Ghaziabad: Alleging that the government’s final draft Lokpal Bill is “anti-people and seeks to promote corruption”, Team Anna on Thursday demanded the withdrawal of the bill and redrafting of the anti-corruption bill.
The Lokpal Bill has been tabled in the Lok Sabha on Thursday.
“We reject the bill as it is anti-people. It seeks to promote corruption. Entire civil society is under the bill while 90 per cent politicians and government employees have been kept out of the Lokpal’s ambit,” Team Anna member Arvind Kejriwal told reporters here.
Mr Kejriwal said the government wanted to “crush the people’s voice” through its Lokpal Bill. “The government has kept political parties and corporates out of the Lokpal ambit. But the colleges, schools, madarsas, teachers, doctors and others have been brought under the Lokpal Bill. The government thinks that politicians are clean and the citizens are corrupt,” he added.
Team Anna said the Lokpal will be under complete control of the government as the government will have powers to select, suspend and remove Lokpal members.
Mr Kejriwal said the Bill has placed all the investigation under the government’s control while the Lokpal will be merely a “post office”.
The RTI activist added that the government’s draft will make the CBI “ineffective” and the premier probe agency will get “destroyed”.
“The Prime Minister, Leader of the Opposition and Chief Justice of India will select the CBI Director. The PM and Leader of the Opposition will never want to select such a person as the CBI Director who could create trouble for them,” he said.
Mr Kejriwal also claimed that if the bill was passed in its present form then the Lokpal institution will collapse within ten days.
Team Anna slammed the Congress-led UPA government for bringing such a bill which “protects” corrupt bureaucrats and politicians.
“First time after the independence the government has made provisions that the government will provide legal aid to corrupt officials in their cases while on the other hand there was no provision to protect complainant,” Mr Kejriwal said.
He said social activist Anna Hazare will start hunger strike at Mumbai’s Azad Maidan from December 27.
Mr Kejriwal alleged that the government has been expressing sympathy with the corrupt politicians and bureaucrats.
“After the government’s Lokpal Bill, the Lokpal institution will become a place of corruption as the government has not made provisions to check corruption in Lokpal members,” he added.
Furthering his attack on the government, he said the people who prepared the bill “have no knowledge or they are very clever”.
The Team Anna member stated that the according to the draft bill, the state Lokayukta will get investigation through state police.
“We all know what happen if the state police will probe corruption cases. There is a large-scale corruption in state police forces,” he alleged.
Asked about Rashtriya Janata Dal supremo Lalu Prasad’s demand for reservation for minorities in the Lokpal, Mr Kejriwal said Mr Yadav was “doing politics” on the issue.
“We have come at a situation where we were in April,” he added.
Another Team Anna member Kiran Bedi said the “rationale of the Lokpal is lost” as the Bill which they were seeking was for an independent effective investigating agency and not an “Inquiry Pal and a weak CBI”. (UNI)