Anna Hazare with Baba Ramdev – hunger strike will start from June 8th

NEW DELHI: To protest the midnight crackdown on Baba Ramdev and thousands of his supporters forcibly shutting their hunger strike, Anna Hazare said he will go on hunger strike again on June 8 at Jantar Mantar in New Delhi.

Voicing his concern over the midnight crackdown, Anna said he and other members of Lokpal drafting panel will boycott June 6 meeting with government. He also warned the government that if it does not take a lesson, a bigger agitation will be launched.

Speaking at a press conference in New Delhi this evening, Hazare said the midnight swoop is against the basic tenets of democracy. The Prime Minister Manmohan Singh must answer to the people of this country, he said.

Meanwhile, Anna said that the government is not serious about drafting an effective Lokpal Bill. The five civil society members of the Lokpal Bill drafting committee have decided to boycott the meeting of the panel on Monday in New Delhi.

The decision to boycott the meeting comes just a few hours after the crackdown by Delhi Police on Baba Ramdev and his supporters, who were protesting against corruption and the issue of black money, at Delhi’s Ramlila Ground on the intervening night of June 4-5.

Several civil society members and social activists have strongly condemned the crackdown on Ramdev and his supporters and their forceful eviction. Veteran Gandhian and Lokpal Bill drafting committee member Anna Hazare, whose four-day long fast in April against corruption forced the United Progressive Alliance ( UPA) Government to form the panel, called it an undemocratic action.

“What the government has done is a blot on democracy. There was no need for the Government to supress this movement and attack those protesting at midnight. It was not right to lathicharge the people at midnight Small children and women were brutally assaulted. The entire country should stand up as one and protest against this brutal and inhuman action,” said Hazare.

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