New Delhi: Stating that the Opposition should shed all pretences of supporting the Lokpal Bill and stop searching for an ‘elusive perfects,’ the Congress on Thursday said they were ready to stand up against corruption and the party was neither scared nor defensive in its battle.
Taking part in the discussion in the Rajya Sabha on the Lokpal and Lokayuktas Bill, 2011, Abhishek Manu Singhvi, who headed the Standing Committee of Parliament on the Lokpal Bill, said that it was time that the people outside who claim to the voice of the people and those who were supporting them inside the Parliament should realise that ‘extreme models’ don’t work on the ground. The power of proclaiming the preamble of the Constitution ‘We the people’ should reside with the Parliament and not outside.
The BJP, he said, should primarily decide if it should support the fight against corruption and there was no use to put conditionalities for supporting the Bill while infact it were really opposing the legislation in guise of of demanding a strong and comprehensive Lokpal Bill after three months. Otherwise they should have the conviction of saying ‘No’ to the fight against corruption.
Accusing the BJP of seeming to create an ambience of argument, dispute and weird propositions (vaad, vivad and vitand vaad) in the battle against corruption, he said it was irony that the BJP wanted the institution of Lokpal as a constitutional entity both in the all party meeting as well as in its notes of dissent before the Standing Committee but had acted different in the Lok Sabha. The BJP’s opposition to make Lokpal a constitutional body seemed to stem because an AICC General Secretary supported such a body, he felt. The Oppostion, he alleged, had not come out with any constructive suggestion for making the body effective.
Singhvi said the final version envisaged Lokpal as a quasi-judicial body by the UPA II Government after due deliberations was to give birth to a new institution — Lokpal without killing a 70-year-old CBI, Central Vigilance Commission along with suo motu powers to take note of a complaint.
The demand for making Lokpal to such unimaginable proportion to make a prime minister look a ‘pygmy’ was not at all fair.
He said while the ‘PM to Peon’ should be made accountable, the beauty of democracy was in creating checks and balances without disturbing equilibrium of existing organisations. This was how the Constitution makers envisaged and that was how the Bill had taken shape, he said.
For the first time, a decision to building a wall between the investigation and prosecution embarked and the Lokpal was empowered to file charge sheet.
The Bill had done away with the provision for prior sanction for the officers which was the bane of the cases pending before the CVC.
The Government was in a minority in the selection panel consisting of Prime Minister, Chief Justice of India, Lok Sabha Speaker, Leader of Opposition and a prominent jurist and yet there was a demand to grant autonomy to Lokpal who was not even answerable to the Parliament, he remarked.
About the objections of Lokpal Bill intruding into the powers of the States, Mr Singhvi said the parliament was empowered to legislative for the whole or any part of the country and it was not proper to argue that the parliament could not legislate for any state through an international treaty. Institutions like National Human Rights Commission and the Human Rights Commissions in the states were all created again under an international treaty, he said.
On objections against the provision for reservation for the SC and STs, Minorities and OBCs not more than 50 per cent of the Lokpal panel, he said it was to provide due diverse population representing the country. Some of them will be from the feminine population. It is easy to criticise and destroy through ‘vitant vaad’, he said.
The Bill, he said, was not against the ‘sense of the House’ as appropriate mechanism was provided for dealing with issues of citizen’s charter. (UNI)