Petition to include women in Lok Pal Panel

CHENNAI: A writ petition has been filed in the Madras High Court for a direction to the Centre to include representatives from SC, ST and women in the Lok Pal Bill drafting committee.In his public interest writ petition, advocate M Palanimuthu of Todhunter Nagar submitted that presently, there was no representative from the two communities and women, who constituted a major chunk of the population, in the panel. The formation of the committee would go meaningless and it would remain incomplete if there was no representation from these sections, the petitioner contended.His interim prayer was to restrain the chairman of the committee from holding further proceedings.When the petition came up before the vacation bench comprising Justices S Rajeswaran and KBK Vasuki today, Additional Solicitor General M Ravindran took notice on behalf of the Union government. The bench posted the matter for further hearing on June 9.