Cabinet to discuss POTO changes today

Joint session likely on Bill

New Delhi, December 5, 2001
Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee today said the Union Cabinet would discuss tomorrow amendments to the Prevention of Terrorism Ordinance.

Replying to questions in this regard at an Iftaar hosted by Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah, he said the “Cabinet will discuss amendments to POTO tomorrow.”

Mr Vajpayee declined to comment when asked whether the government was considering convening of a joint session of Parliament to adopt the Bill if it failed in the Rajya Sabha.

As reporters shot more questions, Dr Abdullah took the Prime Minister away.

Among others present at the party were Vice-President Krishan Kant, former Prime Ministers I.K. Gujaral, P.V. Narasimha Rao, Congress president and Leader of Opposition Sonia Gandhi, Lok Sabha Speaker GMC Balayogi, Centre’s interlocutor on Kashmir K.C. Pant, Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, Nationalist Congress Party president Sharad Pawar besides several other Union Ministers and senior bureaucrats from the state and the Central Government. The government is in minority in the Upper House, the POTO may fail to get the approval of the Rajya Sabha.

The Bharatiya Janata Party favoured a joint session of Parliament to ensure passage of a Bill meant to convert the Prevention of Terrorism Ordinance (POTO) into a law.

BJP spokesman Vijay Kumar Malhotra accused the Congress of placing party interests above national interest by opposing the POTO.

The Bill to replace POTO would be introduced in Parliament on December 10 or 11 and would come up for discussion on December 12 and 13, Mr Malhotra said adding that a final decision to take the Bill to a joint session would be taken by the Government.

Prof Malhotra said the Government wanted to evolve consensus among political parties to deal firmly with terrorism, but the Congress was interested more in vote bank politics after having misused similar law in the past.

Picking up the Congress for the BJP’s wrath particularly, the BJP spokesman said while the left Parties and the Samajwadi Party opposed the Bill, consistently it was the Congress attitude that created confusion.

The Congress was also opposing proxy voting for defence personnel, which would not send right signals and would evoke adverse reactions, he said.

To the charge, Mr Malhotra S.Jaipal Reddy of the Congress said, “the boot is on the other leg”.

It was the BJP-led government which confronted the country with the POTO a few hours before the notification for the winter session of Parliament was issued, he said.

Mr Reddy accused the government of adopting a confrontationist course on the POTO.