All-party meeting on Lokpal Bill to be held on July 3

New Delhi: The all-party meeting on the Lokpal Bill will be held on July 3. Yesterday, after ninth round of talks between the government representatives and the civil society activists, a consensus was elusive and both the sides were seen leaving clutching two separate versions of the draft.


The chasm between the two teams took on Grand Canyon proportions yesterday. “We agreed to disagree,” said Kapil Sibal, who is one of the five ministers on the committee; the other five members are activists headed by Gandhian Anna Hazare. PTI quoted Mr Hazare as warning that he would start a fast on August 16 “to teach the government a lesson” with the help of a people’s movement.

The Prime Minister met with his allies yesterday evening at his residence. The first meeting of the UPA in a year focused largely on the fierce battle the government is fighting with activists over the Lokpal Bill. In a huge setback for him, the DMK said it does not endorse the government’s stand that the Lokpal Bill should not apply to the Prime Minister’s Office.

The Lokpal is meant to have 11 members who will serve as an ombudsman and combat corruption among politicians and bureaucrats. There are eight major points of difference between the activists and the ministers – which have led to both sides developing their own versions of the Lokpal Bill. Topping the list of irreconcilable differences is whether the Lokpal can investigate the Prime Minister on charges of corruption.

In the next two or three days, Mr Sibal said, Team Anna will share its comments on the ministers’ draft of the Lokpal Bill. The two drafts – or one draft that reflects both points of view, it’s not clear which – will then be circulated among political parties. After that, the bill will be forwarded to the Cabinet. The version that the Cabinet approves of will be tabled in Parliament in the Monsoon Session.

The Joint Drafting Committee with its unique combination of elected and non-elected representatives was formed in April after Mr Hazare undertook a lengthy hunger strike against corruption. His call-to-action resounded with middle class India which unconditionally backed his movement- India Against Corruption.

The government was forced to sanction Mr Hazare’s demand – that civil society representatives be given a formal role in the drafting of the much-delayed Lokpal Bill.

Sticking points between the two sides include whether the Bill can apply to bureaucrats and MPs. The government says that while MPs will be covered by the Lokpal Bill, their conduct inside Parliament remains off-limits for the Lokpal. The government has also refused to let the Chief Justice of India be covered by the Bill; it says the Judicial Accountability Bill will handle complaints against senior judges. Activists want all bureaucrats to be covered by the Bill; the government says only senior bureaucrats should be governed by it.