Showdown imminent as gulf between govt, Anna widens

Wednesday night passed with Team Anna at Ramlila Maidan bracing for a police intervention to forcibly remove Anna Hazare, on fast for the 10th day, to hospital, after a midnight speech in which Anna called for a peaceful uprising to fill the jails and to surround Parliament.

And although by dawn, the intervention never came, it  appears that Anna himself is reconciled to being taken away. “’If the authorities come to get me, I’ll go with them,” he said, and urged his followers not to stop the authorities or resort to violence. Instead, he said, they should continue the agitation – peacefully.

“Mere peeche bhagwan ki shakti hai. Jao Parliament ka gherao karo. Jail bharo (I have the power of god behind me; go and surround parliament and fill the jails),” Anna told his supporters.

More controversially, Team Anna’s core member Kiran Bedi, a distinguished police officer, appeared to court controversy with a line in a midnight speech that suggested she was calling on the police not to obey political orders.

The heated rhetoric came after a late evening meeting between Team Anna and government representatives ended in a seeming stalemate – although both sides had varying interpretations of how the talks went.

While Team Anna representatives said “we’re back to square one” and that the government side had been “disrespectful” and had even “scolded” them and suggested that Team Anna was responsible for Anna’s health, Pranab Mukherjee challenged this reading of the meeting’s outcome – and said that Team Anna was distorting his statements.

Mukherjee told CNN-IBN : “My statements have been distorted. I never said that Anna’s fast is his problem. It is a national problem. I appeal to him to end his fast as fast as possible..”

The government, said Mukherjee, “is deeply concerned about Anna’s health. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has appealed to Annaji to end the fast. We are appealing Anna to continue with the talks," he said

Asked if any police action would be taken against Anna during the night, Mukherjee said only the Home Minister could speak on police plans. “I dont look after law and order so I cannot comment as I am not the competent authority,” he said

Earlier, apprehending his forcible arrest and removal, Anna asked his supporters to start a jail bharo (fill the jails) agitation by gheraoing residences of MPs.

Addressing his supporters at Ramlila grounds after the virtual breakdown of talks, Anna said “If such a thing happens, I appeal to all of you not to resort to violence. I understand the government’s design. If you try to stop them there will be huge violence. To break this movement, they want you to resort to violence.”

Team Anna repeatedly claimed that Anna may be forcibly removed from Ramlila Maidan by the Delhi police. In a speech at midnight, Arvind Kejriwal said the latest information was that police would intervene at 3 am or 4 am and take away Anna.

And although that intervention never came, the tone points to an unhappy  denouement on Thursday.