G Sampath

So the Baba was manhandled and forcibly evicted from the Ramlila grounds. It's terrible, undemocratic, and condemnable. But c'mon, his "forcible eviction" was not nearly as "barbaric" as the brutality unleashed by the state against Indian citizens living in unconventional housing (also known as 'slums') in areas like Mumbai's Golibar every other day. "I have never faced such violence and atrocity in my entire life," said the Baba. Well, hello! Wakey, wakey! The police in India thrashes you first, asks questions later — that is what life is like for the vast multitudes in India who can't afford to seek salvation in sarvangasana. At least the cops didn't thrash the Baba. I'm guessing Kapil Sibal didn't entirely have his way.

Unlike what the BJP is claiming, this is no Emergency, but it is something as bad: the slow, painful throttling of a fledgling citizens' movement against an unscrupulous, arrogant, morally bankrupt political class that is convinced of its god-given right to loot the country with impunity.

Baba Ramdev was never, and could never be, a civil society representative — something Team Anna chose to ignore in their eagerness to acquire numbers at the expense of principle. People landed up at Jantar Mantar to support Anna's campaign because they believed in his issue. But I don't believe the lakhs of supporters the Baba enjoys are driven primarily by a passion to recover black money — they turned up at Ramlila maidan more because they believe in their Baba, and will do what he tells them to do, and this includes voting as he tells them to vote.

Ramdev's political gameplan

I find it interesting that it was Kiran Bedi's brain wave (so says Devinder Sharma, one of the founding members of India Against Corruption)to involve Baba Ramdev in the Lokpal campaign. In a debate on Times Now last week, when I argued that the Baba was sabotaging the Lokpal campaign by suddenly calling for the exclusion of the PM from the purview of the Lokpal (he backtracked, but the damage was done by then), Bedi kept insisting that the Baba and Anna were 'united' in their fight against corruption. Well! Did anyone spot Anna (or anybody else from his team) at the Ramlila maidan on Saturday? It was suggested that a vastly strengthened Baba and Anna will fight graft together — I say, that's not gonna happen. If Team Anna hopes to retain any support at all from the average non-communal citizen, they can no longer afford to share a platform with the Baba.

In the same programme, I also argued that the Baba was basically seeking to become a right-wing, Hindutva alternative to the BJP — as opposed to a secular alternative, a space already occupied by the Congress and the dubious Third Front. The events of the past 48 hours seem to bear out this thesis.

In a span of two days, the entire anti-corruption agenda has transformed, from being a civil society vs govt battle, into a BJP-Sangh vs govt one. From being a battle between the citizenry and the political class, to a family squabble within the political class, in the process turfing out civil society from the debate. The BJP, which till yesterday, was nowhere on the anti-corruption agenda, was suddenly on every TV channel on Sunday, its leaders yakking away about how it was they who had first raised the black money issue and the Baba had just taken it forward.

Saffron, with a tinge of grey

Given the nature of his demands, many of which were over the top — death penalty for the corrupt, banish all high denomination notes, etc — it was evident that the Baba had already made up his mind to go ahead with the fast no matter what.

Black money, for the Baba, is not an issue so much as a handle that could catapult him into political centre stage. Contrary to his proclamations, his fast was not about black money, it was about flexing his political muscle and sending a message to the neta log — that he does command a sizeable vote bank. His volunteers, at 20 lakh, are said to outnumber even those of the RSS. But while Ramdev has always maintained links with the Sangh Parivar, he wants to be less a family member and more a powerful family friend. He will not be just another entity under the Hindutva umbrella, like the Sena or the Bajrang Dal. He may not want to be the PM, but he will be the PM-maker, the king-maker, as they say.

That's why, just as he talks to the RSS, he will also talk to the Congress. He is saffron, but it is a saffron born out of the gene pool of a chameleon. It is a saffron tinged with grey, a shade that, depending on the political climate, will reflect a different colour. The Congress, for example, can never form an electoral alliance with the BJP. Neither can the BJP form an alliance with the Congress or the Left. Right now, blatantly cross-ideological alliances can only be formed at the state-level, but not at the Centre. But Ramdev wants to be that pan-Indian entity with whom both the Congress as well as the BJP can do business. Hence his anxiety to have saffron elements on board, and at the same time maintain a distance from them. In the process, he has left both the Congress and the civil society reps looking foolish.

I got a direct sense of the man from the responses to my previous blog on him, 'Baba Black Sheep, have you lost your mind?' Many were manifestly from the Baba's supporters. One chap said I was criticizing the Baba because I myself had black money stashed away in a Swiss bank. I wish his information was true, and I had the account number. Others speculated that I must be on the payroll of the Congress, despite my calling the Congress all kinds of names. Again, as an underpaid hack, how I wish it was true. What with the inflation and everything, basic necessities like dal, chawal and cocaine have become unaffordable these days. But the comment that really shamed me into my senses came from a guy who said I wrote the blog just "to impress a few girls around me", adding, presciently, "but I doubt they really care!!" As he had predicted, the girls weren't impressed. I am guessing they were more impressed with Baba Ramdev.

For it is hard not to be impressed with a man who graduated from a bicycle to a private jet in a matter of 18 years — I think even Dhirubhai Ambani took longer. It is hard not to be impressed with a man who managed to pull a fast one on such seasoned politicians as P Chidambaram and Kapil Sibal. And it is even more impressive how he managed to zero in, and tap, the one weakness of every political/non-political formation to push his own private agenda.

Does anyone remember the Lokpal Bill?

The Congress' weakness was that it was over-anxious to cut Anna down to size: Ramdev helped them do that. The BJP needed a solid stick to beat the Congress with — he has given them that stick. Team Anna needed a quick fix way to increase the numbers for their Lokpal campaign — he gave them what they wanted by calling on his followers to pitch in. In the process, the Congress has ended up looking panicky, draconian and stupid. Civil society has lost majorly, with the Lokpal campaign pushed to the sidelines. The hitherto inconsequential BJP is desperately trying extract political mileage from the quasi-holy mess, but I have a feeling it won't amount to much. The only entity that has emerged bigger and stronger from the entire tamasha is the Baba himself. I don't know if there is an asana equivalent of sitting pretty — but he is in that pose right now, playing the victim, with the nation's sympathy for the atrocities he's had to endure.

Anyway. So, where does this leave...what do you call that...err... the Lokpal Bill? I can hardly remember its name now, it all seems so long ago. Jantar Mantar in April could have been on another planet.

What interests me, watching these events unfold, is how a simple, but powerful, citizens' movement, led by committed individuals, aiming for a specific goal — a strong Lokpal Bill to curb corruption among politicians and babus — has been sought to be crushed, sullied, discredited, split, hijacked, and brushed off the national agenda.

To sum up, the entire Ramdev phenomenon has replaced the issue with a personality, which suits the Congress, and all political parties, rather well. The challenge now is to get the national focus back to the core anti-corruption issue: passing a non-joke version of the Lokpal Bill. But that would entail not getting distracted by what happened, or will happen, with Baba Ramdev.