The Hindu : National : BJP disappointed with Manmohan's `no' to POTA

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Tuesday, Jul 18, 2006

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BJP disappointed with Manmohan's `no' to POTA

Special Correspondent

Unveil plan to fight terrorism: Arun Jaitley

NEW Delhi: The Bharatiya Janata Party continues to insist that bringing back the Prevention of Terrorism Act in one form or another is necessary to fight terrorism effectively, especially to secure conviction in terrorism-related cases.

Emphasising this, general secretary Arun Jaitley on Monday expressed disappointment that the Prime Minister had once again rejected the idea and said current laws were sufficient to deal with the problem.

Mr. Jaitley was commenting on the remarks attributed to the Prime Minister, while he was on his way to attend the G-8 meeting in St. Petersburg, Russia.

While admitting that an anti-terrorism law by itself could not fight terrorism, Mr. Jaitley said it prescribed severe punishment and a special and deterrent procedure for prosecuting terrorists or those who might have given them logistics support.

Asked how the Narasimha Rao Government was able to end terrorism in Punjab and reduce it in Kashmir without POTA, he said: "There were other factors like giving more powers to security agencies."

As for the lack of political will in the United Progressive Alliance, there was no answer from the BJP why its government in Chhattisgarh was facing virulent naxal attacks.

Mr. Jaitley said four things needed to be done to fight terrorism effectively: intelligence gathering had to be strengthened; illegal migration which created a "human resource" for "recruitment of misguided youth by terrorists" had to be stopped; anti-terror laws had to be strengthened, and the fight against terrorism "must be delinked from vote-bank politics."

All developed, democratic and liberal countries had adopted special anti-terror laws.

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