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Almost 10 months after a group of 14 eminent citizens (G14) created a flutter with an ‘Open Letter To Our Leaders’ expressing alarm over a “governance deficit in government, business and institutions”, it released another ‘Open Letter’ supporting the “need for the urgent passage of a well-crafted Lokpal Bill by Parliament” and calling for “urgent action on land, judicial, electoral and police reforms”.

Acknowledging that a “strong nexus exists between certain corporates, politicians, bureaucrats and power brokers”, which it described as “one of the greatest threats to the Indian economy”, the G14 said both the “giver as well as the receiver of a bribe” should be punished.

The groupsaid, “We … believe that the Lokpal Bill is only one small but critical step in the national task of weeding out the plague of corruption. This draft Lokpal Bill is intended to address episodic corruption, but is unlikely to have any significant impact on day-to-day corruption, which is insidious and demeaning.”

The G14 comprises Wipro’s Azim Premji, HDFC’s Deepak Parekh, ICICI’s N Vaghul, industrialists Keshub Mahindra, Jamshyd Godrej and Anu Aga (also a member of the National Advisory Council), former Hindustan Lever chairman and MP Ashok Ganguly, former RBI governors M Narasimham and Bimal Jalan (Rajya Sabha member), Justices B N Srikrishna and Sam Variava, architect of key Sebi and RBI regulations Yezdi Malegam, member of the PM’s Economic Advisory Council A Vaidyanathan, and bankerturned-social worker Nachiket Mor.

The group lamented, at length and with examples, the fact that the common man’s life was “vitiated by corruption” at every turn. It has called for speedier environmental clearances, “online auction of natural resources … and appointment of more judges for an effective redress mechanism.

- times of india