Punishment on democracy

Anna Hazare has made a surprisingly unexpected statement. To quote him: "If any candidate takes or gives money in Vidhan Sabha or Parliament for asking questions or voting, such people should be given severe punishment, in fact according to me, they should be hanged."
His remarks came soon after former Samajwadi Party leader Amar Singh was sent to Tihar to join the other high-profile politicians. By the way, Amar Singh’s neighbour in jail is Madhu Koda, the former Jharkhand chief minister who is facing trail for siphoning off millions of dollars.
But what is strange is Anna’s demand for capital punishment. I hope he was at least referring to the judicial process of execution, rather than execution by “people’s judgement”. I have this confusion because of his “fast-track” resumption of a Lok Pal, ably fuelled by the electronic media that propelled large-scale citizen participation in a classic film style mass appeal. The Lok Pal Bill had been part of the legislative woodwork ever since Shanti Bhushan introduced it in 1968, popping up into debates subsequently once in a while by our “conscientious” men in white.
Coming back to the demand, it is strange because it came from Brand Anna, who has been portrayed as the post-modern Mahatma Gandhi. His brand positioning has been done carefully on the lines of Mahatma Gandhi and his ideals of satyagraha and non-violence. His Ram Lila fast episode was remarkably advertised by news channels as a peaceful, non-violent, Gandhian method to coerce the UPA government into tabling a “people-centric” ombudsman that will be sympathetic and for real, rather than mere tokenism. And, it struck a chord with the middle class, who were tired of paying bribes for almost every service they expected for smooth running of their everyday lives.
But the point is having carefully nurtured this Gandhian image, why did Brand Anna, who commands a mass hysteria, make this comment? Isn’t this a dangerous remark in a country of human icon-worshippers? Remember the original Gandhi once said: show the other cheek to the one who slapped one cheek?
Capital punishment is a debatable issue. The blast outside the Delhi High Court premises is apparently a message to the judiciary to pardon Mohammad Afsal, or Afsal Guru, the Kashmiri convicted of conspiring the December 2001 attack on Indian Parliament.
Then came the President, Pratibha Patil’s rejection of clemency petitions of three LTTE members, Murugan, Santhan and Perarivalan, for conspiring to kill Rajiv Gandhi in 1991.
The rejection acquired a parochial hue with most Tamil Nadu political parties seeking pardon for the perpetrators of the crime. The Dravidian parties are, as always, playing their game of political one-upmanship by lending a sympathetic shoulder for the cause of Tamil eelam. It will help them in their election speeches to draw lusty cheers from the dialogue-hungry Tamil electorate.
But why can’t we do away with capital punishment? Is it fair to practice this in an adolescent democracy like ours, of politicians, by politicians and for politicians?
Capital punishment in India seemed to have become a blatant political tool. So while the presidency is simply sitting on Afzal Guru’s mercy petition, it rejects those of Rajiv Gandhi’s killers. This automatically draws attention to the fact that the President is a UPA government nominee.
Crime has no religion, caste or linguistic identity. Irrespective of the nature of the crime, our country’s leaders, with a myopic wisdom, have no right to decide who can live and who cannot. An impartial presidency is a constitutional truth, but remains only that: a documented fact with no evidence of it being applied.