To Jihad or not to Jihad…

As part of my daily morning routine I was mindlessly surfing through the T.V. channels, while also flipping over the pages of my news paper. Suddenly a quote made by L.K Advani caught my eye- “People should be a ready for a Jihad to root out corruption from all levels of the government.”
It made the cynical me wonder, as to what point was Shri. Advaniji trying to drive through this statement, and especially his reference to the term ‘jihad’… For as long as I can remember, more so in the recent decades, Jihad has been synonymous to terrorism in India and most parts of the world.
Let me throw some light on what exactly this greatly misused Jihad word means: Jihad is an Islamic term that means struggle… It has been further explained in the netizen’s encyclopaedia Wikipedia thus - Muslims use the word Jihad in a religious context to refer to three types of struggles: an internal struggle to maintain faith, the struggle to improve the Muslim society, or the struggle to defend Islam.
If I go with the above explanation of Jihad, then is Mr. Advani trying to state that we will have to put up a fierce struggle and battle to root out corruption, the main cause of disruption in the common man’s life? I specifically refer to the people that Advani talks of as the ‘common man’, for it strikes me that maybe this quote has been ‘inspired’ by the genuineness of the fast-unto-death protest undertaken by Anna Hazare till the government agrees to have citizens' participation in the drafting of the legislation through Lokpal bill. He stated that his fast against corruption is a stand on behalf of the common people… so maybe Advaniji was simply ad-libbing this sentiment to gain political mileage and converting the activist’s fight that has been on for the last 42 years, into a BJP blitzkrieg of the Common man Vs Corruption.
Through these ponderings, another interesting statement made by I & B Minister Ambika Soni caught my attention. She mentioned that the Lokpal bill should be formulated in such a way that it should benefit both the applicant and also the person who is to be affected by it. Gosh! Is she trying to say that dear Mr. Judge, please ask the criminal/ thief/ accused, if the law fit their needs well, and if the accused agree, pen it down as in the law book!
The government and its representatives best understand the statements made by them ,the promises made by them and (sigh!) the rules made by them…at times I feel Mr. Abraham Lincoln’s definition of democracy as the ‘government of the people, by the people, for the people’ should change to suit the current state of affairs in India today and read as the “government of the government, by the government, for the government”. Maybe in the light of this new definition we the common people will understand the government and its strange ways!!!!
As for Advaniji and his Jihad, if he looks beyond temples and divide, he will see that the commonplace “aam aadmi, the janta” has long been in a Jihad against all things and people corrupt, as they crusade along to keep their faith. With each sunrise, they think of a new way to keep peace and harmony in the society and tread carefully to protect this precious gift. They struggle to take measures to improve this precarious balance of peace. They put up a fight to defend their country against religious riots, terrorism, corruption and the endless list of all that India does not need…
If people who pass legislations woke up from their cosy slumbers and really smelled the coffee, they should be on their feet, on the road, holding hands with the aam aadmi who gave them power and leading the junta from darkness to light, and not putting out the light! If I can be allowed to be quixotic, then there will be a day in the life of India when we will truly be led by leaders who show us the way in one of the greatest democratic nations of the world… and that will end the need for jihad..
Jameel Gulrays
Communications Audit Consultant