The seeds had been sown in the minds of the people and Team Anna would continue to raise awareness on the issue.
Every family in the country should have at least one member to fight against corruption to rid the evil, Team Anna member and retired IPS officer Kiran Bedi said here on Wednesday.
In an informal chat with The Hindu, the noted social activist who was on a visit to the city nearly half a century after her maiden visit, said it couldn't be an agitation all the time. The seeds had been sown in the minds of the people and Team Anna would continue to raise awareness on the issue. “Every family should have an Anna Hazare to root out corruption,” she said.
Asked about what she thought of Andhra Pradesh, Ms. Bedi said the situation was not any different here. “You have politics of corruption and violence, politics of divisiveness, dismal-administration and political transfers,” she said referring to how upright officers fighting against liquor mafia in the State were penalised with transfers even while bureaucrats were arrested by CBI. They had always been talking out the politician-bureaucrat nexus. Unfortunately, though such bureaucrats were in a minority, gave a bad name.
“That is why we want Lok Pal. They (the bureaucrats) are the ones not allowing effective Lok Ayuktha and Lok Pal to come,” she remarked.
On jail reforms, Ms. Bedi said the prisoner has to pay for his imprisonment and not the society. He or she should be made to pay for education inside the prison and work.
“When he leaves, he is a skilled, literate person and productive maker of the society who has not wasted his time,” she pointed out.
About the port-cum-steel city, she said the place had changed a lot since Waltair was renamed as Visakhapatnam.
“I go more often to Hyderabad as the national police academy is located there. Urbanisation has taken place since I was here in 1966 as Kiran Peshavya along with my sister Rita Peshavya to play the all-India inter-university women's tennis final.
And we won the title defeating the defending champion Karnataka,” she recalled.
Ms. Bedi said she had won the Asian tennis title in the year 1972 and was a top tennis star in the country along with Nirupama Vasant (Mankad) those days.
No thanks. I'd rather have a Mohandas Gandhi or a Henry Thoreau in my family. At the very minimum, I want a family member who is intelligent enough to understand that concentrating power in the hands of a single institution leads to more corruption.
I fully agree with Ms.Kiran bedi on this as it is the mindset of the people which needs to change & hence yes, there is a need that every house hold needs to have one hazare to root our corruption as it has to start with good family values that everyone needs to work hard be it a job or a business without trying to scam the system and get rich by taking bribes.This should start in schools as well as today's children are future citizens and leaders. Also, in Hinduism which teaches good values like truth, sacrifice, selflessness should also now teach that stealing others wealth or giving or taking bribe is a sin. The fight against corruption should be a two pronged battle - i.e fought both from the top (via a strong Lokpal) and also from the bottom by educating the people & changing the peoples mindset and mentalitand making them aware of the menance of corruption on how it destroys their own well being and that of the country as well.
Kiran Bedi's comment that every household should have one hazare to root out corruption shows the level of her understanding of the causes of corruption and the remedies against it. Her remark is in tune with anna gang's suggestion of a 'Big Brother' Lokpal watching everybody. Corruption cannot be rooted out in this manner. To root out corruption, systemic reforms are needed, not creation of yet another giant bureaucracy in the name of Lokpal or one hazare from each family. After watching all the circuses of team anna and hearing their foolish utterances, I have come to the conclusion that these people are not really interested in rooting out corruption. In fact, they want new channels of corruption to be opened up, so that they can run their shops in the name of fighting corruption.
Please Email the Editor