Opinion Lokpal not enough

Editorial enumerates six suggestions to be implemented to tackle corruption.

January 10, 2014 12:05 AM IST First published on: Dec 25, 2013 at 12:08 AM IST

While Parliament has passed the lokpal bill,corruption can only be effectively tackled when people collectively raise the level of the social consciousness in the society,says the CPM in Peoples Democracy. A political alternative to the two main political formations,the Congress and the BJP,which compete with each other in excelling the levels of corruption,is required to cleanse our society from this morass of fast declining political morality, says an editorial.

The editorial enumerates six suggestions to be implemented to tackle corruption,and the CPM also wants the definition of corruption to be widened in the Prevention of Corruption Act,1988,which defines corruption as the misuse of public power for private gain or enrichment. In many cases,power is misused to benefit an entity like a private company,which is not a person as required under the PCA,1988. Often,there may be no traceable kickbacks or embezzlement,but there may be a huge loss to the public exchequer and breach of public trust,for example through the sale of PSUs due to a wilful misuse of power, it says.

The editorial also points to the need to legislate a bill to protect whistleblowers.

Corporate gap

An editorial in CPI weekly New Age laments the failure of the new lokpal law to include amendments moved by the Left parties,which wanted corporations and NGOs to come under the lokpal. But it was not supported by the two major parties. These amendments received only 19 votes,whereas 171 members took part in the voting, the article states.

Referring to the scams on 2G spectrum and coal block allocation,the CPI asserts that these cases made evident the role of corporations in facilitating corruption. As far as framing laws are concerned,this bill will not be sufficient. The government itself has said that to make the institution of lokpal effective,at least half a dozen other laws,including those related to assuring protection to whistleblowers,have to be enacted , it claims.

RESOLVE THE IMPASSE

The CPI-ML,in the journal ML Update,has attacked both the US and Indian government over the case involving Indian diplomat Devyani Khobragade in New York. Instead of muscle-flexing and grandstanding,India and the US must work on resolving the diplomatic impasse without compromising either on Indias sovereignty and the dignity of its diplomats,or on the rights of Indian workers, it says.

It argues that the issues of mutual and reciprocal dignity of nations and those of the rights of domestic and migrant workers,the rights and dignity of Khobragade as diplomat and those of Sangeeta Richard as an Indian citizen,should not be used to undermine each other.

Compiled by Avishek G. Dastidar