PADMABHUSHAN SHRI ANNA HAZARE - A ONE MAN ARMY - THE BEGINNING OF A NEW SOCIAL REVOLUTION

PADAMBHUSAN VETERAN SHRI ANNA HAZARE

A write up by Brig Nawab Heer (Retd)

There is a small village named Ralegan Sidhi in Ahmednagar district of Maharastra. A young boy hailing from this village joined Indian Army as a driver in Army Supply Corps. He was on convoy duty during INDO-PAK War In 1965, in Shakargarh Sector. In course of his duties as a driver, while taking Army Supplies/ stores from Pathankot for fighting troops in Shakargarh sector these convoys used to be under heavy air attacks from the Pakistan Aircrafts. One day Naik (Nk) Anna Hazare was driving his vehicle as part of the convoy across international border when, their vehicular column came under intense attack of fighter aircrafts of PAF. The attack continued for 10 to 15 minutes. All drivers under took all passive measures to ward off the attacks. Once the attack was over, Nk Anna Hazare got up from the road side deep pit a shelter which he had taken to save himself, visited other vehicles and found that all other drivers and co-drivers had been killed due to Pakistan Air Force air strafing and he was the sole survivor. Anna was deeply shaken and questioned him as to why only his life had been spared among all his colleagues, however, he got no answer. As the Indo-Pak war came to an end, Anna Hazare requested for some leave .While moving back the question as to why only he survived never left his psyche. At Pathankot railway station he purchased one book on life of Swami Vivekananda which he read and re -read throughout his journey back home. One particular thought in the book really hit his mind hard that was, Swami Vivekananda propagated that we human being are meant to live for others not for themselves as most of the humans are doing presently which is next to animal behavior.

On reaching his village whose economic status and social status was very low. The whole village had no cultivable land, they had only 20 odd cattle’s for milking, there was no source of drinkable water and the general area around the village was devoid of trees. His village was located in rain shadow area which was draught stricken.  The villagers were very poor and their only source of income was sale of locally brewed illicit liquor. There was not even one concrete house in the village and all were living under thatched huts. There was no school in nearby areas up to 20 kms. Drinking water used to come once in a week in water trailers sent by the Collector from Ahmednagar 60 km away. In general, villagers were living under very poor and pathetic conditions. Anna Hazare decided to do something for his village and at that stage he did not know as what he will do; nevertheless he decided to do something. He took premature discharge from the Army and came and settled in his village.

Anna only received Rs 25000/- from the Army as lump-sum payment for pension which he pooled in and jumped in to improve the village. There was one temple in the village Anna improved the temple and started living there. He vowed to remain unmarried and dedicate his life for the up liftment of the villagers. He motivated some young persons of the village and first undertook the task of watershed management for the village. Prior to the rainy season they made bunds so that water did not flow away. They planted trees, ensuring cleanliness in the village and organized classes in a make shift classroom at the temple. The village had almost 2500 acres of land out of which only few acres was cultivable. Through sustained efforts of Anna and his team, the water table started rising, land bank of cultivable land increased, children started learning, and people purchased few buffalos and cows.

Today the Anna Hazare, s village displays a different story.  All 2000 acres of land is being cultivated, village has 3000 cattle, all houses in the village are pucka and per capita income of villagers has gone up by many folds. There is one school which is of international standard. This school apart from taking students of the area also admits students who have been dropouts or failures. The School is being run like military schools and it produces very good results. All areas around 40 kms of Ralegan Sidhi have green cover, water table has come up and water is being conserved through water shed management techniques. He accomplished all this through “Sharam Daan”, motivating villagers to work on the rolling landscape of the area around his village. He developed a very innovative bunds and small reservoirs along the contours which were designed to hold almost every drop of whatever scanty rainfall the parched land received. Soon the subsoil water reserves reached a level sufficient to cater to the agricultural and drinking needs of the village even if it did not rain for two consecutive years. There is one institute come up in the village being supervised by Shri Anna Hazare which conducts classes for students and farmers from all over the globe. They come to learn techniques of rural development and watershed management. Today Anna has been asked by the Maharashtra Government to bring up 300 villages of the state on model village like Ralegan Sidhi. Shri Anna is on advisory in agriculture and rural development of five states and has got 45 awards to his credit out of which 30 are international awards.

Anna sahib spearheaded “Bharastachar Nirman Andolan”, a movement aimed at cleansing the society of the malaise of corruption in public life. Anna Hazare was the person who initiated the Right to Information act first time in Maharashtra. He had to agitate for a very long time to get this act through in Maharashtra against all the opposition from the politicians and beuaurecrats; thereafter heagitated to get it through at National level. He was the force behind getting Telgi Stamp scam unearthed and later investigated in which number of ministers had to resign and many Babu's were suspended.

One fine day one contingent of police led by one inspector reported to him at his residence at Ralegan. Anna very politely asked inspector purpose of his visit. The inspector informed Anna that Chief Minister had detailed him with 20 Sepoys saying that Anna was under threat in view of his role in unearthing Telgi Scam. Anna very politely told the inspector that he had died long back while serving in Army during 1965 Indo Pak War and if anyone wants to pump some bullets into a dead body let them. He asked the inspector to go back and inform the CM that he needs no protection.

While serving as Commandant Mechanized Infantry Regimental Centre at Ahmednagar; I came very close to Shri Anna Hazare. Once I invited him to our regimental centre to address 5000 soldiers posted there and large number of them was under training. Anna accepted our invitation; most interesting part of his one hour talk to them was that out of 5000 persons not even single person dosed off, which used to be normal phenomena since training schedule for the soldiers used to be very hard and invariably some of them used to fall asleep in the mass lectures. All men identified themselves with Anna Hazare since he was Ex soldier were highly motivated with his talk to them.

HE IS ON HUNGER STRIKE TO ERADICATE CORRUPTION IN PUBLIC LIFE- LET US SUPPORT OUR OWN CAUSE