According to a tentative proposal initiated by the ministry of personnel under the Prime Minister's Office, the Lok Sabha speaker and Rajya Sabha chairperson would be the designated authorities to give the necessary sanction in the case of MPs.

Similarly, in cases of corruption involving members of legislative Assemblies and councils in states, the presiding officers of the states' houses would have the power to allow the politicians to be prosecuted.

The proposal to amend the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988, was cleared last month by a Group of Ministers, headed by Home Minister Shivraj Patil. It comprised Law Minister HR Bhardwaj and Minister of State for Personnel Suresh Pachauri.

Later, it was sent to the Legislative Department in the law ministry to draft a cabinet note and a bill to amend Section 19 of the act, which provides that an investigative agency has to secure prior sanction from the appropriate authority to prosecute corrupt public servants.

Section 19 would be amended to empower the presiding officers of parliament and state legislatures with the authority to grant the necessary sanction.

Sources in the ministry of personnel said they hoped the bill would get cabinet approval in time to be introduced in parliament during the monsoon session.

The proposal to amend the Prevention of Corruption Act comes nearly nine years after the Supreme Court in a 1998 ruling on the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha MPs (JMM) bribery case held that MPs and MLAs are "public servants" within the meaning of the Act.

In the 1998 ruling, in the case involving payment of bribes to JMM and other MPs to vote in favour of the Narasimha Rao government during a no-confidence motion against it in 1993, the apex court also upheld the need to have an appropriate sanctioning authority to prosecute MPs and MLAs - like in the case of other government officials.