Book of Integration Council New - Ministry of Home Affairs

organizations affiliated to a national political party are engaging in spreading
communal disharmony, disunity and hatred? The pattern of this entire campaign
suggest that there is unholy conspiracy to polarize people on communal lines, to
foist an atmosphere of fear and terror and to create confusion in the minds of the
people by repeatedly charging that this Government is soft on terror.
When the UPA Government came to power, we agreed on an agenda of
Governance which laid down certain commitments. The misuse of TADA
and POTA in the past had provided us with enough lessons to commit that the
draconian legislations with vast potential for misuse of power have no place
in a democratic country which swears by governance through the rule of law.
We wanted terrorism also to be tackled by a strong law that does not
harass or victimize innocent people, a law that is not used to settle personal
political or sectarian scores. And, therefore, we repealed POTA and strengthened
existing legislations. TADA and POTA had miserably failed in their
avowed objective of preventing terrorism in this country. Unfortunately, the
debate about terror legislation has become mere political sloganeering with
little concern about effective enforcement of existing laws. Today, the country
is asking how many convictions took place under POTA, how many terrorist
strikes were prevented, did we eliminate fake encounters, did we not settle
political scores by invoking provisions of POTA??? My friends from Tamil
Nadu are sitting here. They will bear testimony to how an important political
figure there was incarcerated under POTA and this is not an isolated example
of misuse of the Act. We are not a dictatorship, we are not under Martial Law
and we are not a police State. In a mature democracy, extra-judical powers
with a license to violated human rights cannot be given to anyone. Example
of USA is often cited for enactment of tough terror laws after terror strikes of
2001. But I want to ask the advocates of POTA - have there been any reports
of misuse of such powers in that country? Have they not sent a US citizen to
life imprisonment within one year of killing an innocent sikh? We have to
reach that level of accountability and maturity before enacting legislations like
POTA. I fully agree with Shri Moily, Chairman of Administrative Reforms
Commission, who has recommended that such legislations should be brought
only after the Police reforms are fully implemented.
When we talk of national integration, we have to become specially
cautious about the nefarious designs of certain organizations who follow a
divisive and disruptive agenda. Violence in Orissa and Karnataka has been
aided, abetted and conduted by the activists of Bajrang Dal and Vishwa Hindu
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