I Didn’t violate any service rule: Kejriwal

Anna Hazare’s key aide Arvind Kejriwal yesterday questioned the income tax notice served on him for payment of Rs 9 lakh as outstanding dues pertaining to the period while he was in government service, terming it a clear case of political vendetta against those involved in the Jan Lokpal campaign.

“In my opinion, there is no role of the Income Tax Department…they are doing it under political pressure,” he said, responding to the August 5 IT notice served on him.

Government sources, however, maintained that the notice had been served long back and the Anna group was only raking it up now to gain public sympathy and score brownie points.

Kejriwal said he remained in the government service from 1995 to 2006 and took study leave between November 2000 and October 2002. He said he rejoined and took a leave without pay from 2004 before resigning in February 2006 to devote full time to his NGO Parivartan.

The activist rejected the view that he had violated government service and bond rules or that he owed money to the government. He said if at all he owed money, the government could take it from his outstanding General Provident Fund dues. “I have been repeatedly writing to them to adjust it against my GPF amount, which is believed to be a few lakhs. However, this has not been done so far,” he said.

He said the government was interpreting the bond in a wrong way to suit itself. “No employee can work without taking a single break. I have not violated the bond condition. The government should return the GPF amount. I would donate the entire amount for the movement against corruption,” he added.

Supporting Kejriwal, Prashant Bhushan said the notice showed “the government has not yet taken any lesson. It is still using its dirty tricks department to target the group”.

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Will the Lokpal be tenth time lucky?

The Lokpal bill is into its ninth life but the eight previous governments that tried to deliver it failed to show similar cat-like survival skills.

For over four decades, the bill has repeatedly been introduced only to be forgotten and then resurrected again. But almost all the governments that tried to give it birth died prematurely themselves — some within months — and the two that completed their terms got waist-deep in problems and failed to return.

The Congress was the first to try. On May 1, 1968, then home minister Y.B. Chavan introduced the bill in the Lok Sabha and it was referred to a joint select committee that completed its work in a year. The House passed the bill on August 20, 1969.

But before the legislation could travel the few yards to the Rajya Sabha, the fourth Lok Sabha was dissolved following the Congress’s split into Congress () and Congress (R). Nothing was heard of the bill for the next two years and, despite its passage in the Lok Sabha, it lapsed.

On August 2, 1971, Ram Niwas Mirdha, junior personnel minister in the Indira Gandhi ministry, brought it back to the Lok Sabha. But within weeks, India had gone to war with Pakistan.

Thereafter, Indira’s term was dogged by problems, from food shortage and price rise to bandhs and corruption, culminating in the June 1975 court judgment against her election that led to the Emergency. So the Lokpal bill was the last thing on her mind. Her government lasted its term but lost the 1977 election.

The victorious Janata Party government took up the bill. Charan Singh, home minister in the Morarji Desai cabinet, placed it in the House on July 23, 1977. But the Janata Party’s innings ended in just over two years.

The fourth to introduce the bill — on August 25, 1985 — was Rajiv Gandhi’s law minister A.K. Sen. Rajiv’s decision to bring it within a year of securing a stupendous majority appeared to be in sync with his promise to root out corruption.

But the bill was again referred to a standing committee and forgotten as the Bofors cloud gathered steam and the Ram temple agitation got off the blocks. Rajiv never returned to power.

The V.P. Singh government, high on its pre-poll promise of bringing the corrupt to justice, introduced the bill in its first Parliament session. The government didn’t last even a year.

P.V. Narasimha Rao didn’t touch the bill for the five years he ruled but his successor H.D. Deve Gowda, Prime Minister of the United Front coalition, introduced it on September 10, 1996. By April next year, he was gone. The Front itself was ousted later in the year.

On July 23, 1998, Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s National Democratic Alliance resurrected what by then was already looking like a doomed legislation. It followed the familiar route to a standing committee and, before anything substantive could be done, Vajpayee had lost his majority in April 1999 — in less than a year and by a single vote.

Vajpayee returned but the bill had to wait until 2001, when deputy personnel minister Vasundhara Raje placed it in Parliament on July 9. The House panel that vetted it was headed by Pranab Mukherjee, who completed the job in record time.

However, the NDA government sat on the bill. Then, buoyed by its Assembly poll victories, it called a snap general election and lost.

UPA-I didn’t once think of the bill. Now UPA-II has revived it and suffered its gravest political crisis. When a revised draft comes up, perhaps in winter, will the Lokpal be tenth time lucky?

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Central Govt. prayd SC to recall it's Black Money Order

The central government Wednesday told the Supreme Court that its judgment and order on black money needed to be recalled as its implementation would have far reaching consequences on its functioning.

The apex court bench of Justice Altamas Kabir and Justice S.S. Nijjar was told that converting the high-level committee headed by the revenue secretary into a special investigating team (SIT) amounted to dislodging each and every authority set up under the law.

The HLC comprising the heads of different organisations or their representatives was set up by the government to monitor and co-ordinate investigation into parking of ill-gotten money by Indians in tax havens abroad.

Attorney General Goolam Vahanvati wondered how secretary-revenue, or deputy governor of the Reserve Bank of India would transform themselves into the role of investigators. The attorney general wondered how director of Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), India’s external intelligence agency, could be included in the SIT.

The attorney general said that ‘there were serious objections on converting the HLC into SIT. How the members of the HLC would become the investigators’.

The court was told that director, RAW, was a faceless entity and nobody knew who he was.

The government moved an application July 15 seeking the recall of the court’s July 4 order. But Wednesday it moved another application restricting its prayer to recall that portion of the July 4 order by which the apex court set up a SIT to probe money laundering.

The SIT was asked to undertake investigation, initiation of proceedings and prosecution.

The application said that in exercise of the jurisdiction under Article 32 of the constitution, the apex court could not pass orders ‘which have the affect of completely eliminating the role and the constitutional functions of the executive (government).’

Vahanvati wondered if the ‘SIT without the authority of law, where would it get its funds’.

The court was told that there were very serious issues about the scope of the reference of the SIT asking it to do everything and SIT can’t possibly do.

Vahanvati said that the way SIT has been made responsible to the apex court, it would denude the finance minister of his power to ask for any report from his officials.

Senior counsel Anil Divan, who commenced the arguments for petitioner and noted jurist Ram Jethmalani, would continue his arguments Thursday.

The apex court’s July 4 verdict came on the petition by Jethmalani seeking direction to take steps for bringing back ill-gotten money stashed away in tax havens by Indian citizens and the disclosure of the names of such account holders that were available with the government.

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Indian Govt. hired top lawyer in Dubai to file an appeal

The Centre has hired a top lawyer in Dubai to file an appeal against the death sentence to 17 Indians, minister of state for external affairs Preneet Kaur said on Monday. She assured a delegation of families of the convicts here that the government would do its best to ensure justice in the matter.

Preneet Kaur said the Indian consulate in Dubai had been sounded on the matter. The families interested in visiting their wards in Dubai would be granted visa relaxation, she said.

Sukhwinder Kaur, whose son Taranjeet (23) is among the 17 convicts, said the minister had assured them that special secretary, foreign affairs, would be sent to UAE to meet the convicts. “The government is making all efforts to help us,” she said.

Her son left for Dubai around one-and-a-half years back. “We only knew that Taranjeet was arrested on suspicion. Now he is facing death,” she said. Parminder Kaur, whose husband, Kashmir Singh, figures in the list of the 17 convicts, said they were shattered with the harsh sentence.

“We are exploring all options to save them and that’s why we met the minister. I am satisfied with the outcome of the meeting,” she said. Meanwhile, prayer meetings were held in Ludhiana and Jalandhar for the convicts’ well-being.

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