Indian anti-graft hunger striker faces test

Indian activist Anna Hazare's populist anti-corruption campaign faced its first major test Saturday as it sought to sustain the momentum that has left the government floundering in its wake. In frenzied scenes on Friday hundreds of thousands turned out to see Hazare parade through Delhi and launch a two-week public hunger strike. Several thousand of his supporters still thronged the open-air protest venue Saturday morning, despite heavy monsoon rains lashing it overnight and forcing many to take cover elsewhere. The 74-year-old activist was "resting" out of sight in the morning, but organisers said he would take to the stage later in the day. With Monday a national holiday, campaign organisers said they were optimistic that the long weekend would bring large crowds in support of Hazare's fight to force the government to draft stronger anti-corruption laws. Speaking to reporters late Friday, Hazare made it clear that he did not feel bound to an agreement with the authorities to end his fast after 15 days. The focus of the protest is a piece of anti-graft legislation known as the "Lokpal Bill." Hazare insists the current draft is toothless, and is demanding the government adopt and pass his own, more aggressive version of the bill. "I have made the decision of my life. If the bill is not passed... then I will continue my fast till my last breath," he said. Hazare's hero is Mahatma Gandhi -- a huge portrait of India's independence icon fills the backdrop of the covered stage where his fast is being held -- and he threatened a Gandhi-style campaign of civil disobedience unless the government relented. "If by August 30 the bill is not passed then people will be asked to fill jails across the country," he said. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's government, blindsided by the national outpouring of public support for Hazare, now has little option but to see how the protest plays out. So far there has been no official reaction to the ecstatic events of Friday when Hazare walked out of Delhi's Tihar jail and embarked on his triumphal procession through the capital on an open-top truck. Singh chaired a meeting Friday of senior ministers from his ruling Congress Party, but no statement was issued. Hazare's campaign has tapped into a deep reservoir of discontent -- especially among India's burgeoning middle-class -- with a culture that requires bribes to secure everything from birth certificates to business permits. "I think the business world is turning against the official culture," said Somnath Mitra, an IBM managing consultant who came to the protest site on Saturday. Mitra recalled being forced to make substantial cash payments -- for which he received no receipts -- when registering two properties last year. "It was effectively a bribe to get my work done," he said. The government has struggled to have its voice heard amid the clamour surrounding Hazare's anti-graft drive -- in part because its anti-corruption credentials have been damaged by a series of multi-billion-dollar scandals involving senior officials. Singh has criticised the campaign's hunger-strike tactics as "totally misconceived" and an attempt to blackmail parliament into re-drafting legislation.