This term always comes to my mind when I think of the "India against corruption" / "Jan Lokpal" movement.
I do believe in the need for a popular movement to eliminate corruption in our country. Government-driven reforms are unlikely to stop corruption, because those have an inevitable conflict of interest - the cat cannot purchase a bell for itself. The onus is on the victims of corruption - the people - to push for meaningful and sustainable reforms. In that, I firmly believe that IAC is our best hope in a long time for a popular push.
But I am also quite disenchanted by the way the leadership of IAC has been pursuing its agenda. I keep seeing that they are willing to compromise their means so long as they find their ends justified. I find their strategy of promoting Anna as the symbolic leader of the movement to be not unlike the Congress keeping the Gandhi family. It is an open secret that Anna hardly contributes to the strategy or direction of the movement - he is just a front to the less-popular-and-more-controversial leaders really driving it. I do not accept the way they slander and mock our representatives with personal insults. If we may not find the system that elected them to be fair, we should oppose the system, not the people who followed this democratic system and got elected. Slandering them, accusing them of unproven things, is fairly comparable to the lies we believe politicians say. Recently, I saw an IAC leader putting up an MP's mobile number online, so that people can bug him till he concedes. Is that a sign of decency?
I also see people trying desperately to spin situations to show that IAC had contribution to election results, even when the opposite is obvious. If IAC wishes to pursue a noble aim, it must maintain honorable behavior. We should find no shame in admitting our failures. Making efforts is in our control, results are not.
But it seems that, being made of humans, IAC is prone to face moral conflicts. I strongly believe that how its leaders resolve these moral conflicts will determine the success of the movement. If they resort to cheap tactics that they claim their corrupt opponents play, they may find initial support, but that will waver over time, and we can already see that. If they choose noble and decent means, i.e. abide by saadhan shuddhi, they may find initial difficulties, but they will undoubtedly succeed in their mission.
Fortunately for us, we don't have to look far and wide for an example - we have Gandhiji to look up to. Sure some of us now find reasons to blame him, but nobody can claim that he compromised his means. We need to first seek to purify ourselves - by developing integrity and humility. I am far from claiming that I myself have attained that - and like a friend of mine said - by claiming to have these virtues, we immediately deprive ourselves of them - and so we must simply keep trying to improve on these. Next, we should learn to love everyone - even the people who oppose our missions, regardless of their sins and mistakes. Loving them further ensures that we employ only the right means to correct those aspects where we think they are wrong. And it opens the possibility that they may some day even change their stand and agree with us. And finally, we should always be open to be corrected - being humans, we are going to make mistakes - by closing our ears to criticism, we are only compromising our ability to succeed in our mission.
Saadhan shuddhi is not simply applicable to a popular movement or dissent. It is applicable in every aspect of our life. It is applicable to business management, friendships, family relations and parenting, what not. Saadhan shuddhi will make life easy for us, because we will always remain true to our conscience.
Give it a try.
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