[The Demands of Anna Hazare] Hazare's reported call on August 24 for a "gherao" of Parliament deserves conde mnation.

Adequate consideration has been shown to Anna and his suggestions. He a nd his supporters ought now to allow Parliament to function. If they continue on their present path, they will be setting dangerous precedents. Anna Hazare, howsoever well-intentioned, is functioning on the basis of certain fallacious propositions. The first dubious proposition is that elected represent atives need to do the bidding of Anna, and the large number of people gathered t o support him, on the principle of popular sovereignty. Even leaving aside the q uestions whether popular sovereignty vests in the venerable Anna alone and wheth er Anna's approach on the Ombudsman question is the only possible reasonable app roach, there is another issue here. This is that there is a difference between b eing a representative of a constituency and being its "deputee". A chosen repres entative is entitled to the use of his or her own judgement about what is in the interests of the people. That is what they are chosen for. They are not meant t o be attorneys doing a client's bidding. The second dubious proposition which a large section of the media has swallowed is that Anna's tactics, strategies and activities are party-politically neutral and reflect no tacit political affiliations. They do. This is obvious from his s elective political targeting and certifications. It is more than a little strang e that He remains silent on the question of there being no ombudsman machinery i n many states, including some states governed by the principal opposition party at the Centre.He appears to have got around this by suggesting that even in the states, the ombudsman machinery machinery ought to be created only through a par liamentary Bill, when his advisers are sufficiently well-informed on Constitutio nal matters to know that there would be questions here about Parliament's legisl ative competence to legislate on this subject in relation to individual states. The third dubious proposition that Anna is implicitly playing with is that India n parliamentary democracy may be challenged without limit even where it has give n more than adequate space to Anna and his colleagues. I think Anna is inviting trouble that could put India's democracy and constitutional dispensation, painst akingly built up, back by several decades. The fourth dubious proposition put forth by Anna is that there is a strong Gandh ian element in his activities. This does not seem to be the case. Gandhi's strug gles involved respect for his opponent. And whatever one of his religious associ ates may think, Anna needs to be reminded that Gandhi did not use fasts as a wea pon during his civil disobedience campaigns. The fasts were usually on other iss ues, not in the course of mass activity. Anna's views on the death penalty are n ot quite Gandhian. Even on the question of how long Anna would fast or remain at Ramlila Grounds th ere have been conflicting statements by Anna and his supporters. First it was to be 15 days. Then he said he would remain at Ramlila Grounds until the Bill was passed. Finally he said he would FAST until the Bill was passed. Now one of his associates has said that there must be written assurances before the fast would be broken. Anna needs to realise that he is now holding the country and its Parl iament to ransom and that too for a cause on which his demands have been substan tially conceded. I think this is most unfair and most un-Gandhi-like on his part . Now is the time to stop this tantrum before it goes any further. He may, if he prefers, think of suspending it indefinitely and re-examine the matter once the Parliamentary deliberations are over. This blog post is by Anil Nauriya, Thursday, August 25, 2011.