“Who’s gonna monitor the monitors of the monitors?” - Wonders my friend Mr.Common Man

“Who’s gonna monitor the monitors of the monitors?” This is a question that Carla Dean (Regina King) asks her husband Robert Clayton Dean (Will Smith) in the movie Enemy of the State. The movie is about the fight of a normal citizen to reclaim his normal life, after he becomes an unknowing witness of a high profile murder committed by a powerful politician. When the corrupt and powerful politician manipulates the institutions and persons in power in his effort to cover up the murder that he committed in connection with passing a legislation that could result in greater intrusion into the lives of normal people in the pretext of national interest, the life of Mr. Dean begins to be fed to the dogs. After being pushed to the wall and after realizing the power of what he has in his hands the movie ensues on a sequence of events where ultimately Dean reclaims his normal life and everybody goes home to say Merry X’Mas.

Let’s leave Mr. Dean for the time being and allow me to introduce to you, my friend Mr.Common Man living a normal life. I have lots in common with this guy; you know, modest living means, familial responsibilities (off late), pays taxes, do not disrespect the constitution.. and so on.. For long the persons in power had convinced him that he lacks political virility and dubbed him as ‘everyday idiot’. In my daily conversations with him about life in general and life in India in particular I have found him updated, in fact up-to-dated; thanks to his job where he spends more than 12 hours a day staring at a luminescent rectangle and fondling the key board where every third word that he types in is ‘facebook, twitter or ning’. Though he stands the risk of being labeled as an information glutton capable of spewing data and information that holds the potential to sufficiently confuse even experienced discussants I have found him lacking in conviction to take a stance and air his views or mobilize opinion for or against an issue. I was not surprised to find him to have not yet made up his mind when I asked him about his feelings towards the ordeal concerning Jan Lokpal bill, the latest buzzword that have been hailed and chanted by sick looking anchors during the prime and non prime time news in channels as the panacea for all the ills plaguing the biggest democracy in the world.

However he agreed, on strict assurances from my side that nothing that I write will be traced back to him, to share his views on the issue. So here it comes.

The Jan Lokpal Bill (the people’s Ombudsman) is the civil society alternative to the Lokpal Bill. The first LokPal Bill was first formulated in 1969 and passed in the Loksabha but turned down in the Rajya Sabha and again it was reintroduced nine more times, the last one being in 2008, only to be turned down for reasons unbeknownst to the people of India. But it shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone that the bill was not passed even after four decades of introducing it since the main objective of the bill was to monitor the probity of those in power. Albeit the importance of such a bill the elected elite that have been ruling this country never felt the urgency to check the probable agency issues associated with the offices they hold. The Common Man thinks that the promises by politicians to curb corruption is a way to humor the listeners and that the expenditures associated with the meetings of the elected elite that takes place in the Capital city behind guarded doors are to be loathed.

“But does the inability of the existing bunch of jokers mean that we should go bananas on the promises of deliverance from the likes of the Belly Dancer Babas or hasty Hazares?” - wonders the Common Man. Though he shares no disrespect to their credentials or abilities in their respective fields, he is confused about the effectiveness with which they can address these issues. The Common Man; the everyday idiot, found it amusing when the Government of India, on grounds of God knows what, decided to burst the rave party at Ramlila maidan especially when the Government of India had sent four senior cabinet ministers (can you believe it? four senior ministers!) to the airport to pick up the bags of the billionaire Baba.

Hazareji on the other hand has, in the minds of the Common Man, earned the reputation of being hasty when he said that he is leading the second freedom struggle; thus self elevating himself to the status of Mahatma Gandhi. The statements from the pontificators of Anna Hazare as the new age Gandhi; the high priests of the Indian civil society humor the Common Man. The poor Common Man is bewildered and at the same time uneasy at some of the audacious claims that translates to ‘leave everything to us lest India is doomed’ from these self appointed knights who have taken up the task of defending Indian democracy. Sneaking from under the cloak of indolence the Common Man said he had felt the need to break the face of these big mouths that surround a pious looking man like Anna Hazare.

The Government at the Center has called the Bohemian Baba, who woke up from his trance and urged all those who believed in democracy to join his private army, as a threat to national interest and has since then treated him like an enemy of the state. Anna Hazare and the big mouths tailing him, finds themselves in a difficult position as they could not out rightly reject the unwarranted support from the flashy Baba who loves the seven star life even when preaching austerity.

Understandably the BJP leadership, the only patriots left in the country according to them, has joined the verbal struggle against corruption; without putting their house in order that is reeling under allegations against the BJP led Government in Karnataka. The left parties haven’t been too sure on their statements about any of these; may be because there is a low loading of the class struggle element in this issue and are probably referring to Das Kapital: Kritik der politischen Ökonomie to come up with a concrete explanation. And their statement may come in another 25 years.

The three arms of the functioning Government were supposed to monitor each other’s probity. Now the civil society bigmouths are telling us they will monitor these guys. Drinking his ninth cup of black coffee while fondling the keyboard the Common Man wondered “Now who’s gonna monitor the monitors of the monitors?”

Caught in the daily chores, forced to discharge familial responsibilities and dutifully playing the role of the everyday idiot the Common Man knows that the maximum he would do is to share his feelings with a friend who at the most would post it in his blog.

But the Common Man has the following questions..
When the very same institutions functioning with the taxpayer’s money, that are constitutionally liable to upkeep the principles of democracy and protect the polity become shameless edifices of incompetence in warding off corruption what possibly can a normal citizen do? When the offices that are to be receptive to the normal citizen tantamount to nothing more than air-conditioned architectural arrogance housing insidious parasites with ignoble intentions what possibly can a normal citizen do? When the politicians and bureaucrats, even after getting caught, exhibit no remorse whatsoever in abusing the powers vested with them in their crusade to illegally accumulate wealth by plundering the state exchequer and siphon it off to safe havens what possibly can a normal citizen do?

Well.. the Common Man don’t really have answers to any of these questions…and he doesn’t suppose anybody would have either. But that shouldn’t stop him from asking these any way; for these have eluded any concrete attention for centuries despite being categorized as issues ‘demanding immediate attention’!