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Gujarat HC asks Centre to consider banning NBA
By Manas Dasgupta
AHMEDABAD, DEC. 14. In a major setback to the Narmada Bachao Andolan (NBA) agitating against the Sardar Sarovar dam on the Narmada river, the Gujarat High Court today issued a directive to the Central Government to consider banning the organisation for its alleged anti-national activities.
The directive was issued by a Division Bench of the High Court comprising the Chief Justice, Mr. Justice D. H. Dharmadhikari, and Mr. Justice K. A. Puj, on a revision petition filed by the National Council for Civil Liberties (NCCL), which had been at loggerheads with the NBA and its leader, Ms. Medha Patkar, for sometime.
The High Court asked the Centre to take a decision at the earliest on imposing a ban on the NBA, which was not a registered body, under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967, for its alleged role in trying to block the process of development of the country by opposing the Narmada and other dam projects.
According to the president of the Ahmedabad-based NCCL, Mr V. K. Saxena, who filed the petition, his organisation is expecting such a move from the Centre to remove the impediments on the way of speedy implementation of the Sardar Sarovar project. But he decided to move the High Court to issue a directive to the Centre to ban the organisation after the Union Government failed to take any initiative in this direction on its own.
The NCCL in its 175-page petition cited a number of instances to project the NBA as an anti-national organisation and claimed that it had long been opposing important development projects allegedly at the instance of the multi-national companies which were keen on thwarting the development of the country by depriving it of the required water and power supply.
The petition also cited the ``sustained mischievous and surreptitious'' campaign of the NBA against the judiciary and said Ms. Patkar and other leaders of the NBA showed disrespect to the judiciary and criticised the Supreme Court in strong words after the apex court gave a green signal for further construction of the Sardar Sarovar dam last year.
The High Court directive has come as a major support to the Gujarat Government which had been harassed by the NBA activities in Madhya Pradesh and Mahrashtra to prevent official survey and other actions needed for the speedy implementation of the project, described as the ``lifeline of Gujarat''. The project had been hanging fire for over two decades mainly due to the legal and other impediments created by the NBA opposing the mega project on the Narmada river.
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