People's Democracy

Prakash Karat

WHEN we wrote about the Prevention of Terrorism Ordinance (POTO) adopted by the union cabinet (People's Democracy, October 28), the ordinance was yet to be promulgated by the president. The actual provisions of the ordinance were also not available. We had opposed the proposed ordinance on the basis of the earlier bill prepared by the government, the Prevention of Terrorism Bill 2000. The ordinance has since been promulgated and only then was the text made public. It is worse than the earlier bill, with new draconian provisions added.

The new dangerous provisions further underline why this atrocious ordinance must be resolutely opposed and defeated.

A whole new chapter (III) entitled "Terrorist Organisations" has been added. It enables the central government to declare any organisation as a "terrorist organisation" by listing it in the schedule. There is already an Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, under which the government is empowered to ban organisations indulging in unlawful activities. It is under this law that many organisations in Jammu & Kashmir and the north east, along with the LTTE, were banned. The recent use of this law was the banning of the SIMI. Under the new ordinance, the government has armed itself with more sweeping powers to take action against organisations declared as terrorist.

Under the Unlawful Activities Act, the decision to notify an organisation as unlawful has to be ratified within six months by a tribunal consisting of a sitting High Court judge. Under the present ordinance, when an organisation is listed as a terrorist one in the schedule, this process has been done away with. The process of automatic scrutiny of the government decision within six months goes. Instead, an affected organisation will have to appeal to the government for removing it from the schedule. After the government rejects such an application, only then can it go to the review committee. The review committee will have, as its chairperson, a sitting or retired judge of the High Court and two other members who will be nominated by the government. So, under the anti-terrorism ordinance, it will be more difficult for any sort of review of a decision about a terrorist organisation.

The sections under this chapter provide for severe punishment: (a) for belonging to or professing to belong to a terrorist organisation; the sentence can be upto ten years imprisonment; (b) if a person assists, arranges or manages a meeting, which he knows is to support a terrorist organisation, or addresses such a meeting, the sentence can be upto ten years in jail; (c) a person who invites another person to provide money or property, himself receives money, or provides money and if he "knows or has reasonable cause to suspect that it will be used for the purposes of terrorism," then he commits an offence under this law. Such a person can be liable to be sentenced upto 14 years in jail. All these loose definitions and sweeping powers are liable to grave misuse.

There is another obnoxious section, 14(1). This empowers a police officer of the rank of superintendent of police and above, who is investigating any offence under this ordinance to demand any individual, institution or organisation to furnish information in its possession in relation to such an offence "where the investigating officer has reason to believe that such information will be useful, or relevant to, the purposes of this ordinance." Failure to furnish such information demanded can make a person liable for imprisonment upto three years, apart from fines. It is under this clause that journalists can be compelled to impart with information concerning their contacts with any "terrorist activities" or face charges leading to imprisonment. The home secretary has magnanimously conceded that this will not be applied to journalists who conduct interviews and publish them. But definitely, under the ordinance, journalists would have to act as informers for the police under the threat of imprisonment.

The definition of terrorist act includes the act of raising funds intended for the purpose of terrorism; continuation of membership in an association declared unlawful under the Unlawful Activities Act is also construed to be a terrorist act. A family member like a father or mother, except for the spouse, is liable to charges of harbouring or concealing a person known to be a terrorist. In such a case, they can be liable to imprisonment which shall not be less than three years and can be extended upto life imprisonment.

A person arrested under an offence under this ordinance can be kept under detention for a period of one year without bail. After a year, when bail is applied for, if the public prosecutor opposes the bail application, it cannot be granted to the detainee "until the court is satisfied that there are grounds for believing that he is not guilty of committing such offence." What this means is that a person cannot get bail unless the court comes to the conclusion that the person is innocent. But if a person is innocent, then there was no need to have kept him in detention at all!

While this ordinance brutally attacks the civil liberties of an Indian citizen, as far as foreign citizens are concerned, they are deprived of all human rights. Section 48, clause 9 states that no bail shall be granted to a person accused of any offence under this ordinance, if he is not an Indian citizen and has entered the country unauthorisedly.

The BJP leaders who are blind admirers of the United States should know that under the recent anti-terrorist law passed by the US Congress, a foreign citizen or illegal migrant can be detained for only one week, after which either charges should be framed or the person released.

The havoc that such an obnoxious law can cause needs not much imagination. As an illustration, a person who is a member of the SIMI can be detained for belonging to a terrorist organisation. His family members can be detained for harbouring a terrorist. Among the thousands of those who attended SIMI meetings, anyone can be picked up for aiding the SIMI and for collecting money for it. Once arrested, there is no hope for coming out of jail for one year. During the trial, the accused faces severe constraints as the normal processes of law existing under the Criminal Procedure Code will not be available to him.

With such a despotic law in its hands, the police, given its lax and authoritarian character in most places, will seek the easy way out. It is quicker to show "progress" in tracking down crimes by making arrests under this ordinance, which cannot be challenged or scrutinised, than painstaking investigations to find out those actually perpetrating terrorist violence. Worse still, corrupt sections in the police would use this law to coerce and extort money from targeted victims, or pliable officers would invoke its provisions at the behest of their political masters.

In many parts of the country like Gujarat, Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh, the police machinery is biased against the minorities and often hostile. The POTO will become a potent weapon to harass and suppress minorities. Already we have seen how the police tried to attack those criticising America's war on Afghanistan; cases of sedition have been foisted against six students in Delhi. In Malegaon, the police sought to prevent leaflets being distributed by Muslims, calling for boycott of American goods and the resultant clashes led to the killing of nine Muslims by police bullets and communal violence.

The POTO will be a disruptive weapon in the hands of the BJP-led government. It will be used politically for advancing the narrow and sectarian agenda of the BJP-RSS combine that wants to create a communal polarisation in the country. Already it is striving to make America's so-called war against terrorism a Hindu-Muslim issue, with an eye on the Uttar Pradesh elections.

The POTO will also be a lethal instrument against all organisations and movements which oppose the ruthless economic policies and those who lead popular struggles against them. We have seen the use of MISA during the seventies and the emergency; the TADA came next. The BJP-led government must be stopped from making POTO into a law, i e, POTA.