Lokpal, CVC and CBI: Acts, Composition and Powers

India fights corruption in public office through three bodies that students must keep apart, because each has a different legal basis. The Lokpal is a statutory ombudsman created by the Lokpal and Lokayuktas Act, 2013. The Central Vigilance Commission began in 1964 as an executive body and became statutory only in 2003. The Central Bureau of Investigation has no Act of its own at all; it was set up by a government resolution in 1963 and draws its police powers from the Delhi Special Police Establishment Act, 1946. None of the three is a constitutional body, and that single sentence answers a large share of the questions asked on them.

The Lokpal: from idea to Act

The idea comes from the Scandinavian institution of the Ombudsman, and the word Lokpal was coined by the jurist L. M. Singhvi in 1963. The First Administrative Reforms Commission, chaired by Morarji Desai, recommended in its interim report of 1966 two independent authorities, a Lokpal at the Centre for complaints against ministers and secretaries, and a Lokayukta in each State. The first Lokpal Bill was introduced in the Lok Sabha in 1968 and lapsed, as did many that followed. The Act was finally passed in 2013, received assent on 1 January 2014 and came into force on 16 January 2014. The first Lokpal, Justice Pinaki Chandra Ghose, took office in March 2019.

Composition, appointment and term

The Lokpal is a multi-member body of a chairperson and not more than eight members, of whom at least half must be judicial members, and at least half the members must come from the Scheduled Castes, the Scheduled Tribes, the other backward classes, minorities and women. The chairperson is a former Chief Justice of India, a former judge of the Supreme Court or an eminent person of integrity with special knowledge of anti-corruption policy, public administration, vigilance, finance, insurance, banking, law or management. A judicial member is a sitting or former judge of the Supreme Court or a sitting or former Chief Justice of a High Court.

The chairperson of the Lokpal draws the salary of the Chief Justice of India and a member that of a judge of the Supreme Court. A search committee of at least eight persons prepares the panel of names for the selection committee.

What the Lokpal can inquire into

The Lokpal takes complaints of an offence under the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 against the Prime Minister, ministers, members of Parliament and officials of all groups of the Union government, as well as the office-bearers of bodies financed by the Union and of societies and trusts that receive foreign contribution above ten lakh rupees a year. Three limits are examinable. A complaint against the Prime Minister on international relations, external and internal security, public order, atomic energy and space is barred, and any other inquiry against the Prime Minister needs the approval of a full bench with at least two-thirds of the members and is held in camera. A member of Parliament cannot be touched for anything said or any vote given in the House, which Article 105 protects. No complaint is entertained after seven years from the date of the offence. The judiciary is outside the Lokpal altogether. The Lokpal has its own Inquiry Wing and Prosecution Wing, may direct the CBI, and officers of the CBI handling a case referred by the Lokpal cannot be transferred without its approval. Every State was required to set up a Lokayukta within a year of the Act; Odisha was the first State to pass a Lokayukta law, in 1970, and Maharashtra the first to actually establish the institution, in 1971.

The Central Vigilance Commission

The Commission was set up in February 1964 by a resolution of the government on the recommendation of the Committee on Prevention of Corruption chaired by K. Santhanam, and Nittoor Srinivasa Rau was the first Central Vigilance Commissioner. In Vineet Narain versus Union of India, the hawala case of 1997, the Supreme Court ordered that the Commission be given statutory status and that the CBI Director be given a fixed tenure; Parliament obliged with the Central Vigilance Commission Act, 2003. The Commission is an apex vigilance body free of control by any ministry. It is not an investigating agency: it has inquiries conducted through the CBI or through the chief vigilance officers of departments, advises on disciplinary cases, exercises superintendence over the CBI in cases under the Prevention of Corruption Act, heads the committee that recommends the appointment of CBI officers of the rank of superintendent of police and above, is the designated agency for whistle-blower complaints under the public interest disclosure resolution, and submits an annual report to the President.

The Central Bureau of Investigation

The CBI was established on 1 April 1963 by a resolution of the Ministry of Home Affairs. Its ancestor is the Special Police Establishment of 1941, created to investigate bribery in war purchases, and its powers of investigation come from the Delhi Special Police Establishment Act, 1946. Its motto is Industry, Impartiality, Integrity. Administratively it works under the Department of Personnel and Training, while in corruption cases the superintendence lies with the Central Vigilance Commission. The Director is appointed on the recommendation of a committee of the Prime Minister, the Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha and the Chief Justice of India or a judge nominated by him, holds office for not less than two years, and may be given yearly extensions up to a total of five years under the 2021 amendment. The CBI needs the consent of a State government to investigate within that State, but a High Court or the Supreme Court may order a CBI inquiry without such consent. It is also India's nodal agency for Interpol.