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India’s opposition resists anti-terrorist bill citing HR violations NEW DELHI: Opposition deputies on Tuesday physically resisted the introduction in the Indian Parliament of an anti-terrorism bill prompted by the Sept 11 aerial attacks in New York and Washington. Members of the Congress party, the regional Samajwadi (socialist) Party, the Rashtriya Janata Dal (National People’s Party) and the Communist Parties forced the adjournment of the lawmaking lower house or Lok Sabha, scattering copies of the Prevention of Terrorism Ordinance (POTO), a version of which is sought to be enacted by the government. In the new version of the bill, the government has tried to accommodate popular opinion by deleting a clause that would compel journalists to pass on to authorities information that could help prevent terrorist activity. Defending the bill after its introduction was postponed to Wednesday, the spokesman for the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), V.K. Malhotra, said the government was merely trying to follow UN resolutions requiring members to enact suitable anti-terrorist legislation. But opposition leaders were not convinced that there were no other motives behind the bill and vowed that they would resist its passage. Said senior Congress party leader Pranab Mukherjee: “There are many clauses, which are violative of human rights and rule of law. Under this ordinance, the onus is on the accused to prove their innocence.” “There is every possibility that the new law will be misused, especially when nothing is being done about badly needed police and judicial reforms,” D Raja, secretary of the Communist Party of India (CPI) said, reflecting the general mood of the opposition parties. “We are completely opposed to the new law — we were not consulted before it was framed,” Sonia Gandhi, leader of the powerful Congress party, said earlier. The Congress Party, the CPI, the SP and the RJD all have a ”secular” stance and have been consistent in championing the rights of minorities, particularly the large Muslim community that they say is not safe with the blatantly pro-Hindu BJP. Leader of the SP and former chief minister of Uttar Pradesh, Mulayam Singh Yadav, said the bill was being brought in to terrorize opponents of his party at a time when the state faced provincial elections early next year. Uttar Pradesh, where the BJP is currently in power, is the home of Ayodhya, where leading members of the party were involved in the 1992 demolition of the Babri mosque after saying it was built over a Hindu temple by Muslim invaders. Journalist Pankaj Vohra has commented in the widely circulated Hindustan Times: “It would be totally absurd to imagine that the present government could use the law against Hindu fundamentalists, some of whom in the past were involved in acts such as the demolition of the disputed structure at Ayodhya.” While the BJP and its allies in the ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA) can get the bill through the Lok Sabha, the opposition parties dominate the Rajya Sabha (upper house) and have sworn to veto it when it is sent there for the necessary ratification. India’s Law Minister Arun Jaitley said that the bill was necessary if the country was to be rid of terrorism in places like Kashmir. “This country has been asking other countries to ban terrorism and terrorist outfits and it is now necessary for us to enact laws similar to that in place in the United States. and United Kingdom.” Jaitley said that the new bill focused on confiscation of the property and funds of terrorist outfits and banning them and intercepting them, but opposition parties were bent on turning it into a political issue. He said that the opposition parties were exaggerating the idea that the bill could be misused and pointed to various provisions designed to make police officials accountable for their actions. The Prevention of Terrorism Ordinance, on which the bill is based, says that police officers “who exercise powers corruptly or maliciously, knowing that there are no reasonable grounds for proceeding under this Ordinance, shall be punishable with imprisonment which may extend to two years, or with fine or with both.” Jurist Madhava Menon attributes opposition to the new bill to “widespread popular dissatisfaction with the management of police powers by the State”. “Even when high-power committees appointed by successive governments have recommended urgent reforms in police and criminal justice administration, all political parties conspired to keep the police under their thumb, demoralising the police almost to the point of irrelevance,” Menon said. Menon added : “No sensible person could now agree to arm the very same police with more and more powers, which the politicians who control them are bound to use for their nefarious ends.” —Dawn/InterPress Service. Please Visit our Sponsor (Ads open in separate window)
