Centre should take steps to ban black money: Deve Gowda

Mangalore, May 11 (UNI) Janata Dal(JD)(Seculars) Supremo and former prime minister H D Deve Gowda today said there was an urgent need to take bold steps by the centre to ban the use of black money and strictly enforcing compulsory voting to improve the electoral system.

Talking to mediapersons here, he said the Centre should have detailed discussions with the legal experts comprising renowned former Chief Justices of the Supreme Court to review the present system and ways it could be improve it so that the people could repose their confidence and faith on the electoral system.

Mr Gowda said ''all political parties should extend their cooperation on the issue, which would enable us to bring meaningful changes to the present system.'' The former Prime Minister said some of the measures initiated by the Chief Election Commissioner(CEC) N Gopalaswamy, was indeed laudable, as it had shown some progress. The Government should, however, focus on total change with stern commitment to curb the use of black money in the election, he added.

He said use of religion and caste for political gain by dividing society should also be viewed as corruption. Like politicians the religious heads and peetadhipathis were equally responsible for the deteriorating conditions in society and politics, he alleged.

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