Under normal circumstances the Karnataka Lok Ayukta would have been as ineffectual and lame duck as most of his counterparts in other states?big on intention, toothless otherwise.

But a series of accidental developments in recent years, including the personal attributes of the last two incumbents in that office in Karnataka, and the public perception that has built around them, have cast the office of the Lok Ayukta in a new mould.

With no vigilance commission, anti-corruption bureau or anyone to lend an ear to the woes of people harassed by inefficient or outright corrupt public services, the Lok Ayukta in Karnataka has filled a vaccum by acquiring an activist face in recent years.

Strictly speaking, the Karnataka Lok Ayukta has little business in affairs related to the Prevention of Corruption Act?the Supreme Court and Karnataka High Court judgements say so.

The Prevention of Corruption Act has been defined as a law strictly for the police to enforce and it does not vest powers in authorities like the Lok Ayukta. Yet, circumstances and public perception have conspired to make the fight against corruption the most high-profile part of the work of the Lok Ayukta.

Justice N Santosh Hegde, the current Karnataka Lok Ayukta who is now quitting the institution a year prior to the end of his five-year term, in protest against the BJP government?s allegedly callous attitude to fighting corruption, harps on the fact that fighting corruption is only 10% of his job.

?The corruption work gets a lot of publicity because of the media. Our main work is to look at the needs of the poor, to ensure that they are not running from pillar to post, to ensure good governance,?? says Justice Hegde who spent the first six months of his tenure away from the media spotlight in sharp contrast to his predecessor Justice M Venkatachala. This was until public pressure forced him to step into the limelight.

Justice Venkatachala who was appointed as the Lok Ayukta in the tenure of the SM Krishna-led Congress government in Karnataka first pushed the Lok Ayukta institution into the spotlight by being at the centre of televised acts of trapping corrupt officers in the process of accepting bribes.

Though hundreds of raids were carried out during the period of Justice Venkatachala, few cases were actually registered under the Prevention of Corruption Act against officials since the Lok Ayukta himself had no powers to carry out the raids under the PC Act.

Justice Santosh Hedge, appointed by the HD Kumaraswamy-led JD(S)-BJP government in August 2006, adopted a more professional approach to tackling corruption. He would appear before the media only after the Lok Ayukta police working on carefully prepared dossiers carried out raids on the homes and offices of public servants who had allegedly amassed disproportionate wealth.

All the powers for carrying out investigations and prosecuting corrupt government servants are vested with the police team that became attached to the office of the Lok Ayukta when the vigilance commission was done away with during the creation of the Lok Ayukta in 1986 by Ramakrishna Hegde.

This was on the recommendations of the Administrative Reforms Commission.

At the root of Justice Hegde?s feeling of despair and helplessness in the current system is the lack of any effective powers to tackle corruption head on. The absence of a deputy Lok Ayukta?who under the Karnataka Lok Ayukta Act has the powers to handle many of the public grievances?has further constrained the scope of his work.

Justice Hedge, who has had the powers to address issues of maladministration involving class I government servants right up to the chief minister, has been demanding suo motu powers to authorise investigations against corrupt higher officials even without any official complaints.

Successive governments have been reluctant to give the Lok Ayukta this power. ?This has to be debated in the cabinet and the legislature. I am not a dictator that I can impose it,?? Karnataka chief minister Yeddyurappa said recently to a Lok Ayukta request for suo motu powers.