Giving in to demands from anti-corruption activists, the government today issued a gazette notification on formation of a joint committee headed by senior minister Pranab Mukherjee to draft an effective Lokpal Bill. The notification, one of the key demands of the anti-corruption campaign launched by Gandhian Anna Hazare, has been signed by V K Bhasin, Secretary, Legislative Department of the Law Ministry. The notification was proudly displayed at the site of Hazare's...

Government on Friday night blinked in the battle of attrition with Anna Hazare by agreeing to issue a formal order to set up a joint committee for drafting an effective Lokpal Bill and the Gandhian will end his indefinite fast on Saturday. The announcement of an agreement came from both sides late in the night on the fourth day of Hazare's last-unto-death that triggered a nationwide support for his anti-corruption campaign. "Government...

The Lok Pal (anti-corruption body) Bill has generated widespread interest in the past few days. The Bill is an attempt by the government, under massive pressure due to corruption charges, to gain some of its lost ground. However, civil rights activists, including Anna Hazare, Swami Agnivesh, Kiran Bedi and Arvind Kejriwal, have termed the draft legislation as weak and demanded that fifty per cent of the members in the committee drafting...

The new Lokpal Bill panel will have equal representation from civil society, but it will remain an informal committee, the Union government told social activist Anna Hazare on Thursday, whose 'satyagraha' for a stringent anti-corruption legislation entered its third day. Hazare's supporters are disappointed there will be no formal notification issued on this committee which would have made it binding on the government to go by it. The deadlock, therefore, continues though...

Veteran social activist Anna Hazare, who is continuing with his hunger strike demanding enactment of an anti-corruption bill to give wider powers to the Ombudsman, on Wednesday rejected Union Agriculture and Food Processing Industries Minister Sharad Pawar's offer to quit from the Group of Ministers (GoM) meant to look into the amendments required in the Lokpal Bill. 72-year-old Hazare criticizing the NCP leader said Pawar should quit his ministry anyway. Pawar today...