Hazare rejects India’s corruption bill, threatens hunger strike

Posing new trouble for Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, social activist Anna Hazare on Monday warned that the Indian government's anti-corruption bill is unacceptable and threatened to begin another hunger strike on Dec. 27 to oppose it, the Hindustan Times reports.

Hazare's anti-corruption movement has helped paralyze Singh's government for the better part of this year, even as the former telecom minister, high-level bureaucrats and top CEOs have been jailed on corruption charges.

The activist's latest objection is that the government's bill does not grant the national ombudsman, or Lokpal, control over the Central Bureau of Investigation or the lower bureaucracy.

In addition to his proposed hunger strike, Hazare said his supporters will take to the streets to court arrest beginning Jan. 1.

The government may extend the ongoing winter session of parliament by three days from Dec. 27 in a bid to ensure that the crucial anti-graft Lokpal bill is considered and passed, the paper quoted highly placed government sources as saying.