The government says it will wait and see what the majority of MPs and political parties have to say once the bill comes to the floor for discussion. Renu Mittal reports.
On the eve of the Lok Sabha taking up the Lokpal Bill for discussion after it was introduced in the house on December 22, there is a sense of uncertainty and confusion within the ruling Congress. They are worried if the numbers will add up to finally make the bill into a law or whether the bill will fail in the Rajya Sabha where the ruling alliance does not have the numbers to push it through.
A senior United Progressive Alliance leader said that Lok Sabha will only come to the Rajya Sabha once it is passed in the Lok Sabha. He admitted that unless all parties come together the bill cannot be passed, as the alliance does not have the numbers in the upper house.
It is not only the Congress that has issued a whip to its members for the next three days but UPA allies have also issued similar whips. The Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam has reservations over the lokayukta issue and has told the government that states cannot be compelled to introduce it. This is the problem with a host of regional parties, many of which have their own government in the state. The Bharatiya Janata Party too has a problem with this.
But the government feels that this is not an issue which should agitate political parties. Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee made it clear in Parliament last week that after passing the bill, the government will have to notify each clause before it can become a law. He said that the government will call a meeting of all chief ministers before the notification to elicit their views, as the government can take time to make a bill and it does not have to immediately rush into it.
But senior leaders who are handling the Lokpal Bill are clear that the government will not agree to bring any structural changes to the bill that has been drafted and cleared by the cabinet, particularly on issues like the Central Bureau of Investigation, though the government may agree to bring in amendments to other clauses that are not seen as structural or basic to the Lokpal.
The government says it will wait and see what the majority of MPs and political parties have to say once the bill comes to the floor for discussion. As one senior minister put it, "Our intensions are clear. We have brought the bill because we want to pass it. But what do we do if we don't have the numbers and the opposition does not co-operate and support in the passing of the bill?"
This appears to sum up the current sense and attitude within the ruling party. Most of the political parties including the Congress don't want the bill as they see it encroaching on the functioning of the executive and the creation of a parallel authority or executive outside the executive, which would have no accountability or responsibility.
By bringing the bill the government would have washed its hands off any blame that would have been laid at its door for failing to bring in the Lokpal Bill. The ruling party would certainly not be in mourning if the bill is not passed.
As for the opposition, it would like to keep the issue of Lokpal alive till the Uttar Pradesh elections hoping to get mileage in the polls on the issue of corruption. It would certainly not suit the political agenda of the opposition if the Lokpal Bill is passed. The best scenario is to keep the bill hanging till the next session and in the meantime keep the Anna Hazare agitation on the boil.
Hazare and his team are sitting on a three-day fast beginning Tuesday in Mumbai after which he wants to come to Delhi and sit on dharna outside Congress chief Sonia Gandhi's house, followed by a 'jail bharo andolan' against the Congress and the UPA government.
The war of words between the Congress and Anna has intensified with the Congress calling him an RSS agent.
This suits the Congress in UP where the Muslims, reportedly, see Anna Hazare as a proxy for the BJP and RSS. The past association of the BJP with Mayawati and their coming together to make her chief minister is now driving the Muslims closer to the Congress party.
Within the next three-days during the battle between Parliament and Anna, the ruling party would showcase how elements outside the democratic framework are attempting to hijack democracy and not let Parliament do the job for which it has been created: make laws for the people, to whom it is accountable.
