New Delhi, February 15
The banned Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI), linked by the probe agencies to the Mumbai train blasts and Malegaon explosions last year, was today questioned by the Supreme Court why the ban should be lifted from it.
The poser was put to SIMI’s counsel Kamini Jaiswal by the court when she moved an application for lifting the ban, imposed on it for the first time in 2001 and subsequently confirmed by different review tribunals.
As Ms Jaiswal said that there had been no reports of adverse activities against SIMI since 2003, a Bench of Mr Justice S B Sinha and Mr Justice Markandey Kathu observed that the allegations against the organisation were that of its indulgence in secessionist activities.
In a stinging observation, the Supreme Court today described the SIMI as a “secessionist movement.”
“You are a secessionist movement. You have not stopped your activities,” the court observed.
The court pointed out that from the findings of the review tribunals it had come out that it had not stopped its activities.
When Ms Jaiswal said that she would like to argue on this point and the findings of the tribunals, the court said the fresh application moved by SIMI would be tagged with its pending petition against the review tribunal’s order and heard together.
The ban order was issued by the previous NDA government in September 2001 and since then it had been reviewed twice by tribunals, headed by Delhi High Court sitting judges in 2003 and 2006.
The last order of February 8, 2006 passed by Justice B N Chaturvedi tribunal, had confirmed that the ban should continue.
The Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, under which the ban was imposed, has an in-built mechanism for setting up of review tribunals from time to time to see whether the banned organisation had desisted from indulging in secessionist activities.
