By TCN News,
Hyderabad: The Jan Lokpal Bill prepared by Anna Hazare’s Team has such draconian clauses that if that institution is established as they suggested the Indian constitution and the parliamentary democracy will simply get into a crisis, said representatives of the SC/ST/BC and Minority communities.
Addressing a press conference under the banner of Citizens for Social Justice, they urged for the Jan Lokpal Bill to be made election issue of 2014 General Elections. They also demanded nationwide debate on all versions of the Lokpal Bill including that prepared by the Congress-led UPA Government.
Prof Kancha Ilaiah, Dr. John Dayal, Member of National Integration Council, Dr. Joseph D’souza, President of All India Christian Council and many eminent leaders from Muslim, Dalit and OBC communities addressed the press held in Hyderabad on Jan Lokpal Bill on 6th September.
“We as the representatives of the SC/ST/BC Minority communities are of the firm opinion that only after this constitutional governance is put in place, as it was laboriously institutionalized by Dr. B. R. Ambedkar and other nationalist leaders, the representatives of these communities, even in a marginal way, occupied some positions in the state sector. The system has improved the socioeconomic status of the historically oppressed masses in a marginal way. But for the present constitutional system even that would not have been possible,” they said.
“A Lokpal Bill of such powers (whether of Government or of other groups) should be placed before the people as part of political parties’ manifestoes in the general elections. If the BJP and the Team Anna think that the entire nation is with them they should go to election with Jan Lokpal Bill in 2014 and get the approval of the majority. Even the Government Bill, in whatever form it could be, has to be debated by the whole nation in the elections of 2014,” they demanded.
They cannot make us believe that corruption cannot be handled with the existing laws just for two more years. In India’s caste culture if a Dalit or Aadivasi comes to position of eating two meal a day and can send one’s children to school he/she is branded as corrupt. And if an upper caste person builds a house of 400 crore rupees for a small family living he/she is not treated as corrupt. The definition of corruption differs greatly between Dalit-Bahujan, Minorities and Hindutva Anna Hazare forces. Only a national referendum on this issue protects the constitution and democracy, they averred.
The representatives appealed to all the SC/ST/BC and Minority law makers of the country to oppose this mode of introduction of Lokpal Bill and stop it as they have done in the case of Women’s Reservation Bill. They also appealed to the ruling UPA not to yield to Hazare’s political blackmail. The SC/ST/BC and Minorities cannot be deceived with hunger strikes as they were at the time of the Poona Pact.