New Delhi:
The government is prepping to begin a debate in Parliament on the Lokpal Bill on the 19th of this month. Sources say the government is also leaning towards accepting some of the demands made by activist Anna Hazare, like bringing the Prime Minister and junior bureaucrats under the ambit of the new Lokpal or ombudsman agency, which will be empowered to investigate corruption among government servants. But the CBI's role in the Lokpal structure remains a point of contention.
Anna, who is 74, has threatened to start a hunger strike on December 27 if the government does not deliver a potent new law against graft this month.
A parliamentary standing committee examining the Lokpal Bill has finalized its draft amidst dissent from members, including three Congress MPs. In all, a total of 16 notes of dissent are believed to have been submitted to the Committee by members of the BJP, BJD, SP, Congress, LJP, RJD and the Left parties. (
Read: What the parliamentary committee recommends for Lokpal)
One of Anna's non-negotiable demands is that the Lokpal Bill include junior bureaucrats - a feature the committee has not sanctioned. These are the officers who the common man encounters everyday - while applying for a ration card, a passport, or a driver's license, for example. Meenakshi Natrajan, Deepa Das Munsi and PT Thomas, all Congress members of the committee - formally registered their protest against Group C central government employees - who add upto 5.7 million - not being brought under the Lokpal's ambit. The committee agrees with the government that the nine members of the Lokpal cannot manage this huge group. Instead, it recommends Group C employees should be investigated by the other autonomous anti-corruption body, the Central Vigilance Commission (CVC).
On the matter of whether the Lokpal should have the right to investigate the Prime Minister, the committee says it leaves the decision to Parliament because of differing opinions among its members.
But sources say that the government is heading towards accepting these two key points that Anna has deemed essential for fighting corruption. The Prime Minister may be covered by the Lokpal Bill, though with safeguards; government sources say the Prime Minister may himself offer in Parliament that his office should be included in the Lokpal Bill. The government may also agree that the 5.7 million junior bureaucrats will be accountable to the nine-member Lokpal.
For now, what remains unresolved is the matter of who the CBI will report to - the government is not keen to change the investigating agency's current reporting structure. If that doesn't happen, Team Anna says, the CBI will remain vulnerable to political pressure.
The standing committee recommends that the CBI seek the approval of the Lokpal both for chargesheets and for its closure or final reports on investigations. The CBI has taken strong exception to this on the grounds that it contradicts the objective of making the CBI autonomous. A statement from the agency said, "This provision goes against the stated objectives of making investigation agency autonomous, not answerable or liable to be monitored by either the administrative ministry or the Lokpal and protect the integrity of investigation."
Team Anna member Kiran Bedi says bringing the CBI under the Lokpal is critical. "Lokpal came because the CBI needed insulation from political influences and that is how from government control it was supposed to be a multi-member body of independently well-selected Lokpal. But if you are creating a lokpal without the CBI, then what did the lokpal come for? That's a key issue. If the investigating power is not going to come with the Lokpal, then Lokpal is nothing. You're only creating an expenditure on the state. So without the CBI in the Lokpal, Lokpal is like an enquiry-pal," she said.
The standing committee's report, which is not binding on the government, is likely to be tabled in Parliament tomorrow. Rejecting the parliamentary panel's draft, Anna has said the government is not serious about fighting corruption.
The Lokpal Bill has been the raison d'etre of Anna's India Against Corruption campaign this year. Team Anna has its own version of the bill, called the Jan Lokpal Bill. After Anna's epic fast in August, Parliament formally agreed to consider Anna's vision of the Lokpal. The Gandhian says the committee's draft of the Lokpal Bill is a betrayal of this assurance.
"I think the recommendations of the (Parliamentary) Standing Committee, whatever they are, the Lokpal which is coming, I don't think this will have any impact on corruption. On the contrary, it is likely to dismantle whatever exists in the name of anti-corruption in this country," said Arvind Kejriwal, who is Anna's closest aide.