Janlokpal Bill : An overview and my unanswered questions
I have been watching closely on what was happening with the entire process of fasts, demonstrations over Lokpal and Janlokpal bill, I went through the bullet points of Janlokpal bill and began wondering, how does this bill help in curbing corruption or for that matter bringing back the black money back to India, I have seen so many people get behind this movement most of them not knowing what the content of the bill is and how does it improve their lives, I know that people are fed up of corruption and want it rooted out but there is a lot more to this than just a bill.
Let us first discuss what Janlokpal bill wants to achieve and my doubts and counter arguments on why this would not be enough, All this keeping in mind that that I am not against the bill.
These are salient features of the bill (taken from http://www.indiaagainstcorruption.org/salient.html)
- An institution called LOKPAL at the centre and LOKAYUKTA in each state will be set up
- Like Supreme Court and Election Commission, they will be completely independent of the governments. No minister or bureaucrat will be able to influence their investigations.
- Cases against corrupt people will not linger on for years anymore: Investigations in any case will have to be completed in one year. Trial should be completed in next one year so that the corrupt politician, officer or judge is sent to jail within two years.
- The loss that a corrupt person caused to the government will be recovered at the time of conviction.
- How will it help a common citizen: If any work of any citizen is not done in prescribed time in any government office, Lokpal will impose financial penalty on guilty officers, which will be given as compensation to the complainant.
- So, you could approach Lokpal if your ration card or passport or voter card is not being made or if police is not registering your case or any other work is not being done in prescribed time. Lokpal will have to get it done in a month’s time. You could also report any case of corruption to Lokpal like ration being siphoned off, poor quality roads been constructed or panchayat funds being siphoned off. Lokpal will have to complete its investigations in a year, trial will be over in next one year and the guilty will go to jail within two years.
- But won’t the government appoint corrupt and weak people as Lokpal members? That won’t be possible because its members will be selected by judges, citizens and constitutional authorities and not by politicians, through a completely transparent and participatory process.
- What if some officer in Lokpal becomes corrupt? The entire functioning of Lokpal/ Lokayukta will be completely transparent. Any complaint against any officer of Lokpal shall be investigated and the officer dismissed within two months.
- What will happen to existing anti-corruption agencies? CVC, departmental vigilance and anti-corruption branch of CBI will be merged into Lokpal. Lokpal will have complete powers and machinery to independently investigate and prosecute any officer, judge or politician.
- It will be the duty of the Lokpal to provide protection to those who are being victimized for raising their voice against corruption.
So we are basically setting up a new institution which is supposed to be independent, but how can this institution be independent, how would the members of the committee be appointed, it is always mentioned that the committee would be comprised of eminent people, but who would the judge of this, we are the people who knowingly elect so called corrupt people into parliament, so should we be responsible for appointing people ? If not us then who is going to this.
The next being who is going to conduct the investigations and how can it me made sure that the investigations are unbiased, if the corrupt are able to coarse the existing investigation agencies, I am sure that this would be no exception, and how would the timeline of one year for investigation and one year for trail be met? where are the proposed changes for the judicial systems which would allow this timeline to come into existence ? And what would be the appeal process ? the officer/politician would always say that they have done nothing wrong and would want to appeal, In this scenario are they re investigated or would the initial investigation and judgement would be held authoritative ?
And i would not even try to address the point of recovery of loss from convicted as this seems too much hypothetical, good luck trying to get back money from A.Raja or Suresh Kalmadi.
And if Lokpal would be approached for every other issue, how is it going to address the huge list of complaints that it is going to receive ? again we would be ending up in a system which looks like our judicial system.
Again coming back to the process of selection of members this is a point which has not been addressed to in any of the discussions that i have seen. There is no guarantee that even after all the other anti corruption agencies are merged this institution would independent enough or that the people in this institution cannot be influenced, so how can this be addressed ?
The very first counter argument that i always receive is that this a begging step and and we would have to start somewhere. But if we are fighting for it so passionately why settle for first step why not for more? , I welcome you to join this discussion and educate me if I am wrong but I still don’t see light at the end of the dark tunnel of corruption we are in.
India is not mature enough to handle Democracy
I was always of the firm belief that the power to manage should be with the people and in back of the mind I always thought that somehow India as a country would prevail on the long run because of the fact that we have a democratic system in place, which though highly red taped still managed to somehow got things done, I have recently understood that its not that things get done because of the greater good but things get done because it is profitable to some person(s), There is no sense of greater good and even if there it is though by only those who do not have any effect what so ever on others, We live in a society where all development is a by product of some body profiteering, In reality profit should have been the by product of development, but the thing that bugs me the most is that we don’t care, I mentioned WE because including me none of us are determined enough to bring changes to the system, we have always found a way to blame others, and we always find a way to blame.
May be this post is also one of the ways I am blaming everyone. In a democracy I am told that all changes begin from Voting, I know that half of India does not vote, its either because they don’t want to or they don’t care, Then those who vote have a choice on voting on who is less corrupt,May be there a few exceptions but in most cases we are limited to these kinds of candidates, And just look at the kind of people who we elect, they ready to use slurs,swears, throw chairs at each other, and do not even hesitate to get in fist fights in assembly, the place where we are supposedly managed, We watch these thing glued to television and make a comment saying that this is shame on the society, but what next ? , Do we take any actions beyond that ?, The counter argument made to this or should I say the alternated presented for discussion only are either we must select the person who is not corrupt and get this person elected or having a say that no candidate is fit enough until we get the right candidate, I don’t think both of these are realistically possible,
We as citizens of this country have no responsibility to our country what so ever, we do not care about how India progresses, All our activism is limited to few actions which are driven by the media, Let me give you a few examples; During the time of Kargil war all of us collected, food, money and more stuff for the armed forces sent it and felt happy, then what ? have we after that cared about the armed forces a day after that, How many of us have at least tried joining the armed forces, In our Country the people who join armed forces are mostly the people who did not find any better options (I know that there are exceptions), we never even suggest people to join armed forces let alone encourage someone, Where is the responsibility to protect our own selves ?, The same thing was also the case during 26th November attack on Mumbai, All of us were glued to Televisions, then took out candle light vigils and that’s about it. No actions further. During the Jessical Lal Mudrer Trail, The media sparked of frenzy of activism which was projected as our social self waking up,What about thousands of cases still pending in the courts and millions more where injustice was served, As I mentioned before all out activism are limited to few actions.
Democracy is not just putting your vote and forgetting about it, Democracy is where you have to have responsibility towards to the Country, Until we get that sense of responsibility, India is not mature enough to handle Democracy.
I have written this post as a starting point of discussion, I haven’t found a way out of the deep mess we are in, and all this is just a starting point to discussion…
India’s Obama
It has been a long time since I blogged about something, it seems like the blog has went dead, I was so busy with everything that is new in my life that it seems like I have lost track of time and the larger picture is, become invisible, for the longest time I have thought about mobile blogging but have never been able to get a hang of it, then I read somewhere that a person in uk has written nearly 60% of a bestselling book on his ipaq, so I am trying this out. As with everything else I might get bored and move on to the next interesting thing, but till then this is my first mobile blog,
First of all I would like expand the topics on which I blog (I am not sure on how long I will blog about them)
This is about a program I saw on NDTV about India’s Obama or should I say the lack of a person like him, those who know me know that I am really not a big fan of India’s political system, to put in simple words we never have a big picture when it comes to selecting our national leaders, we only care about our local candidates , even then it’s not about their charisma or ability but what party do they belong to, I have met supporters of candidates who support just because he belongs to that party, the candidates never debate on anything important other than a few mudslinging sessions, they don’t have a plan on what to do if they get elected and even after getting elected they don’t know who their leaders would be some are even ignorant enough to say that the party high command will decide the leaders whereas the party high command doesn’t even know what the vibe is.
I also have heard people say that it is easy to criticize someone from the outside, well lets go through a list of things that is required if you want to john politics in India. One you need money and that too a lot of it second you need a last name that is famous for at least 3 generations, both of which you have to be born into, there are few who have come through the route of hard work, but at their age they are already dying or nearly dead. Gandhi was a home person but he along with the best thing to happen to India was also the worst thing, in my opinion if was so focused on getting independence that after India got it he was unsure where to take it , he might of dreamt of a perfect nation which had administration from ground up, but it was the worst thing that happened, India was not and still not is mature enough to get that kind of administration, India still needs a leader with vision and ability to lead from top down and to be democratic we need to elect him or her directly, we need to know who is going to be in charge of running the country
All of this is not going to happen in the near future but there are a few things that can be done that would put into perspective where we are heading,
One there should be no room for post poll alliances you need to get to priorities straight before you fight an election
Two you need to project your leader and your plan beforehand including stuff like details of you foreign and economic policy
Third and the most important is that voting should be made compulsory
I don’t care who you are but you must vote, there should be on chalta hai attitude and don’t take holiday on a holiday, there should be a law which says that he you don’t vote you don’t get any benefits from government
Now the question arises can this be done, even if this is done can it bring improvements if any and at the end can India’s condition be any different than it is now, At least in my opinion these steps will take up one step forward and max be and just maybe we can move towards a better state
And what about Obama like person let us examine his qualities which we want in our leader
One he has to have a charisma, and I am not talking about just the outer layer, two he has to have ability to communicate, and not just talking but the ability to get everyone’s attention with just a few words,
Three he has to have a vision, fourth and the most important he has to have a unifying effect, he should get support from all corners,
Till date I have not seen anyone in India with all of their abilities, I can name a few who satisfy least 3 of the above, Advani is bit ok but the problem is that he is too old and he his much mixed up in the Ayodhya controversy to get support from all corners, Priyanka gandhi is promising but only time can tell if she matches up to the expectations, Narendra modi has 3 qualities but will never be able to unify people, Omar Abdullah is also promising but again time will be the judge of character, so till then let up hope that the leaders who rule will not damage the whole thing beyond repair – Naresh