Civil society submits its version of Lokpal Bill

At the end of the first meeting Saturday of the joint committee of ministers and civil society representatives formed to draft the Lokpal Bill, the government admitted that the experiment was a historic step, and could open new doors in democracy.

The meeting, which took place at North Block Saturday morning, lasted for 90 minutes. The committee will meet next on May 2.

According to sources, the meeting was cordial and everybody underlined the importance of an effective Lokpal. The committee’s chairperson Pranab Mukherjee said, “The joint committee of this kind is a first time experiment and if it becomes successful it would open a new door in our democracy. The government is very keen to make it a success.”   

Audio recording of the meeting was done. As for video recordings, the ministers did not reject it but felt that if the videos were released after every meeting, it would make things difficult,” sources told DNA.

“There was a suggestion that video recording of all meetings can be released once the process is completed. The ministers asked civil society members to further think over this issue. A final call will be taken on it on May 2,” sources added.

During the meeting, the committee’s co-chair Shanti Bhushan talked about the UN Convention on Corruption, while social activist Anna Hazare stressed the importance of checking corruption in the bureaucracy and in development-related works.

Besides Hazare and Shanti Bhushan, the other three civil society members are advocate Prashant Bhushan, Justice (retired) N Santosh Hegde, and RTI activist, Arvind Kejriwal. Apart from Mukherjee, the other four ministers in the committee are home minister P Chidambaram, law minister M Veerappa Moily, human resources development minister Kapil Sibal and minority affairs minister Salman Khursheed.

“We circulated an improved draft of our Jan Lokpal Bill. The government pointed out that they also have a lot of drafts and suggestions which they would share with us. We will look at everything - all the drafts - and take the best of everything. When we meet on May 2, we will discuss all the drafts in detail,” Kejriwal told DNA.

He stated that the new version of their Jan Lokpal Bill was formed after incorporating valuable suggestions received from the National Advisory Council’s sub-committee, the National Campaigners for People’s Right to Information (NCPRI), and from the public.

The key changes in the newer version of Jan Lokpal Bill are: power to Lokpal to tap phones as per the prescribed procedures, only full bench of Lokpal can give sanction for investigation and prosecution in cases of complaints against judges (done to address concerns of the judiciary), and changes in the selection criteria of Lokpal and its members.

“Under the revised proposal for Lokpal’s selection, the prime minister and the leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha have replaced the Rajya Sabha chairman and the Lok Sabha Speaker. Earlier, it had been a single-tier process, but now it will be a 3-tier process. It is being done to strengthen the selection process. This way no one will be able to push for their own candidate,” Kejriwal explained.

He rubbished rumours of the civil society’s draft getting diluted and said they have instead tightened it.

After the meeting, Sibal said that in their next meeting, they would decide on the modality of public consultations on the legislation. Prashant Bhushan, another member of the committee, said all concerned organisations will be consulted as part of the public consultation process, through websites and other forums.

“The fundamental principles will be decided in the next meeting. After that, there would be meetings every week to complete the work,” Bhushan added.

The committee has to prepare the bill by June 30, the deadline set in the notification constituting the committee, as the government has promised to introduce it in parliament in the upcoming monsoon session, which begins in the first half of July.