Judiciary playing crucial role in fight against corruption: Shanti Bhushan

 Former Union Law Minister Shanti Bhushan on Saturday lauded the judiciary for playing crucial role in the fight against corruption and underscored need for having more crusaders locally to see the ill practice disappear from the country.

Addressing a gathering at two-day 'Act Now - National Convention on Corruption' here, Bhushan stressed in forming a network with "good people" in each political party to see their influence within respective outfits grow and the fight against corruption is strengthened."Judiciary has played crucial role in hurting corruption.

Before Constitution came into being, jurisdiction of judiciary was limited. But B R Ambedkar and those who fought for our freedom, they drafted such a Constitution that gave unlimited powers to judiciary through sections 226 and 32... these were used in the interest of people by judiciary," he said.

Bhushan hailed Justice PN Bhagwati for admitting public interest litigations (PIL) in court in 1984 by defining Article 226 and Article 32 of the Constitution. He also lauded his lawyer-son Prashant for using PILs to see probe is ordered in major corruption cases like coal-gate and spectrum auction and others.

Bhushan showered praises on the Supreme Court bench which had in 2013 struck down as unconstitutional section 8 (4) of the Representation of the People Act, 1952, which had allowed lawmakers to appeal before higher court and get a stay on their conviction. "The appeals would go on for years. But Justice AK Patnaik-led bench interpreted the law such and with support of article 14, they quashed the provision saying it would be discriminatory. This is the decision, because of which Lalu Prasad can't contest polls," he told.

Bhushan further stressed on a need for identifying "good people" from each of the political parties and forming a network with them to fight corruption. Bhushan stated that primary job of political parties is to give solutions to problems faced by people and not winning polls.

"Time has come for people of the country unite and stand against corruption. In each district, at least five people should do the job that Prashant Bhushan is doing. If there are five Prashant Bhushans in each district, then corruption will disappear from the country," he added. 

The first day of the convention was also attended by Swaraj Abhiyan leaders Yogendra Yadav and Prashant Bhushan and other RTI activists and whistle blowers. Tomorrow, the convention is expected to be addressed by Yadav, Justice Santosh Hegde and AP Shah, social activists Aruna Roy and Nikhil Dey, Greenpeace activist Priya Pillai and RTI activists and whistle blowers' from various parts of the country.