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PM is a good man but Sonia creating trouble: Hazare

Social activist Anna Hazare (above) addresses a public meeting against corruption in Bangalore on Saturday where he targeted Congress president Sonia Gandhi saying that the ‘remote control’ is creating problems for Lokpal Bill. — PTI

Bangalore, May 28
Anti-graft activist Anna Hazare today appeared to target Congress president Sonia Gandhi saying that the “remote control” is creating “problems” even as he praised Prime Minister Manmohan Singh as a “good person”.

“The Prime Minister is a good person. The Prime Minister is not bad. The problem comes because of the remote control,” he told a public meeting, in an obvious reference to the Congress president without naming her.

Warning politicians of unleashing people's power if attempts were made to scuttle the passage of the Lokpal Bill in Parliament, Hazare said, “Now, we are all confident that in every government, people's power is the strongest.”

Hazare said if the Lokpal Bill was not enacted by August 16, he would return to Jantar Mantar to hold a fast-to-death protest and urged the people of Karnataka to be prepared for a “jail-bharo” (fill prison movement) then.

Hazare alleged that politicians used to the habit of being “rulers” since Independence would not tolerate the Bill, adding, impediments are being put even now to scuttle the proposed Bill.

Sonia Gandhi

“But I have decided.Till there is life in my body, I will continue to fight for enactment of the Lokpal Bill. I will keep fighting,” Hazare said.

He also said that six ministers had to resign because of his campaign. Without naming them, he said these six tried to take “revenge” on him but could not touch him because he was not tainted. — PTI

‘Efforts on to discredit Lokpal Bill’

Bangalore, May 28
Lokpal Bill joint draft committee member Arvind Kejriwal today alleged that vested interests seemed to have ganged up to discredit the proposed legislation by unleashing a sustained campaign to spread misconceptions and falsehood.

He said vested interests first made an attack on the individual members of the committee and now they are attacking the bill per se questioning the provisions of the bill by spreading wrong information about it.

"You would see various articles in various media questioning the bill and presenting the facts in a manner which the bill does not talk of", Kejriwal told a press meet at Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore, after civil society members in the committee, along with social activists Kiran Bedi and Swami Agnivesh, had an interactive session.

He said there is a sustained effort to discredit the whole exercise, citing instances of it being projected as "cure (Lokpal bill) is worse than the disease (corruption)", as a "threat to democracy" and that it (Lokpal) would become a "Frankenstein".

Karnataka Lokayukta Santosh Hegde, a member of the committee, saw no difficulty in the passage of the Lokpal bill in Parliament, indicating that political parties would be forced to take a position on it. — PTI