Indian yoga guru calls off anti-graft fast

An Indian yoga guru on hunger strike for the last eight days in protest at government corruption has called off his fast, doctors said on Sunday. "Swami Ramdev has ended his fast and we will soon discharge him," Vijay Dhasmana, the director of the Himalayan Institute of Medical science hospital in the northern town of Dehradun, told AFP. Ramdev, a popular television yoga guru who is also known as Baba Ramdev, has been under observation at the hospital since Friday after his condition deteriorated mid-week. He and thousands of followers were evicted from the national capital New Delhi in a police crackdown last Saturday but he continued his protest at his ashram, or religious retreat, near the Hindu holy city of Haridwar. Subramanian Swamy, president of the opposition Janata Dal (People's Party), said saffron-robed Ramdev had made his point, despite ending his fast. "Swami Ramdev has achieved his objective and now we welcome this step," the politician told reporters in Dehradun after the bearded guru sipped juice in the presence of Hindu religious leaders in the hospital. "But his campaign will continue and all those who have stashed 'black money' in secret bank accounts abroad are now rattled," he added. Ramdev's high-profile campaign has piled pressure on India's scandal-tainted government. His hunger strike was a protest against so-called "black money", cash from bribes or other illegal transactions held in overseas accounts. His protest has raised political temperatures in India, with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh facing criticism over how the guru was handled by police when he was ejected from Delhi. Corruption has crept up the agenda in fast-developing India after a string of scandals, notably a telecom licence scam that is thought to have cost the country up to $39 billion and seen a former minister arrested. Another activist, Anna Hazare, in April successfully forced the government to draft a new anti-corruption law after holding a 98-hour hunger strike in New Delhi.