PM under Lokpal? Draft leaves it to House
The draft Lokpal Bill, to be tabled in Parliament Friday, has left the issue of inclusion of the Prime Minister to be decided by MPs on the floors of the two Houses of Parliament after the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Personnel and Law and Justice examined three broad views that emerged on the subject.
The conduct of MPs on the floor of Parliament has been kept out of the Lokpal’s ambit.
Justifying the constitutional safeguards given to MPs under Article 105 of the Constitution, the committee said, “There was complete unanimity among political parties that we should not tamper with the constitutional provisions as they are sacrosanct and time-tested.” As for the CBI, the parliamentary panel has virtually rejected Team Anna’s demand to include it in the bill. The draft report said, “Lokpal will have no power to seek explanation from CBI and cannot monitor any ongoing investigation of the CBI.”
While Team Anna has been demanding the inclusion of the entire bureaucracy in the Jan Lokpal Bill, the standing committee has included only groups A and B of government servants (class I and II officers) in the draft legislation. It has left groups C and D (class III and IV) out of the Lokpal’s ambit. The report stated: “It would be impractical, imprudent, inapposite, unworkable and virtually impossible for any Lokpal and Lokayukta institution to function at all... if every class of public servant is subjected to its jurisdiction.” However, in the case of Lokayuktas, the panel has provided enabling powers to the states “to include more and lower levels, if they so desire”.
Though the panel rejected giving the Lokpal pho-ne-tapping powers, it has made it clear that the CBI should continue to retain such power. The panel also favoured independent functioning of the CVC.
The report, of about 200 pages and accessed by this newspaper, has also left the judiciary out of the Lokpal’s purview. It has proposed and recommended a “comprehensive judicial standard and accountability bill” which is already under consideration of the government.
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