Oppn rejects changes in whistleblower protection bill

New Delhi TIMES NEWS NETWORK





Opposition parties in Rajya Sabha rejected the proposed changes in the whistleblowers bill while making a strong pitch to refer the key legislation to a select committee.The government, however, downplayed the demand.MPs from Congress, CPM and SP urged the government not to rush the Whistleblowers Protection (Amendment) Bill, 2015. However, parliamentary affairs minister M Venkaiah Naidu expressed disagreement with the opposition's demand to suspend the debate and refer the bill to a select panel. Naidu said the members should not be seen as being interested in prolonging passage of an antigraft measure.
He said the House had referred one such measure, the Prevention of Corruption (Amendment) Bill, 2013, to a select panel and an impression should not go out that MPs were “not showing much interest“ towards fighting corruption. “That is the general perception,“ Naidu said.
Earlier, Congress MPs Jairam Ramesh and Mani Shankar Aiyar alleged “major dilution“ in the legislation and asked the government not to rush it. Minister of state in the PMO Jitendra Singh dismissed the charge, saying the amendments were only aimed at putting in safeguards, which were not there earlier.
Aiyar rejected the minister's argument, saying he was being “extremely disingenuous“ in arguing that the Act passed in the previous Lok Sabha was brought with “slight“ changes.