'Bring corporates under Lokpal'

The Left parties, ignored by the government's crisis managers in backchannel consultations, lent a favourable voice to the government on select issues in the Lokpal debate on Saturday. HT reports.

The Left parties, ignored by the government's crisis managers in backchannel consultations, lent a favourable voice to the government on select issues in the Lokpal debate on Saturday.

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While in Rajya Sabha CPM's Sitaram Yechury argued for widening the definition of corruption and cited practical difficulty in bringing the huge bureaucracy under the Lokpal, CPI's Gurudas Dasgupta criticised Team Anna for trying to paint all parliamentarians as tainted people in Lok Sabha.

Yechury said the Lokpal Bill should have provisions to probe corporates and the nexus among them, corrupt politicians, bureaucrats and sections of the corporate media. Yechury also focused on the need to follow constitutional procedures while making legislations. Dasgupta, the lone Left leader who frequented the BJP office to discuss strategy after being left in the lurch by the government managers, said in Lok Sabha: "Crusade against corruption is not led by one individual. We are also fighting against corruption."

Yechury also said he wanted a new bill to be presented before Parliament which should be a "combination of best features of all the bills" including the Jan Lokpal Bill.

Harping on the Left's favourite theory of neo-liberal reforms, Yechury said, "Is corruption the prerogative only of public servants? There is a nexus of corrupt politicians, corrupt bureaucrats, corrupt corporate houses and certain sections of the corporate media."

Yechury agreed with the demand for a separate lokayukta for states and said their appointments should be the privilege of the respective state government and authorities there.

Dasgupta supported Hazare on his three sticking points.