Lok Pal Bill; Cabinet to decide on inclusion of PM

New Delhi, May 16: The Group of Ministers (GoM) has left it to the Union Cabinet to decide on the inclusion of Prime Minister's office under the purview of the Lok Pal, Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs Suresh Pachauri announced in the Lok Sabha today.

Replying to supplementaries, Mr Pachauri said the Administrative Reforms Commission in its 4th Report on the ethics of governance had recommended that the Prime Minister's office should not come under the Lok Pal.

The Commission's recommendations were studied by the core committee and the GoM.

The GoM, after long deliberations, had given its report to the Ministry of Personnel which then sent it to the Law Ministry, he said.

''It will now go to the Cabinet which will take the final decision,'' Mr Pachauri said, without committing when the Bill would be introduced in Parliament.

He, however, added that the Government was committed to making the Lok Pal Bill a law.

UNI