History of Deception : The LokPal Bill in Parliament

I liked the Frontline article on this topic and felt many more should know about it …. Here is a shortened version which is easier for our Monday mornings.

PUBLIC anger was understandably aroused over the gross delay by Parliament in the last 40 years to enact a Lokpal Bill and with the toothless one that the government sponsored. It is not widely known that the delay was aggravated by deception and fraud in 1985. It was, however, emulated by almost all governments that came later. One does not grudge any of those who rushed to Jantar Mantar to grab a few minutes’ fame before TV cameras. Tinsel town, predictably, did not go unrepresented. If the cause had stirred them earlier, their disquiet remained their best preserved secret. One cannot expect Anna Hazare to study – or, for that matter, care for – the nitty-gritty of the law. Some of those who could have known ought to have spoken earlier loud and clear.

The Lokpal Bill was one of the three planks in the movement launched by Jayaprakash Narayan 40 years ago to eradicate corruption. The other two were electoral reforms, designed particularly to end the play of money power, and an effective anti-defection law. JP did not jump into the fray all of a sudden, still less did he resort to theatricals. He studied the problems, deliberated on solutions, and consulted a wide range of persons – lawyers, academics, activists, and so on.

Unlike some today, JP knew that no Lokpal could wield the magic wand. He wrote: “Let me not create the impression that the appointment of a Lokpal and Lokayuktas will in itself cure the disease of corruption so rampant among Ministers and civil servants. This is not the place to go into the question, but if the Lokpal Bill and the Maharashtra Ayukta Act, which is claimed to be patterned after the former, were carefully scrutinised, it would be discovered that the action of these vital officers is severely limited and hemmed in by restrictive provisions.

Anna Hazare, in contrast, asserts that the Lokpal Bill “will put the brakes on corruption in the country and help reduce the gap between the poor and the rich”. It is a man of such colossal self-assurance and naivety who leads the movement.

The interim report of the Administrative Reforms Commission (ARC) on “Problems of Redress of Citizens’ Grievances” initiated the discussion in the country. The ARC was headed by Morarji Desai. Its emphasis was on the redress of citizens’ grievances for maladministration even if there was no breach of the law. This was based on Scandinavia’s Ombudsman, who is essentially a parliamentary institution rather like India’s Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG). Speaking to the All India Congress Committee (AICC) in Jaipur on November 3, 1963, Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru said that while the ombudsman system fascinated him, he felt that in a big country like India, the introduction of such a system was beset with difficulties. But then, Nehru was never enamoured of inquiries into charges of corruption, anyway.

No Bill in recent history has been so badly mauled by the JPC as the Lokpal Bill of 1977 was. It was headed by Shyam Nandan Mishra, who was to win undying fame later as Foreign Minister. The Bill had defined “misconduct” to include, besides corruption, failure to act in any case otherwise than in accordance with the norms of integrity and conduct which ought to be followed by the class of public men to which he belongs”. The JPC considered this to be “too wide and is, therefore, likely to be amenable to different interpretations”.

This destroys the raison d’etre of the institution. It is designed to help people who have been badly treated even if no law is breached. It is meant also to cover abuse of power and misdemeanours or misconduct even if they do not constitute offences under the law. Since courts exist to try offences under the IPC and the Prevention of Corruption Act of 1988, why set up a parallel body?

If a Lokpal is to be worthwhile, the selected person must (1) have jurisdiction in respect of both maladministration and misconduct; (2) be appointed by a procedure that excludes executive influence and control. The Chief Justice of India and the Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha must be on the selection panel along with the Prime Minister; (3) be a former judge of the Supreme Court or a former Chief Justice of a High Court; (4) have jurisdiction over a wide range of “public men” – the Prime Minister, MPs, senior civil servants, heads of public corporations and national universities, and so on; (5) have an independent investigating agency of his own and not be dependent on the Central Bureau of Investigation; (6) have the power to launch prosecutions himself and order vacating of office; (7) be easily accessible; (8) have a juridical personality. It would be best to amend the Constitution to give him constitutional status comparable to that of the CAG.