Lokpal bill tabled in Lok Sabha

The government tabled the Lokpal Bill in Parliament on Thursday amid protests by the Anna Hazare group at various places, as activists stepped up their opposition to the official draft by burning copies of the proposed legislation. While civil society members slammed the bill, dubbing it “weak, anti-poor and anti-Dalit”, the government responded sharply, terming the language of their protest an “insult and affront to Parliament’’, with senior ministers counter-attacking the Hazare group. Copies of the legislation were burned at Hazare’s village of Ralegan Siddhi in Maharashtra and various parts of Delhi, Noida and Greater Noida. Team Hazare has announced its plans to burn copies of the bill every day till August 16, when the Gandhian intends to begin an indefinite fast against the bill. The government accused the BJP of political opportunism, with telecom minister Kapil Sibal saying, “If the BJP was so concerned about Lokpal, the states that it is in power would have had a Lokayukta.’’ Sibal pointed out that Gujarat, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Uttarakhand did not have a Lokayukta. While home minister P Chidambaram referred to PM’s exclusion as a “temporary eclipse”, government sources emphasized that the last word on the bill was yet to be heard as it would have to be discussed and debated by the standing committee on personnel, public grievances and law and justice headed by Congress MP Abhishek Manu Singhvi. On the BJP’s argument that finance minister Pranab Mukherjee—as chairman of the home standing panel during NDA rule—had included the PM under Lokpal’s ambit, the ministers pointed out that the NDA regime failed to pass the legislation. “Mukherjee submitted the report on February 16, 2002. The NDA had two years and two months to get the bill passed in Parliament,” they said. Pointing out that the Lokayukta had lapsed in Gujarat, Sibal said, “How can the BJP, on the one hand, allow the office of CM to be excluded in states where it is in government and suddenly say that the PM be included?”