Team Hazare for tougher graft laws

With exactly a month left to meet the mutually agreed deadline to complete the draft of a strong anti-graft Lokpal bill by June 30, the government and Anna Hazare’s team will meet for the fifth time on Monday in a bid to widen the areas of agreement to move forward.

With exactly a month left to meet the mutually agreed deadline to complete the draft of a strong anti-graft Lokpal bill by June 30, the government and Anna Hazare’s team will meet for the fifth time on Monday in a bid to widen the areas of agreement to move forward.

HT Image

Hazare’s team is expected to push their second set of basic principles on the powers and functioning of the much hyped Lokpal institution on Monday, which include stringent punishment including life imprisonment for high ranking officials in cases of corruption.

The civil society activists are also demanding that the minimum punishment for a government official found guilty of any act of corruption should be at least one year. “Punishment shall be higher if the status or rank of the accused is higher,” states a recommendation proposed by Hazare’s team.

This latest set of basic principles also includes provisions like empowering the Lokpal to take up the probe into graft allegations against MPs in return for asking questions or voting inside Parliament and to probe cases of money laundering in case the investigation points to an offence under the money laundering law.

These new recommendations by Hazare’s team have already been proposed, even though government is yet to provide a categorical answer on whether the Lokpal would be given the powers to probe corruption allegations against the Supreme Court and high court judges.