Govt working to make private sector bribery criminal: PM

“To meet the requirements of the Convention,we have introduced a Bill in Parliament to make bribery of foreign public officials an offence. We are considering changes in our laws to criminalise private sector bribery,” he said.

Singh said that the government was also working on ways and means to minimise discretionary powers of public authorities and the issue of a public procurement law to minimise irregularities in the award of government contracts worth thousands of crores of rupees every year.

However,Singh conceded that it was difficult to build a fool-proof system. “Whatever we might do to minimise the opportunities for corruption,the sad reality is that we cannot build a totally fool-proof system. There will always be some instances of corrupt practices in the work of public authorities,” he said at the meet,also attended by Home Minister P Chidambaram and Law Minister Salman Khurshid.

Stressing on the need to carry out ‘due-diligence’ on the part of the CBI in corruption cases,the Prime Minister said there should be a distinction between a deliberate attempt at wrongdoing and honest mistakes,“sometimes inevitable in decision-making process under conditions of uncertainty”.

The Prime Minister also said that the government has decided that if an authority refuses to grant permission for investigation or sanction for prosecution,the reasons for such denial would have to be informed to the next higher authority within three months.

Singh further said,“We expect from the CBI the highest standards of honesty and professionalism and a total disregard of any extraneous considerations,particularly political pressure,in its work…. And professionalism demands face-lessness,in the best traditions of our civil services.” He also cautioned that “premature publicity” given to cases can harm the cause of justice.