National

`Terrorism greatest threat to civil society'

By Our Special Correspondent

BANGALORE JUNE 22. The All-India Conference of the Presiding Officers of legislative bodies in India today unanimously passed a resolution to stand firm and united in the long and sustained battle against terrorism, which posed the greatest threat to "our civil society and democratic political order."

The resolution was passed at the end of the symposium on "Terrorism — threat to civil society and security of democratic institutions,'' held as part of the 65th conference of the Presiding Officers of the State Legislatures here.

The resolution called upon the people and political parties to stand united in their fight against terrorism. It also urged the legislatures to play a greater role in strengthening the democratic institutions to combat terrorism.

All the legislatures should accord priority to combating terrorism, it said, and stressed the need for the media and other public agencies, institutions and all sections of the society to strive towards raising public awareness on the nature and dimensions of the threat that terrorism posed to democracies.

The Lok Sabha Speaker, Manohar Joshi, told presspersons that the symposium dwelt on all the aspects of terrorist threat and vowed to take steps to curb it. The attacks on the Jammu and Kashmir Assembly on October 1 last year and the December 13 attack on Parliament had intended to inflict maximum damage to peace, prosperity and stability and weaken the foundations of the democratic polity. But such acts only "reinforced out determination to fight the evil of terrorism."

Mr. Joshi said that there was a feeling among the presiding officers that no effort was being made to implement the decisions adopted at conferences held in the past.

The Standing Committee of the Presiding Officers Conference under him would take up the issue of follow-up actions in this regard. The conference had also discussed the need to bring about electoral reforms and curb the criminalisation of politics.

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