NEW DELHI: The Peoples Union for Democratic Rights (PUDR) last week released a report on the Supreme Court judgment on the Terrorist and Disruptive Activities (prevention) Act (TADA) and said the very basis of the Act stood on shaky grounds. Describing TADA as unconstitutional, unfair and discriminatory the PUDR report titled TADA Judgment: A Critique said the Act defines every procedural safe guard, every principle of natural justice and every tenet of liberal jurisprudence.
It said the Act was brought into being six months after the anti- Sikh riots on the pretext of providing speedy justice in cases “where the perpetrators were powerful and could subvert the law.”
Yet the killing of 2,733 people who have been denied justice for the past 10 years is nowhere mentioned in its objects and reasons, the report said.
The report said TADA is unfair since it is based on a false classification wherein there is no difference between those included and those left out of its ambit.
“It is arbitrary since crimes de- fined under the Act are included under normal procedural law, and no guidelines exist,” it said.
Its vague definitions carry enhanced punishments and separate procedures, the report said. The PUDR report said 160TADA under trials remanded for the last five to seven years in Ajmer Central Prison went on hunger strike in January this year to demand speedy trial.
Article extracted from this publication >> May 27, 1994
