Rahul Gandhi let us down, says Kiran Bedi

NEW DELHI: Activist Kiran Bedi today said Team Anna members felt "let down" by Rahul Gandhi's lack of support for the anti-corruption movement as they thought that he would work with them to ensure that the Jan Lokpal Bill is passed in Parliament.

Bedi, one of the core members of the Team Anna Hazare, said the young Congress leader was the "biggest loss of faith in our trust".

"Rahul Gandhi was the biggest loss of faith in our trust. We thought he is a young face, who would work with us for this country's future and ensure that the Jan Lokpal Bill gets passed," she said at a panel discussion organised by the Observer Research Foundation here.

Gandhi's lack of support for their movement surprised the civil society members, Bedi said.

The Congress General Secretary had criticised the fast by Hazare and said the need of the hour was not just a strong Lokpal but make it a constitutional body like the Election Commission.

Bedi said that Team Hazare agreed to drop the demand for bringing judiciary under Lokpal after the government promised that it would bring an effective Judicial Accountability Bill in Parliament.

"The draft version of the bill does not cover judicial corruption. We had agreed to drop the demand to bring judiciary under the ambit of the Lokpal because the government had promised to include judicial corruption in the Judicial Accountability Bill.

"We will now demand that the judiciary be brought under Lokpal," Bedi said.