The Lok Pal Bill-26 jan 2001(collapse of the previous BJP-led Government in 1998)

The Lok Pal Bill

MR. ATAL BEHARI Vajpayee's recent statement about to the Lok Pal Bill settles the question about whether the office of the Prime Minister will fall within its purview. Over the last couple of months, there have been (unfounded) worries that conflicting views within the Union Government over the wisdom of including the Head of Government within the Bill's ambit would eventually result in the Prime Minister's exclusion, thereby diluting the proposed legislation in a significant way. Although fears were expressed that inclusion may result in the Prime Minister's office being open to all manner of charges (including frivolous ones), bringing the Head of Government within the purview of the Lok Pal legislation is essential to send out the important signal that no one - irrespective of the importance of the office he holds - is above the law. An earlier draft of the Lok Pal Bill introduced in the Lok Sabha in 1998 (not passed because of the collapse of the previous BJP-led Government) specifically brought the Prime Minister within its ambit. Therefore, there was never any justification for the latest draft Bill to alter this provision. One of the major reasons why a Lok Pal Bill has failed to be passed by successive Governments is differences over the question of inclusion - those opposed strongly arguing that the Prime Minister's office must be insured from the risk of too much litigation.

The Prime Minister has promised to introduce the Bill in the Lok Sabha ``soon'', the plan being to do so in the next session of Parliament. As things stand, the Cabinet has cleared the concept of the Bill and a Group of Ministers (GoM) has to give a final nod to the draft before it is introduced in the Lok Sabha. The Lok Pal Bill of course should have been in the statute books long ago. Opposition to it from some political quarters has resulted in successive drafts of the Bill being lost in a labyrinth of parliamentary proceedings - the old and time-honoured ruse of referring it to a select committee has killed the Bill more than once. As a result, a Bill which was first introduced in the Lok Sabha in 1968 - drafted on the basis of recommendations made by the Administrative Reforms Commission two years earlier - has failed to become law more than three decades later. A string of attempts was made to revive the Bill but proved much too feeble to see the proposed legislation through.

The basic idea of the Lok Pal is borrowed from the office of ombudsman, which has played an effective role in checking corruption and wrong-doing in Scandinavian and other nations. In a climate where, to use the Prime Minister's own words, ``corruption has bred contempt for the law'', an additional mechanism which takes note of public grievances and can take cognisance of wrong-doing in public life deserves to be welcomed. Just how effective the Lok Pal legislation will be in checking corruption in high places has been a matter of longstanding and inconclusive debate. The Lok Pal is no substitute for judicial action and by itself the institution is unlikely to magically transform the manner in which the administration works. But, as conceived in some earlier draft Bills, the scope and jurisdiction of the Lok Pal is reasonably wide and the very existence of an institution which can bring public figures to book could act as an important check on the misuse of power. Given that virtually every major party has routinely supported the setting up of a Lok Pal in their manifestos, the Bill will not fail because of the lack of political support. All it requires now - just as all it had required before - is the requisite political commitment to see the proposed legislation through Parliament.