Presenting the select committee report on Lokpal, Congress and BJP went to town lauding the consensus ‘reached’ by the bitter political foes over the controversial issues in the anti-corruption legislation.
But the reality is that committee members had sharp differences over some issues in the Lokpal bill but they were ‘persuaded’ to opt for ‘dissenting notes’ for the sake of highlighting a consensus. Instead, they were told that their ‘suggestions’ would go as part of annexures in the report to be tabled in the parliament.
“By and large we had consensus on most issues. There were members who had dissent notes but majority of us were of the view that dissenting notes should not be given and instead consensus should be highlighted on such an important bill,” a Rajya Sabha MP, who was part of the committee, told DNA on condition of anonymity.
“They were assured that their suggestions would go as part of annexures in the report. Also they were told that anyways when the Lokpal bill would come up for discussion in Rajya Sabha, they would get a chance to highlight their concerns, dissent and suggestions,” the Rajya Sabha MP added.
The BJP has serious reservations about the provision in the original Lokpal bill which said that ‘not less than 50% of the members of Lokpal would be from SC, ST, OBC, minorities and women.
