Lok Sabha passes Bills extending tenure of CBI, ED Directors

The Lok Sabha passed the Bills by voice vote extending the service tenure of Directors of the Central Bureau of Investigation and the Enforcement DirectorateThe Central Vigilance Commission Amendment Act 2021 and the Delhi Special Police Establishment Amendment Bill 2021 seek to amend the present laws to give oneyear extension of the heads of both agencies up to five yearsResponding to the long debate Minister for Personnel and Training Jitendra Singh said that there was a detailed discussion on these Bills Citing Prime Minister Narendra Modis high esteem for the CBI and the ED he said that these should work independently and in tandemExplaining the process of giving extension of one year each to the CBI Director the Minister said that the same constitutional body consisting of the Prime Minister Leader of Oppositionlargest party in the Lok Sabha and the Chief Justice of India will take a decision on this We have fixed the tenure of these posts as it was not prescribed in the past Even during the previous governments extensions were given for many times Through this Bill we have put a cap of five years he addedResponding to questions why the Ordinances were promulgated just two weeks ahead of the Winter Session he said that with the experience of the last session in which was washed out because of Oppositions protests the government was not sure whether the session would be working or notEarlier initiating the discussion on the Bills RSP member NK Premchandran said the Supreme Court has reiterated time and again that the government should avoid giving extension to the officials The apex court also has made it clear the law making power lies with the Parliament not with the President or Governor he addedCongress member Manish Tewari appealed to the government to approach the SC and ensure that the legality of the CBI is adjudicated BJPs Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore said that the longterm effects of the Bills are good and urged the opposition to support themOpposing the Bill NCPs Supriya Sule said All your BJPs allies have cases against them When they were your allies there were no cases against them but the minute they left you all the cases started They have had raids their colleagues have raids Please stop this vindictive businessShe also said that the Enforcement Directorate raided the residence of former Maharashtra minister Anil Deshmukh seven times and asked what was missed in the first six times She also alleged that the agencies were questioning the family members of those involved in the case and questioned the reason behind itBJDs Bhartruhari Mahtab questioned the move to bring an amendment bill regarding the tenures of the CBI and ED Directors while Trinamool Congress Sougata Ray said that the present ED Director was to retire on November 17 and just three days before his retirement the government brought the ordinanceThe ED and CBI have been accused of catering to the political masters he said AIMIMs Asaduddin Owaisi while opposing the bill said that fixed tenure cannot be on the whims and desires of the government and if the extension is given on good behaviour it creates an inbuilt mechanism of control Both the directors CBI and ED must be subordinate to the present government he saidAlso Read Opposition opposes introduction of Bills amending tenure of CBI ED DirectorsCPIMs A Arif BSPs Ritesh Pandey Trinamools Kalyan Banerjee and Shiv Senas Vinayak Raut also spoke against the billsThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever