Civil society groups and organisations on Tuesday condemned attempts to malign co-chairman of the lokpal bill joint drafting committee Shanti Bhushan and its member Prashant Bhushan. Expressing “full solidarity,” the organisations said they would oppose all efforts to sideline the central issue of establishing a strong and effective mechanism to tackle endemic corruption in the country. Describing Mr. Shanti Bhushan as “a tireless defender of civil liberties and the rule of law,”...

A fresh controversy involving anti-corruption campaigner Shanti Bhushan broke out today over allotment of priced farmhouse plots to him and his son Jayant in nearby Noida and demands have cropped for the lawyer's resignation from the joint committee to draft the lokpal bill. Congress and Samajwadi Party questioned the allotment of farmhouses to Bhushans and suggested that Shanti Bhushan should withdraw himself from the Joint Committee to draft lokpal bill. The controversy...

Irom Sharmila Chanu and Anna Hazare have one thing in common – the ability to fast indefinitely for what they perceive is right. But the similarities end there. She has been on a political fast for 11 years but her silent resilience moves you when you realize the sheer magnitude of what she is single-handedly trying to achieve. Far from the glare of studio lights of television channels and tangled wires of...

The political class may be evil and corrupt but that’s whom Shanti Bhushan and his son Jayant Bhushan turn to when they want a farmhouse each — for a song. In his declaration of assets last week, Shanti Bhushan, also co-chairman of the drafting committee of the lokpal bill, mentioned a 10,000 sq m farmland plot in Noida. What he did not mention was the discretionary manner in which the Mayawati government,...

Given the scale of corruption in India, the constitution of a Jan Lokpal will be a welcome initiative. But the proposed Lokpal has the makings of a super-monster. After 42 years of hesitation and uncertainty, an institutional mechanism to deal with the all-pervasive incidence of corruption in India is in sight. What apparently moved the state machinery was the agitation spearheaded by Anna Hazare, which drew spontaneous support primarily in the...