Explain delay in lokayukta posting, Supreme Court raps 12 states

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Friday sought explanation from the chief secretaries of 12 states in two weeks on why they have not appointed lokayukta and uplokayukta, despite enactment of the law five years ago..

A Bench of Justices Ranjan Gogoi and R. Banumathi gave this direction after hearing counsel Gopal Shankaranarayanan, who appeared for petitioner Ashwini Kumar Upadhyaya, seeking a direction to the states to set up lokayukta.

The 12 states that were asked to file replies are Arunachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, Manipur, Meghalaya, Delhi, Mizoram, Naga-land, UT of Puducherry, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal, Telengana and Tripura.

BJP advocate and social activist Ashwini Kumar Upadhyay in his PIL sought a direction for the appointment of an independent lokapal at Centre and equally effective lokayukta in all the states in the spirit of the Lokpal and Lokayukta Acts 2013, which is necessary to curb the corruption.

The law calls for preventive measures and the criminalisation of the most prevalent forms of corruption in public and private sector. It will be very difficult for corrupts to hide their illicit gains. This is very important issue for country like us where corrupts have plundered the national wealth.

He said that corruption is an insidious plague that has a wide range of corrosive effects on society. It undermines democracy and the rule of law, leads to violations of human rights, distorts markets, erodes the quality of life and allows organised crime, terrorism, and other threats to human security to flourish.