History of Anna Hazare

The name of Anna Hazare is being widely discussed all over the country for the past few days. People of all classes and regions are supporting the fast-unto-death launched by the social activist and Gandhian, demanding introduction of the Jan Lok Pal bill which provides for the appointment of an ombudsman to deal with corruption.

Anna Hazare was born in 1940 in the Maharahtra state. Because his family was poverty-stricken, he could not study beyond seventh standard. He has joined the Indian Army as a driver and has participated in the Indo-Pakistan War of 1965. He was the only survivor in a border exchange of fire while driving a truck during the war. While in the army, Anna Hazare spent his spare time reading the books of Swami Vivekananda, Mahatma Gandhi and Acharya Vinobabhave. He was inspired by these great men to become a social activist after he took voluntary retirement from the Army.

After retirement, Hazare came to his native Relegan Siddhi village in 1975 and transformed it into a role model by organizing the youth. He has set up an organization called ‘Tarun Mandal.’ He made the village alcohol-free by motivating the youth. He is the harbinger of the watershed movement in the country. He has motivated the residents of the village into Shramdan to build canals, small scale check dams and percolation tanks for watershed development. His efforts solved the problem of scarcity of water in the village. Irrigation also was made possible through people’s own efforts. He was honored by the Union Government with Paddma Bhushan in the year 1992.

The crusade of Anna Hazare against corruption is not new. He fought against corruption in Maharashtra several times and six corrupt ministers and 400 corrupt officials had to quit as a result of his fight. However, results of such individual fights are showing only temporary results and the menace of corruption could not be totally eliminated either from politics of officialdom. Corruption has been raising its...