The Hindu : States told to furnish details on POTA detenus

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Apr 26, 2003

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States told to furnish details on POTA detenus

By J. Venkatesan

NEW DELHI April 25. The Centre has directed all the States to furnish details of all the persons arrested under the Prevention of Terrorism Act and the nature of the offence committed by them.

This direction is a sequel to the appointment of a Central Review Committee headed by Justice R.S. Saharya, former Chief Justice of Punjab and Haryana High Court, to review all the cases registered under POTA.

Sources said that though the details were sought some time ago, only Jammu and Kashmir had informed the Centre on the number of cases registered under POTA.

Asked whether Tamil Nadu, where several persons, including the MDMK leader, Vaiko had been arrested under POTA had given the information, the sources said that "so far the State is yet to reply to the Centre's communication''. Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand and Gujarat too were yet to provide the details. Once the details were collected, the cases would be referred to the Review Committee.

The decision of the committee, which has two non-judicial members, would be final and binding on the special POTA courts dealing with these cases. The decisions would be communicated to the State Governments concerned for follow-up action, sources said. If the review committee felt that prosecution had been initiated by police with malafide intention, the special courts were empowered to punish the erring police officer, besides awarding compensation to the victim for the incarceration suffered.

It had been made clear in POTA itself that "any police officer who exercises powers corruptly or maliciously, knowing that there are no reasonable grounds for proceeding under this Act, shall be punishable with imprisonment which may extend to two years or with fine or with both, it was pointed out."

Referring to the memorandum submitted to the Prime Minister last week by the 21 MPs of DMK, PMK and MDMK complaining about "misuse" of POTA in Tamil Nadu, the sources said "so far the Centre has not written to the State asking for its views''.

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