NEW DELHI: The Centre on Tuesday refused to give a timeframe by when Lokpal could be appointed but told the Supreme Court that the selection committee headed by the prime minister would meet on July 19 to set up the search panel to shortlist names for the post.

Appearing before a bench headed by Justice Ranjan Gogoi, attorney general K K Venugopal said the appointment of Lokpal would take time as the selection committee would have to first constitute a seven-member search panel which would lay down its own procedure for selecting names. He said time limit for the panel would be fixed only after laying down guidelines for evaluating persons for empanelment.

“The search committee will have to lay down its procedure. After that, the selection committee will fix the limitation of time within which the search committee will recommend a panel of names for selecting the chairman and members of Lokpal,” the AG told the bench. He said it might not be feasible for the panel to complete deliberations in one sitting.

The bench, also comprising Justices R Banumathi and Navin Sinha, expressed hope that the selection committee would finalise the names for the search panel on July 19. It asked the Centre to file a report on the decision taken by the committee by July 23 when it will take up the case for further hearing.

“As the meeting of the selection committee is scheduled to be held on July 19, we refrain from making any observations and passing any directions, save and except to express our optimism that the search committee will be duly constituted in the said meeting in the course of which the selection committee will also consider the question of laying down a particular timeframe within which the search committee is to complete its deliberations and make its recommendations to the selection committee,” the bench said.

As the Centre failed to appoint Lokpal in the last four years, the SC on July 2 had asked the government to give a timeframe by when the anti-graft ombudsman would be made functional.

