LUCKNOW, 29 September — A meeting held in Bahraich town of Uttar Pradesh, near the border with Nepal, by the Students’ Islamic Movement of India (SIMI) a fortnight ago provided authorities the clinching evidence they were looking for to ban the outfit, say officials. The Uttar Pradesh government had made a formal recommendation to ban SIMI in July 2000, though it took more than a year for the Central government to bring it under the purview of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act.
“We had already sent our recommendation; we could not have done anything beyond that as any such ban order could be issued only by the Central government,” UP’s Pincipal Home Secretary Naresh Dayal said. The meeting in Bahraich on Sept. 16 provided further reason to ban the outfit. “This time we made it a point to record the Bahraich event on video-tapes, which provided firsthand foolproof information about the anti-national public utterances of SIMI’s top leaders, who would otherwise get away by denying their acts of commission,” Dayal said.
“SIMI President Shahid Badr and former chief Muhammad Anees had openly tried to incite communal passion and even called upon the gathering to defy the Indian Constitution and parliament,” he said.
UP police chief R.K. Pandit said: “Since there was enough matter on the tapes to prove that the SIMI chief was indulging in anti-national activity, we ordered his arrest. We have sufficient evidence,” Pandit said.
But on the other side, the center’s decision has fueled fire in the political circles. The Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and the Samajwadi Party yesterday described the ban on SIMI as politically motivated.
The parties demanded such actions against the Rashtriya Swamsewak Sangh (RSS) and its affiliates, which they said were involved in anti-national activities. The government must also act against these Hindu militants groups. “You can’t solve the problem by acting only against one or two groups, said Sitaram Yechury of the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPM).
