Singhvi refuses to set deadline for Lokpal report

Chairman of the Standing Committee on Lokpal Abhishek Singhvi on Thursday refused to set a deadline for finalising its crucial report but insisted that the panel was working on the issue with unparallel swiftness.

"No deadline, no timeline can be given" was his refrain to repeated questions on whether the committee would be able to finalise the report before the winter session of Parliament so that the bill could be taken up there as promised by the government.

Law Minister Salman Khurshid had a few days back said that giving Constitutional status to Lokpal will not delay passage of the bill and that the Government's commitment was to bring it in the next session (winter session) of Parliament.

Singhvi said the committee has invited Team Anna for confabulations in the first week of November after having already consulted a wide range of stakeholders.

"We hope to end converstation with Team Anna by the first week of November. We have already held negotiations with them in August earlier. One month was taken away in reconstitution of the committee and we could resume work only from September 23 but in this short period, we have covered all sections of the society.

"We have elicited the views of NGOs, media, corporates, lawyers, bar association and other key stakeholders. We are working with unparallelled swiftness," Singhvi said.

The panel is also holding a meeting tomorrow but Team Anna members have not been invited.