Amid Mamata-Anna alliance, West Bengal Lok Ayukta lies defunct

It was only on July 17, 2007, that the state issued notification, appointing Samaresh Banerjee as first Lok Ayukta of West Bengal

Even as Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee and anti-corruption activist Anna Hazare team for the Lok Sabha elections, the office of the Lok Ayukta has been defunct in West Bengal, where she has been the chief minister, for about three years. It became definct a year before she took charge.

“The Left saw no utility in the Lok Ayukta and took a long time to implement it…the Trinamool Congress did nothing to revive the office,” said a senior bureaucrat.

In 2003, the then Left Front government in West Bengal had passed the Act. It was only on July 17, 2007, that the government issued a notification, appointing Samaresh Banerjee as the first Lok Ayukta of West Bengal. But since he vacated office in 2009, no Lok Ayukta was appointed in the state.

Asked why the Mamata Banerjee-led government didn’t revive the office, West Bengal parliamentary affairs minister Partha Chatterjee refused to give an explanation.

The question was also raised at a joint press conference addressed by Mamata Banerjee and Anna Hazare in New Delhi on Wednesday. “The new Lok Pal Bill has been passed. Within 365 days, the state Lok Ayukta will be appointed,” Banerjee said.

Political observers are interpreting Banerjee’s assurance on a Lok Ayukta as an attempt to rope in Hazare as a campaigner for this year’s Lok Sabha polls. The scepticism stems from the fact that Banerjee has never been a supporter of Anna Hazare’s movement for a Lok Pal Bill.

In fact, the Association for Protection of Human Rights (APDR) has written to Hazare, highlighting Banerjee’s reluctance to appoint a Lok Ayukta and her public disapproval of the Lok Pal movement. “A total of 32 months have elapsed since Mamata Banerjee assumed the post of chief minister of West Bengal with a huge majority in the state Assembly. Yet, she has taken no steps to appoint a Lok Ayukta in the state. One and a half months have passed since the new Lok Pal and Lok Ayukta Acts have been passed in Parliament. Banerjee, her government and her party, the Trinamool Congress, are totally silent on the issue,” said the letter.

“When journalists asked for her comment over your movement on Lok Pal, her response was ‘joto shob faltu (all bogus)’. We are reminding you all this just to make you understand her attitude over Lok Pal and Lokayukta,” the letter said, adding when Hazare’s movement was underway, Banerjee had refused to accept a prize from a TV channel in the presence of Hazare.

It is not clear whether the letter, dated February 17, has been read by Hazare. “I know a lot of people will say a lot of things. But I have made my mind to support Mamata Banerjee’s ideology,” the activist said.

Apart from campaigning for the party, Hazare will also have a say in selecting its candidates.