*Says SAC in need of vital tools to ensure accountability
Mohinder Verma
JAMMU, Mar 29: Chairperson of Jammu and Kashmir State Accountability Commission and former Chief Justice of J&K High Court, Justice B A Khan today said that Parliamentarians and Legislators are framing laws and carrying out amendments from time to time without application of mind and this is the main reason behind laws failing to meet the intended objective.
“The problem in our country particularly in Jammu and Kashmir is that laws are enacted by the Parliamentarians and Legislators as a routine exercise and without applicability of mind”, Justice Khan said while addressing an interactive session on “Role of Accountability Commission in Good Governance” organized by the State Accountability Commission in collaboration with Department of Law, University of Jammu at the Convention Hall of The Business School this evening.
“The bureaucrats draft the law by sitting in their offices and without holding discussions with the legal luminaries and then the concerned Minister takes it to the Legislature for enactment. Be it Parliament or State Legislature, generally there is a tendency of giving approval to laws without much debate and discussion”, he said, adding “this casual approach results into the casualty of the law as on one side no seriousness is adopted in framing the same and then inherent lacunas create hurdles in implementation”.
He further said: Similar casual approach is adopted at the stage of amendments in the laws and finally the institutions or mechanism created under such legislations become the useless tool and don’t serve the real purpose behind their establishment. “As such, debate before taking the draft laws to the Legislature for enactment becomes imperative”, Justice Khan stressed.
“In the present scenario not only in J&K but in entire country creating awareness about the laws has become more important that enacting laws”, he said. The SAC Chairperson justified this by mentioning that there are about 1500 to 2000 laws in the statue book but what to talk of people even very few lawyers are aware about the same.
Justice Khan said that amendments in J&K State Accountability Act in 2011 whereby the bureaucrats were taken out of the jurisdiction of the Accountability Commission were also carried out by the Legislators without application of mind.
“How can this amendment be justified when at the stage of enactment of Act in 2002 it was stated that Accountability Commission would be a watch-dog for ensuring accountability and checking nepotism, favouritism, corruption and mal-administration involving bureaucrats and public functionaries”, he asked, adding “due to amendments of 2011 the whole Act was mutilated and the ground of placing bureaucrats under the purview of State Vigilance Commission was only aimed at weakening the Accountability Commission”
“Though the SAC was given all pervasive powers but the mechanism to implement the law and directives of the Commission is missing till date. Actually, no Government in the State ever tried to make the Commission strong and this is evident from the fact that we are still without the weapons required to deliver as per the expectations of the people”, he rued.
Stressing the need of providing independent investigating agency, proper enquiry mechanism and prosecution agency, Justice Khan said, “let the Government give me these weapons I will ensure Commission delivers up to the expectations of the people within a period of six months”.
About corruption, he said, “this menace is such deep rooted that all the concerned agencies cannot completely eradicate the same even by taking collective efforts”, adding “actually, for eradicating corruption attitudinal change is required in the society”.
“Moreover, the success of any anti-graft body depends on the sincerity of the Government in allowing such an institution to work freely and without any interruptions”, he added.
Justice J P Singh, Member of J&K State Accountability Commission and former-Judge of the J&K High Court also denounced ‘clipping of the wings of the SAC’ by the Government due to 2011 amendments.
“Actually, the bureaucrats and political circles didn’t find them comfortable with the functioning of Accountability Commission as such they decided to snatch its powers”, he added.
He, however, said that the Accountability Commission still have sufficient powers to ensure accountability. “We have inherent powers in the Act….now we have powers to take suo-moto cognizance also. So there is no need to worry. All what we require is the society fully aware of the provisions of the Act”, he added.
Justice Singh made a clarion call to the civil society to come up with credible information against the public functionaries and submit the same to the Accountability Commission. “I assure the civil society that the Commission will take suo-moto cognizance of such credible information and carry out necessary proceedings on the basis of same. At the same time, I assure the civil society that the name of the person furnishing such an information/data would be kept secret”, he added.
Stating that Accountability Commission needs support of civil society to make public functionaries accountable, he said, “what we need is to create awareness about the Act and its provisions so that people can come forward with the complaints”, adding “let me make it clear that SAC is not a tooth-less tiger. It still enjoys sufficient powers whereby not only public functionaries but officers and officials functioning under them can also be made accountable on the receipt of formal complaints”.
Prof R D Sharma, Vice-Chancellor of University of Jammu and Prof Arvind Jasrotia, Head and Dean, Faculty of Law also spoke on the occasion.
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