Those dismayed by the failure of the United Progressive Alliance government's new Lokpal Bill to address some critical concerns regarding the creation of a potent anti-corruption watchdog can derive solace from the fact that the problem pertains to not just the Congress party but the political class in general. This was clearly evident from the response of our parliamentarians to the introduction of the Bill in the Lok Sabha on Thursday, with everything but the issue of corruption being cited by them to pan the legislation.
Discord
There are parties which think the very idea of a potent anti-corruption watchdog is a threat to democracy, there are those which think getting a seat or two for marginalised sections on the Lokpal panel is more important than fighting corruption while there are still others which resist the Bill since it is being introduced under street pressure, threatening parliamentary sovereignty. Every side has high-flown catchphrases to couch its opposition in even as the attitude of individual MPs cutting across party lines suggests that nobody really wants the law.
This is not to say that the issues raised by the Opposition parties are not legitimate. Of course it is right to say that Parliament should not be enacting laws on the basis of a deadline set by activists. Nobody is denying that there is an issue with the Lokpal Bill providing for Lokayuktas in state since this conflicts with the federal principle. But what is remarkable here is that no parliamentarian has stood up to accept that the roots of the problem lie in the political class as a whole failing to ensure clean and transparent governance. No one has seen the irony in parliamentary supremacy being stressed even as members of the House show the same lack of concern for public good that has discredited the political class, giving rise to agitations on the street.
From the looks of it, it will take a good deal for the Union government to get the Lokpal Bill passed by Parliament after the debate scheduled from December 27. The failure of the government to take on board the dissenting notes appended by different parties to the standing committee's report on the Bill makes storm and fury a certainty ISSUE OF GRAFT once Parliament gets down to the nitty-gritty of the Bill.
There is also the ominous fact of Anna Hazare going on fast at the same time as Parliament discusses the Lokpal Bill, with the added threat of a jail bharo agitation from December 30 in case the outcome fails to meet Team Anna's expectations.
Debate may be healthy in a democracy but the prospect of discord within and outside Parliament over an issue which merely needs right intent and adequate flexibility to be settled can hardly evoke optimism. What is perhaps worse, there is the distinct possibility of conflict over the Lokpal stretching well beyond the Winter session of Parliament, coming in the way of engagement with other equally pressing issues.
If blame has to be apportioned for this unseemly state of affairs, both the United Progressive Alliance government and the team of anti- corruption crusaders led by Anna Hazare will not escape censure. Team Anna has obviously failed to make the most of the public support that their agitation has evoked. In fact, this support seems to have been interpreted by it as a licence to make intemperate statements and adopt rigid stances. Were it not so, we would not be confronted with the spectacle of Anna Hazare issuing Parliament a deadline for passing a complex piece of legislation with serious ramifications for the future.
The means used by Anna Hazare in the past to make himself heard by politicians can be justified given the latter's disconnect with public aspirations but his team seems to have overlooked the need for using such means sparingly. Overuse of fast for a cause can rob it of its potency because there is a real possibility of the crowds stopping to come in sooner or later.

Government
When that happens there will not be much to distinguish between Anna Hazare and Irom Sharmila who has been fasting for years for the repeal of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act without her demand being conceded.
Team Anna's fixation with a monolithic Lokpal structure which incorporates any and everything, from all categories of government employees to the redressal of public grievances, has also seen it fail to corner the government on issues where its position is most blameworthy. But, more on that later.
While the media has rightly highlighted Team Anna's shortcomings, sections of it seem to forget that the crusaders symptomise a problem that originates well and truly within the citadels of power. This means that nothing the anti-corruption crusaders do or not do can match what the UPA government has not done all these months: hammer out a mechanism that will serve the intended purpose of checking graft.
Right from the time Hazare launched his first stir in April, the government's approach has been to tackle their challenge by yielding only as much as is rendered unavoidable given the present mood against corruption. This was reflected in the first bill it presented in Parliament in August and it is to be seen in the second one tabled in Parliament on Thursday. This entails that while the government has proposed steps that will mark an improvement over the present system, these have been mooted less with a genuine desire for change and more with the intent of tackling Team Anna and retaining the party's credibility in the public eye.
It is this half-sincerity that is behind the sorry spectacle of the Lokpal Bill mandating an elaborate paraphernalia for the institution even as the most critical part of its functioning-investigation of corruption cases - will continue to be handled by the CBI over which the government is to retain administrative control.
But Team Anna's Lokpal chant has made less audible the government's doublespeak. Their persistent demand that the CBI should be brought under the Lokpal has got projected as yet another instance of their unreasonableness, since there are already widespread concerns about the institution becoming a behemoth that is accountable to none. A flexible Team Anna would have instead taken two steps forward to stress that if bringing the CBI under the Lokpal was not possible, the agency should at least be freed from the administrative control of the government. This would have reconciled their position with the CBI's own stand. Such flexibility would have also put all the focus on the real issue at stake: the reluctance of the government to give up control over the agency which it has all along used for the wrong reasons.

Resistance
If Team Anna's lack of flexibility has harmed its cause, the Union government's resistance to coming up with an effective legislation indicates the stranglehold of status quo over our present system. In fact, the kind of resistance we have seen from the Union government over what are some genuine demands is remarkable, if only because it shows how strongly vested interests influence public policy. Otherwise, months of intense public debate over the issue of corruption would have been enough for the government to acknowledge to itself that the era of unaccountable regimes is perhaps drawing to a close, with the people having run out of patience with them. Such acknowledgment would have made drafting of a proper legislation a far simpler thing than the government has made it seem. For, at the end of the day, those who man the levers of power know better than any civil society activist what makes for a good law and what is unlikely to have much of an impact.
Source:indiatoday.in