Can Kejriwal deliver the goods?

Even with Anna Hazare nowhere in the picture, Arvind Kejriwal of India Against Corruption is going great guns. First, he attacked the Congress chief Sonia Gandhi’s son-in-law Robert Vadra over an issue that had been doing the rounds in Delhi’s grapevine for two years and written about a year ago.

Now he is training his guns on Law Minister Salman Khurshid, who, incidentally, has been the most vociferous in defending l’affaire DLF-Vadra, over the alleged misappropriation of funds in the Dr Zakir Hussain Memorial Turst. The Trust gives out appliances to the physically challenged and Kejriwal picked up the story broadcast by a TV channel. The allegations are grave indeed, even though the amount involved, about Rs 71.5 lakh, is rather small.

Of course, not for Mango people like you and me, but in comparison to the hundreds of crores our politicians and their relatives, are notorious for siphoning off. Khurshid and Louise, his wife, who is the project director of the Trust, have put forth a spirited rebuttal and heated words are being exchanged by both sides.

Khurshid says he doesn’t respond to allegations from “people on the streets” and Kejriwal says if the Prime Minister and the Congress Party don’t ensure Khurshid’s resignation, they will get a fitting reply in the 2014 elections when Khurshid will have to contest the election against a physically challenged person.

Jury out on Kejriwal

Forget the Khurshid saga, the jury is still out on Kejriwal himself. The cheering he is getting at the moment is because the mango people of India are fed up of the shenanigans and mega corruption of our politicians. By the way, I am beginning to like these words, because mango is not only an exotic but also my favourite fruit, and I’d rather be called a ‘mango person’ than the rather depressing ‘ aam aadmi ’, which doesn’t do justice to my gender.

While his sharp attacks on the people in power make much easier the job of 24x7 channels thirsty for news, he doesn’t inspire spontaneous trust that a comparatively simple-minded Anna Hazare did. And then acting as jury and judge before a trial can be launched is not only a dangerous, but also an unfair thing to do. For example, on Monday, he dismissed the inquiry ordered by the Akhilesh Yadav-led government into the allegation against the Trust run by the Khurshids.

“There is enough evidence, but who will conduct an investigation. Akhilesh Yadav? A case of disproportionate assets is pending against his father Mulayam Singh in Supreme Court. The Law Minister will appoint a government lawyer against Mulayam. Khurshid will save Mulayam Singh and Mulayam’s son will save Khurshid.”

Acid test

Rubbishing the system, however inadequate or warped, might be okay for a rebel, an activist, a rabble-rouser or cynical journalists. But not for somebody who aspires to come to power to remedy the system by contesting elections.

Even if his party makes some electoral gains in the next election on the extremely potent anti-corruption plank, what is the guarantee that Kejriwal and his men will not be sucked into the system? From all available accounts, the pot of gold at the other end of political power is indeed a mammoth one.

Even if you give the extremely righteous-sounding Kejriwal the benefit of doubt, can he offer an assurance that even in the event of an honest man heading the government, as in the present scenario, whatever power he manages to get will be dispensed by a team that is entirely made up of honest people?

I will wait before I hail Kejriwal a hero; I don’t like his swagger, arrogance and contempt for another point of view.

Malala’s courage

So, I’d rather write about the extraordinary courage of the feisty Pakistani girl Malala who dared to defy the Taliban and had them launching such a dastardly attack on her. Malala, who had been defying the Taliban and championing the girl child’s right to education, was shot in the head by the Taliban for promoting ‘western values’. Her best friend Shazia Razman, who was in the same bus, and was also shot in the shoulder and hand in the same gruesome attack, has also vowed to defy the Taliban and return to school with her friend Malala.

With the entire civil society in Pakistan, its Government and other outraged sections such as the clergy condemning the Taliban for their shameful brutality, Malala has now been flown to a British hospital for specialised care for her still critical and fragile condition. According to initial reports, she is going to need prolonged neurological rehabilitation care.

Malala, who belongs to the infamous Swat Valley of Pakistan where girls’ schools were destroyed by the Taliban some years ago, has been defying the Taliban and attending secret classes from 2009. She has also been writing an anonymous blog for the BBC championing girl’s education.

The kind of courage this teenager, the daughter of a schoolteacher, has displayed is mind-boggling and goes beyond the realm of the courage and focus required for political activism. Very few adult women have dared to defy the Taliban in either Afghanistan or Pakistan. With the Taliban swearing to attack her again, it is doubtful she’ll be able to return to Pakistan.

While girls in India do not have to put their lives on the line for the right to attend school, on the issue of women’s rights and violence against women, we have little to cheer about. Fast on the heels of the series of rapes in Haryana came the shocking news of the Haryana Panchayat khaps’ bizarre recommendation that the age of marriage of girls should be reduced to save them from rape.

And on Monday, India woke up to the shocking news of the gang-rape of a 21-year-old student of the National Law School in Bangalore, in the adjacent Bangalore University campus.

While the Vadras, Khurshids and Kejriwals slug it out under the glare of continuing media coverage, is the media, or activists, doing enough to highlight and combat such depravity and degradation in our society, is the moot question.

( rasheeda.bhagat@thehindu.co.in and blfeedback@thehindu.co.in )

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