A Response to Arundhati Roy’s “I’d rather not be Anna”
ASIA--PACIFIC, 29 Aug 2011
Dr Felix Patel – Gandhi Foundation
I’ve been up since 4am, woken by hearing Arundhati Roy interviewed on the BBC world service – they seemed to cut her critique of Anna’s failure to critique corporate roots of corruption – & connivance of the media in promoting him – rather short!
Opinions differ wildly about Anna’s integrity. Like her, I see him as authoritarian & narrow-minded. While he’s bringing into much-needed focus the enormity of corruption, he’s focusing on the main bribe-takers – i.e. the politicians – rather than the main bribe-givers – the corporations and banks, and is as rigidly insisting on rapid implementation of his own deeply flawed & authoritarian version of the Lokpal bill as the govt’s pushing its own ludicrously flawed version. Rapid implementation can be extremely dangerous if it sets up a flawed structure that will “take over the government” with even less accountability.
What we see in the Anna phenomenon is a reduction of Gandhi’s fasting technique to a ridiculous extreme, superbly manipulated by the media. I can’t agree that the essence of Gandhi was in this fasting trick though, or that a public threat to fast to death is necessarily “violent violence”. It can be sometimes I’d say “non-violent violence”. E.g. when he used it in West Bengal, when he did actually succeed in stopping massive-scale Hindu-Muslim violence through a fast-to-death that came extremely near completion, I’d say this was in a sense a homeopathic use of violence against one’s body to stop massive outer violence. Yes there was a manipulation of public opinion, but in the sense of exercising a “correct control”, bringing a mood of extreme public violence under control.
Understanding the difference between what Gandhi did & what Anna’s doing is important & instructive. Arundhati’s recent article is the first time she has used “Gandhian” in a positive sense, to make clear the difference between the two.
But the idea that Gandhi was manipulative, and did become an adept user of media-power, is also part of why Arundhati dislikes Gandhi.
On the use of public fasting, do see the Lepchas. Their fast, which has gone on in relay for 4 years, has made very little impact, probably because they are so remote, in northern Sikkim, and as Buddhists, seen as very marginal in India – unlike Anna, who taps into the mainstream Hindu aesthetic. Also marginalised because the vested interests in big dams by construction, energy & mining companies are so extreme – at the centre of the whole issue of “ecocide” that Anna’s not addressing at all.
This video [& article], better than any other I’ve seen, reveals the full horrendousness of what is actually happening to all the rivers coming down from the Himalayas.
www.hindu.com/fline/fl2512/stories/20080620251209500.htm
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bqKTIhs4E_Y
In West India, the Ganga & Yamuna descending from the glaciers have become or are becoming rivers no more, but a series of tubes chiselled through rock, leaving devastating waste and decaying ecosystems. In northeast India, 300 new big dams are being constructed on Brahmaputra tributaries in Arunachal alone – mostly already under construction to sabotage widespread protests. The Teesta is the major river in Sikkim, running north-south. This video shows the one big dam already completed with appalling impacts – 27 more are planned/under construction. It shows the Lepchas fast, and I’d say it’s an appropriate use of fasting, and deserves far more publicity.
When I tuned into the BBC world service just now at 3.45am just as Arundhati was being interviewed on Anna. What she said opened my eyes more to the heinous nature of the Anna charade. My brother had questioned “what does she mean comparing Anna with the Maoists as trying to overthrow the government?” I’d replied that partly, it’s because he’s being used by the BJP to overthrow the Congress leadership of the present government. This answer’s inadequate, partly because he’s made a public display of humiliating BJP politicians whenever they come to support him (though this doesn’t stop them coming).
She spelt out this aspect more precisely – he’s attacking the government full-on – but not the corporations or banks at all! Attacking the bribe-takers – among whom politicians are pre-eminent! But not the bribe-givers: every “AAM ADMI” [ordinary man] in India is a bribe-giver by definition – just to get routine bureaucratic work done, one has to give a bribe, so his solution is to focus on penalising the bribe-takers rather than the bribe-givers.
However the main bribe-givers are in effect, structurally, the corporations and banks – sometimes (with the latter) doing this illegally in massive bribes, but also doing this in “legal” ways, through revolving doors, corporate “largesse” and use of banking power. By not saying a word about the corruption stemming from the big companies, the World Bank & other banks (who also largely control the media) – it becomes clear who his real backers are, & why the media are highlighting him so assiduously.
In this sense, he’s truly attacking the role of government, even more than the Maoists do, but in the same way that Naomi Klein outlines in “Shock Doctrine”. In other words, what he’s really promoting seems to be the corporate state & a privatizing of government.
I’m examining these aspects more closely from now on. Attaching a document I’ve just made, highlighting statements by the 2 Anna-supporters I personally respect most, but also the confusion over details that Anna is promoting (highlighted by Arundhati on the BBC) at the same time as demanding an immediate implementation of the Lokpal bill. It’s interesting in this light that videos I’m looking at of Anna don’t seem to translate him…….. The Tehelka articles by Shoma are very revealing*, but I don’t agree with her final comments that Anna himself has complete integrity or that his intransigence on changing his own version is only a slight fault….
Go to Original – gandhifoundation.org
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if u read this comment… inbox me ur reply @ rahul_nit1988@yahoo.co.in
you see entire Anna’s movement as with maxalism ideology. if reform ideology with non violence is maxalism , u need psychiatrist. but u are blamimg his fast as ‘violent violence’, i dont know why? because this is not first time in india and earlier this kind of fast have taten place but u never spoke , but now, i dont know, through which glasses u r looking at the matter.
‘bribe taker’ and ‘bribe giver’- one is brive taker is by his own will , but bribe giver is because of compusion.
who give the bribe willingly? you! same thin apply to both aam aadami and banks & corporates. this the govt which compel the corporate houses to bribe since they(govt) want to eat more and more. they are killing the healthy competition and bidding procedures among private corporates because of corruption. stop govt.
if bribe takers are stopped, then no one need to give bribe. then where does come the question that anna’s campaign is biased?
u said that this is for politicians and beaurocrats and not for ” AAM ADAMI” can u differentiate a man working in govt office(beauro.) in daytime and at his home( aaam aadami) at night? this is system fault that has given hin dual personality. every time aam aadami is victim. same we want to eradicate this system.
you say”Rapid implementation can be extremely dangerous” this case of corruption is not new… it has been for 40 years. u like ppl who claim themselves as intellectual also never suggested any path. every time you pua an article on some web or newspaper, put ur insane points ..and try to show d ppl ” i m such a intellectual!’ whatever shit lies beneath ur hairy or bald head, keep up to u. dont throw this around bcoz whenever you throw this, it make the surroundings dirty.