Medha Patkar, Aruna Roy Ask Anti-Corruption Crusader to Retract Statement
Manoj Mitta | TNN
New Delhi: For all his damage-control efforts, Anna Hazare's praise for Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi has emerged as a touchstone, however unwittingly, for determining the political character of the Jan Lokpal movement.
Adverse reactions from his own supporters indicate that civil society is not satisfied with Hazare's clarification that he had patted Modi only in the context of rural development and that, as a Gandhian, he was opposed to communal disharmony.
Hazare is under pressure to come up with a more direct denunciation of Modi because many of the proponents of the Jan Lokpal Bill see the ongoing cover-up of the 2002 riots, by not just the Gujarat police but also the Supreme Court-appointed special investigation team, as an egregious form of corruption.
A statement signed by, among other civil society stalwarts, Medha Patkar, Aruna Roy, Sandeep Pandey and Kavita Srivastava, said that Hazare's endorsement of Modi was "unfortunate and unacceptable''.
Besides recalling his alleged complicity in the riots, the statement issued on Tuesday under the banner of the National Alliance of People's Movements (NAPM) questioned the Modi regimes's claims to have done well in rural development and in combating corruption.
Urging Hazare to be vary of Modi's tendency to divide secular forces, NAPM said that the Gujarat government's lack of commitment to probity is evident from its failure to appoint a Lokayukta for over six years even as it is selling land to a clutch of industrialists at throwaway prices leading to scams and displacement and livelihood problems for the poor.
“The common people of India have supported the battle against corruption with faith in our campaign and credibility as people's movements based on the core values of equity, justice, democracy, secularism and plurality,” NAPM said, adding, “This should not be compromised at any cost.”
Hazare clarifies again; Gujarat doesn’t buy it
Civil society organisations in Gujarat have refused to buy Anna Hazare's clarification on Narendra Modi in response to an open letter to him from dancer and activist Mallika Sarabhai on behalf of activists from the state. While Hazare again reiterated that he did not endorse communal disharmony and discrimination on religion or caste lines and cited among his supporters the likes of Archbishop of Delhi and Mufti Shamoon Qasmi, Vadodarabased environment and human rights activists Rohit Prajapati and Trupti Shah wrote another letter to Hazare saying: "Your vague clarification is only related to communal harmony and politics, which is not we in Gujarat raised for you in our letter on Monday, while pointing out that your praise of Modi's development model is misplaced.'' They said Hazare's endorsement of Modi's development prompted Modi to write an open letter to him telling him of a "vilification campaign". "We hope you realise the implications of endorsement now,'' they wrote in their letter on Tuesday. TNN
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