Anna Hazare became highly relevant because he was a crusader for anti-corruption. Unfortunately under the previous government talking about corruption was a method for attacking the previous government and gaining popularity and prominence amongst the public. It fed off the anger of the people. People were at the end of their tether and in total despair when it came to corruption. But when Arvind Kejriwal and Anna Hazare broke up and Kejriwal formed the Aam Aadmi Party, Hazare had already begun to lose relevance. Because it was clear that both of them had dis-owned each other. Anna has over the last few years therefore done a slow fade and left the public's memory.
Back in the news briefly after the AAP came into the limelight with the Sandeep Kumar case Anna told the press 'I had said this earlier also, be it any party or leader, it is necessary to check if the people who join a party have a clean character or not."
Modi usurps the anti-corruption position
But the real reason for Anna to be forgotten and to be irrelevant today is because what he stood for, which is anti-corruption, has actually been usurped by the ruling BJP Party. And Prime Minister Modi is himself the greatest crusader against corruption. Given his power as a Prime Minister we hardly need another crusader with no position in the government. The Prime Minister has proven himself as a worthy crusader against corruption by showing a clean central government over the last two odd years of his tenure.
Prime Minister Modi has made corruption both a local India issue and an international issue. By personally talking about the deadline for disclosure of black money by September 30, 2016. At the recent concluded G20 meeting he also took up the issue of money laundering very strongly with the international community.
Now Anna Hazare's only role now may be to discredit his erstwhile partner Arvind Kejriwal who unfortunately has been plagued by corruption amongst his party members. In fact there are several charges against the AAP party, sex scandals, fraud, corruption and forgery. Once he completes that job of discrediting Kejriwal, Anna will once again lose relevance. and fade into the twilight. While Kejriwal called Anna his guru when accosted by Arnab Goswami accosted him in his interview on Times Now on the evening of September 6, 2016, he responded ' I am no one's Guru or Chela'.
Leadership Lesson
When your cause becomes irrelevant, you become irrelevant. Build a repertoire of causes to stay relevant. Not all of them will survive.
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About the Author:
Prabhakar Mundkur is an ad veteran with over 35 years of experience in Advertising and Marketing. He works as an independent consultant and is also Chief Mentor with Percept H. All previous posts of Prabhakar can be found here.