Members of the Muslim United Front were detained under it for “arousing religious sentiments” and demanding “independence” from the Indian Union.
In some instances the TADA and the NSA have been used in combination to keep people in detention for several years without trial. This has been the case in Punjab. In March 1987 Julio Ribeiro, the then Director General of Police in Punjab, was quoted as saying: “We have put 52 such persons (political detainees) away for two years under the National Security Act. Then we will try them under TADA and that should keep them in custody for another year or two.”
3.4 The Terrorist Affected Areas (Special Courts) Act
The Terrorist Affected Areas (Special Courts) Act, 1984, like the TADA, permits the establishment of special courts sitting in camera and allows the identity of witnesses testifying before a special court to be kept secret. Again like the TADA, the act transfers to an accused person the burden of proving innocence (if arrested on a charge of “waging war” and if found in a specific area). An appeal against orders made by the special court must be made within 30 days and can be made only to the Supreme Court.
3.4.1 The Jodhpur detainees
The government has given repeated assurances that it would review the cases of a single group of, originally, 366 Sikhs on trial under the act in Jodhpur jail, Rajasthan. These Sikhs were arrested in June 1984 in the Golden Temple in Amritsar, Punjab when the army removed armed Sikh fundamentalist leader Sant Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale and his followers from its premises. Among them are many apparently innocent men and women who happened to be in the Golden Temple at the time, including pilgrims and temple employees. First held under the NSA and later charged with “waging war” under the
