However, after a huge hue and cry was raised, Hazare clarified his stand on Modi. But he never criticized Kumar, whom he met on June 30 in New Delhi. Later, in September, while writing in his blog, Kumar promised to enact a powerful lokayukta law. He had even hinted that Bihar would seek the help of Santosh Hegde in drafting the new bill. The state has had a lokayukta since 1973. But it was a weak institution and the chief minister was not in its purview.

On November 8, the Bihar cabinet gave its nod to the Bihar lokayukta bill 2011, and put it up on its website to seek public opinion. A day later, Arvind Kejriwal dubbed it as a copy of the much-criticized draft of the lok pal bill framed by the United Progressive Alliance government in Delhi. He said selection, suspension and removal of the lokayukta would be controlled by the Bihar government. Therefore, it would not be independent.

This infuriated Kumar, till then a darling of Team Anna. He asked Kejriwal to exercise restraint and told him, point- blank, that he did not need a certificate from anyone in the fight against corruption. He went on to state that he would not take orders from anyone.

His belligerent reaction came as a shock to Team Anna. Shanti Bhushan and Kiran Bedi criticized the chief minister on subsequent days for the the Bihar lokayukta bill and for his utterances. However, they expressed the hope that Kumar would do his best to enact a new lokayukta law on the lines of poll-bound Uttarakhand.

New race

In the days that followed, Kumar blew hot and cold. Yet, at the same time, he said that he did not wish to indulge in a war of words with Team Anna on this particular issue. At the national level, the Congress initially welcomed Kumar’s diatribe against Team Anna as Bihar’s chief minister had served the party’s purpose. At the state level, several leaders of the party took him to task for rampant corruption and loot of public money.

It remains a mystery as to why Kumar was in such a hurry. He did not even bother to take any Team Anna leader into confidence during the drafting of the bill. According to one school of thought, he was outsmarted by B.C. Khanduri, who became the chief minister of Uttarakhand only two months back but got the new lokayukta bill tabled. Kumar, who had been patted on the back for being the first leader to give 50 per cent reservation to women in local bodies in urban and rural areas and for the speedy implementation of the Right to Information Act, was upset because Uttarakhand had scored over Bihar on this occasion.

However, the other opinion is that Kumar’s move has little to do with who enacted the law first as several states had framed other significant legislations before Bihar. Kumar tried to sell old wine in a new bottle and succeeded initially as the print media in Bihar applauded him in the early days. But Team Anna chose to criticize him for his move to create a toothless lokayukta, which many in the state now call ‘lipayukta’ (in Hindi, lipa means hushing up the matter).

However, Hazare himself has not chosen to get embroiled in the issue yet. After all, it was he who had praised Kumar and Modi for the good work in rural development, although not for instituting a powerful lokayukta. On that count, he should have appreciated Manmohan Singh too. But as an anti-corruption crusader, he is only talking about the jan lokpal bill.

(This article was carried by The Telegraph in edit page on Nov 17, 2011)

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