The Congress core committee has rejected the demand made by Team Anna to withdraw the Lokpal bill from Parliament and replace it with the Jan Lokpal bill.
At a meeting of the core committee, presided by Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh in the absence of Congress president Sonia Gandhi, the discussion revolved around the ongoing events at Ramlila ground.
Sources said that while the core committee took stock of the situation, the prevailing view was that the Lokpal bill, which has been introduced in Parliament, is before the Standing Committee and it is up to the committee to make changes in the bill or leave it as it is.
While the government has made efforts to reach out to Anna Hazare and his team through intermediaries, the government intends to track Anna's health to ensure that his life is not put in any danger by his "hardline and publicity hungry" friends. They also feel that it is best to let Anna continue his fast within the boundaries of the Ramlila grounds.
Sources said that the government does not see Bharatiya Janata Party member of Parliament Varun Gandhi's move to bring the Jan Lokpal bill as a private members' bill as a viable option. Any member who wants to move a private members' bill has to give a month's notice, after which the bill is introduced in the house. It is then balloted along with other such bills to decide the priority that would be accorded in bringing the bill up for discussion.
The assessment within the government is that the hype surrounding Anna Hazare's agitation against corruption is no longer as pronounced as much as it is made out to be on television.
A senior minister admitted that the entire operation has been well planned and is being run in a systematic and efficient manner with a great deal of money being invested into the entire operation.
Congress party leaders have been telling reporters that Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh activists and Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad members were boosting the numbers at Anna Hazare's rallies.
Sources say that corporates too have spent a great deal and large sums of this money have gone to television channels in the form of highly paid advertisements, which has led them to give continuous and uninterrupted telecast of the drama at Ramlila grounds.
Even as the government has come under severe criticism for 'political mismanagement', it has now become Congress party versus the government.
A young Congress MP, Sandeep Dikshit, who is also the deputy whip of the Congress in the Lok Sabha and the son of Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit has come on record to say that the arrest of Anna Hazare was wrong. He said the Delhi police could have detained him and then released him by evening.
He also went to the extent of saying that maybe the government did not realise the gravity of the situation it was dealing with. Lots of Congress leaders are worried that in their respective constituencies they will have to face people's displeasure if they are seen as 'anti-Anna'.
For a party and a government which is caught in a bind and is looking for a way out of the ongoing impasse, what is intriguing is the silence of Rahul Gandhi, who has kept away from the ongoing Hazare vs government tussle.
It is the first time, in many decades, that Sonia Gandhi will be away on Rajiv Gandhi's birth anniversary on Saturday. Rahul Gandhi will, however, visit Rajghat in New Delhi to attend the events and ceremonies. But will he break his silence or will he ask his security to keep the media away as he has been doing since the last four days? It remains to be seen.
