Kalam studying office of profit bill

President A P J Abdul Kalam, to whom the office of profit bill has been sent by Parliament for assent without changes, is studying the provisions of the law.

Official sources said no decision had been taken by Kalam so far and he was studying the bill. The bill, which exempts 56 posts and gives reprieve to over 40 MPs who could have faced disqualification, was sent to the President on Tuesday, two months after Kalam had returned it to Parliament for reconsideration.

Under the Constitution, the President has to give assent to a bill sent to him for a second time by Parliament after reconsideration. The passage of the bill in the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha earlier marked the end of a four-month long political storm in the wake of disqualification of Samajwadi Party MP Jaya Bachchan on the office of profit issue which later saw Congress President Sonia Gandhi resignation and subsequent re-election from Rae Bareli in Uttar Pradesh.

The President, while returning the bill to Parliament, on May 30, had asked it to reconsider it to have a "comprehensive and generic" criteria besides being "fair and reasonable" and applicable in a "clear and transparent" manner across all the states and union territories. Another point raised was in relation to the posts sought to be exempted by the new law. The implication of including the names of offices for which petitions were already pending under process by the competent authority should also be addressed by Parliament while reconsidering the bill.

While returning the bill, the President had urged both the houses of Parliament to reconsider the propriety of the applicability of law with retrospective effect.