Support. Right Direction? By Diplomatic Editor Trevor Royle

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FROM his base in the Ramlila Ground, an open area in New Delhi close to the India Gate, Anna Hazare is not short of attention. That is what the 74-year-old civil activist craves and that is what he is getting almost a week into his fast unto death as a protest against India's widespread political corruption and the official refusal to introduce cast-iron legislation to combat the problem.

If the sight of the surprisingly robust-looking man brings back memories of similar fasts undertaken by Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi during India's long march to independence last century, that is exactly what Hazare and his supporters, known as "Team Anna", intend. On arriving at the Ramlila Ground on Friday after a short period in jail, Hazare declaimed his aims in terms that could have been used by Gandhi: "After 64 years of independence, we still haven't achieved complete freedom," he said. "The fight is far from over, it has just begun."

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Support. Right Direction? By Diplomatic Editor Trevor Royle

Given India's healthy position as an Asian superpower this might seem a strange political eruption at the present time. The country's economy is booming, with GDP set to rise by 8% by the autumn, and last year the number of new Indian millionaires surged to a record high of more than 150,000, putting the country in the world's top 10 of individual wealth.

This is a far cry from the old socialist command economy of the 1990s,...

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