The Hindu : POTA is not misused here, asserts Govind

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Apr 29, 2003

Southern States

Southern States - Tamil Nadu

POTA is not misused here, asserts Govind

By V. Jayanth

CHENNAI April 28. The Director-General of Police, I. K. Govind, has declared that there is no `misuse' of the Prevention of Terrorism Act in Tamil Nadu.

His assertion comes in the wake of repeated charges by the Opposition. The DMK and other parties are mounting a campaign for repeal of the POTA, alleging the Centre has been unable to prevent misuse of the legislation to curb political dissent.

Tamil Nadu is coming under special attention in view of the large number of cases booked under the POTA - at least 42 persons have been charged under various sections till now. Starting with the detention some 10 months ago of the MDMK leader, Vaiko, along with eight party functionaries, the State administration has arrested the Tamil Nationalist Movement leader, P. Nedumaran, and a couple of his associates, and later two dozen naxalites in Dharmapuri district. The latest addition to the list was Nakkheran Gopal, emissary of the Tamil Nadu and Karnataka Governments to negotiate with the forest brigand, Veerappan, to secure the release of the Kannada matinee idol, Rajkumar in 2000.

According to a senior police official, the State police have gone entirely by the Central Act and detentions have been made under either Section 21 or 4, ``applicable in these cases''. The charge sheet was laid in the first set of detentions and the rest would follow, ``within the stipulated time span''.

The official said that speaking in favour of a banned outfit, organising a meeting in support of such a group or raising funds for it would be covered under Section 21 of the Act, which was slapped on the MDMK functionaries and the Tamil nationalists. In the case of the naxalites, the charge was an armed rebellion against the `State'. As for Mr. Gopal, the official said, his connections with the two banned groups, Tamil Nadu Liberation Army and Tamil Nationalist Retrieval Troops; the possession of an unlicensed firearm and seizure of a TNLA pamphlet led to his detention. Though the police wanted to convert the case against a fundamentalist group into one under the POTA, they could not do it because it was not a banned outfit.

The police argument was that all cases were brought before the special court at Poonamallee, and it was now up to the court to decide whether there was a case under the anti-terrorism law. Except that the POTA provisions were more `stringent' and coming out on bail was `difficult', there would be no difference in the handling of such a ``serious offence'', say the police.

But the Opposition parties have argued that the POTA was essentially an `anti-terrorism law', meant to be used against terrorists and brought into force in the context of cross-border terrorism. Their contention is that it should not be used against political leaders or opponents by a ``vindictive State Government''. Calling these arrests ``misuse of the POTA'', they demanded the repeal of the law.

A senior DMK leader and former Minister alleged that political opponents and those found ``inconvenient'' to the Government were being detained under the POTA, so that they could not come out ``easily''. The party's understanding was that the POTA should be used only against ``terrorists'' and in its view none of those detained and booked under this special law in the State fitted that description.

The police took the line that they had gone by the clauses and sections of the law, which was a Central legislation, but left to the States for implementation. As the matter was before court, they would wait for the verdict. The message that the Government and the police here wanted to send out, loud and strong, was that ``There will be no room for terrorism, or for support to banned organisations in this State''.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Southern States