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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | Sonia agrees to meet Anna

Sonia agrees to meet Anna

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published Published on Jul 1, 2011   modified Modified on Jul 1, 2011

Congress president Sonia Gandhi will meet Anna Hazare on Saturday, citing a “packed prior schedule” to turn down his request for an appointment today.

The anti-graft activist has been parleying with leaders of major political parties in the capital for the past two days and met Bihar rivals Nitish Kumar and Lalu Prasad.

Sources said despite the Congress Working Committee in its meeting last week coming down strongly on Hazare and his colleagues for arrogating to themselves the powers of elected representatives and challenging the “architecture of democracy” in the garb of “civil society activism”, Sonia decided to meet Hazare.

“A political leader may hold his or her own views. But in life, courtesies have to be observed,” a source said.

In the past, despite the frequent run-ins between Hazare and his team and the ministers on the letter and spirit of the Lokpal bill, Sonia made it a point to answer the letters the veteran activist had written to her.

The sources, however, ruled out a “rethink” in the Congress on accommodating the rights activists’ views on bringing the Prime Minister under the bill.

To underscore the government’s standpoint, its press information bureau released write-up by telecom and human resource development minister Kapil Sibal this evening titled: “Jan Lokpal: Cure worse than the disease”.

The minister, who was on the joint drafting panel for the Lokpal bill, rejected the Hazare version on several counts, including the clause on the Prime Minister.

“In a democracy, all public servants are accountable. None can object in principle to such a proposition. The issue is whether the Jan Lokpal consisting of 11 wise men should be given that authority.... Our future experience is likely to prove that members of the Jan Lokpals are also not angels. Independence does not make functionaries angelic,” wrote Sibal.

BJP undecided

The BJP has not yet decided whether it will attend an all-party meeting on the Lokpal bill the Prime Minister has convened on July 3.

Party president Nitin Gadkari told a news channel: “The UPA wants us to attend the all-party meeting because now it needs our help.”

The BJP’s Opposition leaders Sushma Swaraj and Arun Jaitley will hear out Hazare on Friday on his Lokpal draft after which the NDA leaders will meet on Saturday and take a call on whether they should be part of the Prime Minister’s gathering on Sunday or not.

Although the BJP’s initial reflex was to be part of the Prime Minister-initiated political process, sources said the leaders had second thoughts over “bailing out” the government.

Sources said Gadkari was “prodded” by the RSS — that actively backed the Hazare and Baba Ramdev endeavours — to decouple the BJP from the government’s efforts.

The BJP isn’t the only party that’s trying hard not to be seen on the same page as the government. DMK chief M. Karunanidhi stated in Chennai today that the Prime Minister must be within the Lokpal’s ambit to “prove to the world that we are clean”.

The Telegraph, 1 July, 2011, http://www.telegraphindia.com/1110701/jsp/nation/story_14183806.jsp


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