CHANDIGARH:  The radical Sikh organisation Dal Khalsa Wednesday condemned the BJP for advocating enactment of law on the lines of POTA. 
 

In a statement party general secretary Kanwar Pal Singh said draconian laws like TADA, POTA were unacceptable in the country, where politicians are neither talented nor honest and where culture to respect the dissenting voices has not been developed. He said draconian laws were invoked in the name of combating violent acts but unfortunately the successive governments misused such laws to curb the fundamental rights of regional and religious communities.

Driving his point home, he said all groups banned under POTA belonged to either of the ethnic and religious minority community. Ironically, all those who were booked under POTA in Gujarat in the wake of Muslim carnage were Muslims themselves beside alone Sikh.  
 
He said POTA neither prevented violent attacks nor deterred the resolve of those who carried out such acts. "Rather it became an instrument of oppression in the hands of the establishment. It brought anti-human rights culture and provided the police a license to arrest, torture and even murder innocents". Cautioning SAD leadership against implications of POTA, he said Akalis should oppose BJP's move as they too have borne the brunt of Emergency and TADA.

Condemning terrorism in all its form including state terrorism, he said there's a need to provide positive and creative alternatives to the path of violence and ensure a global culture of non-violence and tolerance for political dissent. 
 
He suggested that to end the cycle of violence, instead of depending on harsh and black laws, the ruling elite should make an attempt to understand the causes of disenchantment, resolve contentious problems engulfing the peripheral states through dialogue, shun its discriminative policies and provide justice to all in letter and spirit.