situation. He said grounds were also prepared in 1975 through various conspiracies to kill Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.
Describing the recent movement of the opposition parties as the conspiracy to prepare the ground for killing Sheikh Hasina, Ashraful said we admit the rise in the price hike of essentials and dilapidated condition of roads and highways in the country. But a quarter is out to create an anarchic situation on the issues to destabilize the country.
Conspiracies Hatched
The Awmi League Leader said repeated conspiracies were hatched in the past to kill Sheikh Hasina and the conspiracies are still going on. He said we have to protect Sheikh Hasina. For this reason, he said, the leaders and workers of the Awami League will have to face the situation in a united way.
The minister has termed as 'part of the conspiracy' the publication of articles in different media that Bangladesh needed anti-corruption personality like Anna Hazare of India. He said some newspapers are searching for Anna Hazare. He said some of the TV channels are presenting events smearing color to create a destabilizing situation in the country. This is also part of the conspiracy so that the conspirators get the chance to kill Sheikh Hasina.
Syed Ashraful Islam said a particular quarter is searching for Anna Hazare in Bangladesh with an ill motive. He said our country has a government, the parliament and democracy. He wanted to know whether the government here is plunged into so deep in corruption. The minister said the government has not committed such crimes that warrants searching for an Anna Hazare in this country.
Syed Ashraful Islam also considers as part of the conspiracy the uproar created within the ruling party in the wake of failures of the government in different sectors. He urged the party leaders and workers to remain vigilant against the conspiracies and said a conspiracy is being hatched to crate division in the Awami League. The local government minister said attempt are being made to create deficiency in confidence among us.
He said a particular quarter is trying to reap benefit after creating division and conflicts between leaders and leaders, MPs and MPs and the party and the government.
Issuing a note of warning to the Awami League leaders and workers, Syed Ashraful Islam said still we have time to forge unity. It will not do if we allow ourselves drifting away. Sharing of power is not our main target.
National Interests
In this regard, Jahangirnagar University Professor Dr Tareq Shamsur Rahman said recently that the apprehension expressed by the senior leaders of the two parties about the two top women leaders is a matter of concern. It will not be in the interest of the country if anything bad happens to any one of the two leaders.
Shamsur Rahman said lawsuits have been filed against the leader of the opposition party. He said a severe agitation will spread among millions of BNP workers and supporters if she is arrested. And this will make violent the ongoing movement against the government. He said none is expecting such a situation in the country.
However, a serious anxiety has been created in the wake of apprehension expressed by important ministers of the government and the ruling party general secretary Syed Ashraful Islam about the plot to kill Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina. He said the minister should present before the nation the conspiracy of the killing the Prime Minister. He also called for taking necessary measures to unearth the conspiracy to kill the prime minister. Because, he said the lack of security of life of the prime minister is very damaging for the country.

Government, Opposition Parties Lack Willpower To Curb Corruption

Corruption has been a powerful focus for movements in the past, and battling it is a global idea. In our neighborhood, "corruption" has been used by army generals in Pakistan, Bangladesh and even Myanmar to do away with elected governments. Latin America was assaulted by corporates from the United States, for centuries, arguing that the "corruption" of the local elites in mismanaging the boundless possibilities of resources justified annexations and invasions, generating the fascinating term "banana republic."
Fixing the generically "corrupt" is a win-win at the moment. It is heretical to question it. Yet, there is a deep tussle over the central idea that is at the heart of what "corruption" is.
In the late 19th and early 20th century, there were ideas of freedom from corruption and the tyranny of the state, as economists like Friedrich von Hayek and even David Ricardo understood the phrase. Adam Smithian ideas rested on the freedom of entrepreneurship, under a benign law-and-order minimalism. The Depression of the 1930s and the economics and politics of the World Wars brutally reconfigured these ideas. Keynesian notions were on the necessity of broadening the ambit of the state; and, over the years, freedom from the tyranny and "corruption" of private profit, as opposed to social good, was in currency. The anti-milawat and anti-mehangaai agitations in India, for example, in the late sixties, found a focus at the doors of traders, as seen in several of the popular movies of the time that villainised the shopkeeper.
However, as the world changed once again, with the collapse of the Soviet Union and its empire, caused by "corrupt" and bureaucratic insensitivities and the negation of personal freedoms there, free enterprise was once again a winner. But now, the mood in Europe and elsewhere, particularly its annoyance at corruption and malfeasance, is also demanding freedom from unregulated, self-serving business interests. After Lehman and Madoff, the West is introspecting not only on the role of corporations but also that of NGOs, and the need for accountability and transparency in the causes they front and the shows they put up. Scrutiny is not simply limited to the state.
In India, after two decades of economic reforms, there is a flourishing private sector. But this agitation is not quite clear about what and whose corruption it is so doggedly opposed to? CII, FICCI, big industries and several corporations, in a fabulous PR move, were the first to get off the block and ride the Anna annoyance wave. It has been a smart move to pre-empt the identification of other sources of corruption.
Fight Against Growing Menace
While Anna Hazare is fighting nonviolently against corruption with strong willpower with the support from the people of the country, the manner in which people's representatives sitting in the country's Parliament are fighting against corruption, neither is there honesty in it, nor will power.
The manner in which both sides put their points across on corruption issue on 24 August in both houses of Parliament; there were more things against each other than against corruption. Both sides tried their best to humiliate each other, which is utterly shameful. You can never fight decisively against corruption with such attitude.
Role of Congress
The Congress has, since 2004, argued for a redefinition of the role of the state in India, and seen it as a crucial vehicle for the uplift of those below the breadline. Their understanding of rural poverty programmes; their social vision; even their understanding of the Maoist problem stem from a concept that there is too little of a "good and effective" state.
The Two Indias idea -- one India desperately needing redress and programs, food security, employment guarantees, a right to information and freedom even from private contractors, with a dutiful state being refashioned to allow aspirations to take flight -- is the bedrock of this idea and its politics. The fact that these two ideas were interwoven (either cleverly or by chance) before the 2009 elections, and that they clicked, should have provided the regime an impetus to push ahead and aggressively question whether the narrow focus on a particular sort of corruption of this movement was at all fair.
Rigid Stance
There is lack of willpower in the ruling parties and opposition parties both. The elected representatives have made the biggest contribution in encouraging corruption. During the debate, MPs admitted partially that corruption is growing under the present system. The institutes that are established to prevent corruption are themselves encouraging it. Therefore, change in the system is essential, otherwise, in the coming days, people of the country would never forgive political parties and elected representatives.
Hazare's Proposal
The question now is: How to rein in corruption? Had the government taken such concrete steps, there would have been no need for Anna Hazare to agitate. Hazare's proposal of the Jan Lokpal bill is a step in the direction of preventing corruption, which is unacceptable to the government. The task of enacting the law is of the Parliament. It is supreme, but one would also have to think about the kind of mentality and character those sitting in Parliament have.
Had the MPs and ministers been honest, there would not have been such big scams in the country today. That is why they are also talking about bringing the behavior of MPs inside Parliament also under the ambit of the Lokpal. Political parties would have to clarify their policy on the corruption issue. Political parties themselves are unclear. The offer of resignation by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)MPs Yashwant Sinha and Shatrughna Sinha is an example of the party's dual character. Not only the BJP, but all other parties also have such dual character. They would have to correct this character.

Impasse on Lokpal Bill

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's statement in both houses of Parliament over social activist Anna Hazare's arrest is disappointing and causes concern. It is clear from his statement that he is not only unaware of the country's ground realities; he also does not realize the big mistake his government has made. It is ridiculous that his government is committing one mistake after another and he is trying to show as if everything is being done in a legal manner.
Government's Obstinacy
After how much more disgrace would the federal government realize that its prestige is being ruined and that the government has become a subject of ridicule inside and outside the country?
Despite condemnation of Anna Hazare's arrest by all, the manner in which the prime minister tried to justify the action taken by the Delhi police only shows the federal government's obstinacy. Could there be anything worse than the prime minister stating conditions imposed by the police as right, which is indicative of a dictatorial system from every angle?
Fighting Corruption
It is not surprising that the prime minister opposed the Jan Lokpal bill, (citizens' Ombudsman bill) but how could he support the government draft of the Lokpal bill? It is not only a weak bill, but it is also a symbol of deceit with the people. It is because of this toothless and watered down bill that people are compelled to conclude that the government is deliberately refraining from putting in place a capable system of reining in corruption. Does the federal government have any answer why such a diluted draft of the Lokpal bill was prepared despite talking big about fighting corruption? It is because of this deceit that people of the country are on the streets today.
No matter how much the federal government calls itself committed to fighting corruption, the fact is that nothing is being done that would reassure people that the government is concerned about growing corruption. Since it is the Parliament's task of enacting the law, the civil society would also have to understand its limitations. The manner in which a weak and useless Lokpal bill is not acceptable to the civil society, similarly the civil society does have the right to impose the Jan Lokpal bill on Parliament.
Solutions to Problems
Democracy has some laws of its own and solutions to the problems can be found only within their ambit. When the civil society under Anna Hazare's leadership has brought the egoistic federal government on its knees, and undoubtedly it has lost its splendor, all efforts now should be made to pave the way for enacting an effective Lokpal bill.
Undoubtedly, the responsibility to find a way out rests with the ruling party, but that does not mean that the opposition remains restricted to maligning the government. Like the ruling party, if the opposition too were to say that the Jan Lokpal bill is not acceptable to it, how would the deadlock be broken? It is not only necessary but essential that there is fresh dialogue between the political leadership and civil society and its intention this time should not be to deceive the country.

Communal Violence Bill

Social worker Anna Hazare's struggle against corruption and scams was applauded by one and all. Muslims also supported the cause as every citizen has been suffocating with the corrosive decease. However, Muslims hope Anna could raise his voice about another poison communalism. Quite often this disease is internal but at times it comes from outside. Internally, our compatriots behave with discrimination and treats Muslims brethren suspicious.
Victim of Discrimination
The British for their vested interests had sowed the seeds of hatred and division between Hindus and Muslims which got deep rooted and is still prevalent. Being Muslim, they do not get employment in government and private sectors; they don't get flats in housing societies. When four men are talking and fifth man as Muslim come, they stop talking. Muslims become the victim of discrimination at all levels, as a result of which they feel suffocated.
Jawaharlal Nehru was the last secular prime minister who left most of the jobs incomplete. Communalism is a big problem, it devastates lives and properties, but the same frenzy subsides after a few days. The dream of minority and majority living together in consonance must come true.
Salient Feature
Showing concern on this sensitive issue, Congress President Sonia Gandhi has come out to move the communal and targeted the violence bill. The object of this bill is to provide protections to religious and lingual minorities, backward classes and tribal people. A National Authority will come to existence through the bill. The salient feature of the bill is the provisions of five-year imprisonment to police officers who fail to curb communal violence. The bill provides compensations of Rs.1.5 million to the next of kin of the deceased.
Harsh Mander, member of National Advisory Council, says that like the Right To Information Act, government officials will be accountable for the lapse. The Communal Violence Bill has been hanging since 2005. After the formation of the National Advisory Council, all aspects of the bill were discussed. Now the text of the bill will be presented before the prime minister. It will be a big day when Sonia Gandhi's vision will come to its practical shape and will emancipate the country from this execrable enormity.