Chennai: The state government on Monday informed Madras high court that it would file a status report on setting up of Lokayukta in the state within four weeks.
Additional advocate general C. Manishankar made his submission to this effect when a public interest litigation filed by G. Ramakrishnan, state secretary of TN state committee of Communist Party of India (Marxist) came up for hearing before a division bench comprising Chief Justice Indira Banerjee and Justice M. Sundar.
Manishankar submitted that a status report would be filed in the matter and sought four weeks. The bench posted to July 10, further hearing of the PIL, which sought a direction to the state government to establish Lokayukta in the state as per the Lokpal and Lokayukta Act within a time frame fixed by the court.
According to Ramakrishnan, the historic Lokpal and Lokayukta Act, 2013 was passed by the Parliament paving the way for establ ishment of a Lokpal (Ombudsman) to fight corruption in public offices and ensure accountability on the part of public officials, including the Prime Minister, but with some safeguards.
The Act mandates state governments to set up Lokayukta, but TN government has not done so far.
He said the inaction of the state government in not establishing Lokayukta has emboldened a large section of the political and bureaucratic officers of the state, to participate, promote and propagate corruption on a large scale in the state.
This court, while enquiring about the large scale corruption in granite business, has appointed IAS officer U. Sagayam to enquire the matter. Sagayam has reported that the granite scam involves nearly '1 lakh crore and this money could have flown into the coffers of the state, had there been mechanism to plug in the loopholes of leakages.
The petitioner has also reliably learnt that in this infamous case many officers of the state government were involved. In another infamous case involving the then Chief Secretary, it was reported in the media that his residence was raided by on the tipoff of large scale corruption. These infamous cases of corruption involving political and bureaucratic officers of the state government necessitate establishment of Lokayukta in the state, he added.
