Police use Gandhian methods to tackle Hazare supporters

New Delhi: It was not just Gandhian Anna Hazare urging his supporters to use non-violent methods of protest, Delhi Police were also resorting to 'Gandhian' ways to manage the thousands of Hazare supporters gathered outside Tihar Jail and Chhatrasal Stadium here Wednesday.

"The anti-riot force and police deputed are unarmed. We have also asked them to handle protesters politely," Deputy Commissioner of Police BS Jaiswal told IANS.

The police personnel, numbering in thousands, have been deployed unarmed and told to exercise maximum restraint in handling supporters of Hazare who is in Tihar Jail.

The cops have also taken several measures to keep at bay a 'Ramlila Maidan-like situation'.

The reference is to a June 5 swoop by Delhi Police on the supporters of Baba Ramdev a little past midnight when the cops fired tear gas shells and resorted to lathicharge on the people to end the yoga guru's day-old hunger strike on the black money issue.

The supporters of Hazare, who were detained from Jai Prakash Naryan Park, Raj Ghat and Pragati Maidan, were requested politely to make a queue and board the police vans. Then they were dropped off at Chhatrasal Stadium and Burari in north Delhi.

Anna Hazare still in Tihar Jail, driving a hard bargain with police

New Delhi: As evening fell upon Delhi, rush hour saw hundreds of people gathering in different parts of the Capital in support of Anna Hazare, the activist who is still in Tihar Jail after being arrested last morning.

At India Gate, nearly 5,000 marched in the second candelight vigil at this location in 24 hours, stating simply "Anna, hum tumhaara saath hain (we are with you, Anna)." The crowd of hundreds of people outside Tihar Jail was more boisterous, roaring each time word spread that the government was negotiating new terms for the mass-protest against corruption that Mr Hazare wants to hold in Delhi. As the hours passed, the police conceded more ground. Mr Hazare knows his arrest and the overwhelming public support for him has given him considerable leverage. So when the police offered him Ramlila Maidan as a new venue, he accepted; when he was asked to limit his protest's duration to 15 days, he did not. Sources say Team Anna wants the right to protest for a month.

"We are not worried, we will find a way out of this", said the Prime Minister outside his home this afternoon. However, the decision to have Mr Hazare arrested has proved to be near-catastrophic for the government. Dr Manmohan Singh's statement in Parliament this morning explaining the background to the arrest failed to placate either the Opposition or the public. The consensus is that Mr Hazare's right to hold a peaceful protest was violated.

Mr Hazare was allowed by the Delhi Police to leave jail last night, about 12 hours after he was arrested. But he turned down the offer to head out of Tihar, insisting that he wants the government to first agree that his hunger strike will not be interrupted or his protest checked as long as it remains peaceful.

Through the day, the 74-year-old who has become the totem of a people's movement against corruption consulted with his closest aides within prison. Among his visitors were spiritual guru Sri Sri Ravi Shankar and civil rights activist Swami Agnivesh. Outside, among the crowd, popular yoga guru Baba Ramdev, was seen standing atop a car.

Mr Hazare's hunger strike began last morning. Since then, he has had only water. Doctors have been examining him in prison.

The war between the government and Mr Hazare centres on the Lokpal Bill introduced in Parliament last week. The bill is meant to provide an antidote to the seemingly limitless corruption among politicians, bureaucrats and judges. Mr Hazare says the government has betrayed India by drafting a bill that has no intention of seriously and objectively investigating charges of venality. The BJP's Arun Jaitley stressed in Parliament that while his party has vast differences with Mr Hazare's suggestions for the bill, it does not agree with the "government-appointed Lokpal" that the current bill provides for.

Like yesterday, the public support for Mr Hazare played out in different cities. In Bangalore, Freedom Park saw thousands of protestors. Mumbai's Azad Maidan was also filled during the day with supporters of Anna.

Anna Hazare

Anna Hazare is one of India's well-acclaimed social activists. A former soldier in the Indian army, Anna is well known and respected for upgrading the ecology and economy of the village of Ralegan Siddhi which is located in the drought prone Ahmednagar district of Maharashtra state. The erstwhile barren village has metamorphosed into a unique model of rural development due to its effective water conservation methods, which made the villagers self-sufficient. Earlier, the same village witnessed alcoholism, utter poverty and migration to urban slums. Inspired by Hazare’s unique approach of salvaging a hopeless village, the state government has implemented the `Model Village’ scheme as part of its official strategy. Hazare is now synonymous with rural development in India.

Who is Baba Ramdev?

New Delhi: As Swamis go, he is rather young - turned 45 last year. Before Baba Ramdev became the latest crusader against corruption, he was best known for his efforts to popularise yoga among increasingly health conscious Indians.

Ramdev is largely a television and video phenomenon. He fired the imagination of an entire segment of TV watchers, who tuned out of daily soap opera to tune into and do yoga with Baba Ramdev. Now, thousands turn up at his camps to do mass yoga with him.

A wiry man with a full flowing black beard, hair parted and tied back, in red robes, the abiding vision of Ramdev is of a man demonstrating very difficult yoga asanas. He has a considerable following and people flock to his institutes in Haridwar, near Dehradun. The yoga guru claims to cure many ailments through yoga and ayurveda and has courted controversy with his claims of curing AIDS and cancer with yoga, though he later clarified that he had only said yoga helped provide relief to those with AIDS.

As his popularity has grown in the era of multiple television channels, Ramdev has found not just celebrity, but political ambition too. A year ago he announced that he would launch a new political party - the Bharat Swabhiman - to "cleanse the system." Ramdev said that he would not contest elections but that his party would contest all 543 Lok Sabha seats in the next elections on a manifesto that shall address black money and corruption as the key issues.

And those are the issues that Ramdev has brought out now. In a change of plans, he said he would launch a satyagraha instead of a party. He is do that today in the national capital. With a hunger-strike, much in the manner of social activist Anna Hazare, who had galvanized mass support with his hunger strike against corruption two months ago. Both Ramdev and Anna are part of a citizens effort to goad the government into making more stringent laws against corruption.

Ramdev was born in 1965 in a Haryana village called Alipur. He was named Ramkishan Yadav. Various biographies say Ramkishan attended school till class 8 and then joined a gurukul where he learnt Sanskrit and Yoga.

He later became a sanyasi (one who renounces the world) and took the name Baba Ramdev and began to teach yoga. He later moved to Haridwar, where he continued to offer free yoga lessons. His followers claim he has studied the Hindu scriptures deeply and even taught them in various gurukuls.

Ramdev has set up several trusts, gurukuls and foundations and conducts yoga camps and classes throughout the world. He is known for his focus on pranayama, the ancient breathing exercises that are a fundamental part of yoga.

Baba Ramdev muscled his way into India's consciousness in 1995 when his mass yoga sessions started being televised. He used his classes to preach against corruption in the system, and occasionally to promote a swadeshi ideology that was welcomed by saffron groups.

http://www.ndtv.com/article/india/who-is-baba-ramdev-109946

Anna Hazare

Kisan Baburao Hazare, popularly known as Anna Hazare (January 15, 1940), is an Indian social activist who is especially recognized for his contribution to the development of Ralegan Siddhi, a village in Ahmednagar district, Maharashtra, India and his efforts for establishing it as a model village, for which he was awarded the Padma Bhushan by Govt. of India, in 1992.