The recent terrorist attacks in Ahmedabad and Delhi have revived the debate on terror and the state’s inability to deal with it. The BJP’s strident position is that combating terror requires the revival of the POTA and the UPA’s obduracy in not doing so shows that it is soft on terror: that this government neither has the political will nor does it wish to arm itself with legislation that effectively deals with terror. For the BJP, every terrorist attack is an opportunity to politicise the tragedy for possible electoral gain.

We need to differentiate between combating terror and dealing with terrorists, which require separate strategies. Dealing with terror requires an institutional response and dealing with terrorists requires a legislative response. This subtle distinction is lost on the BJP. The BJP’s ideological position is that if you deal with terrorists by reviving the POTA, the fight against terror will have been won. The argument therefore runs that a government which does not revive the POTA is soft on, and unable to deal with, terror.

To demonstrate the flaw in this argument, let us examine whether the NDA, which enacted the POTA was able to deal with terror more effectively than the UPA. The facts somehow do not speak in favour of the NDA. Men may tell lies, but statistics don’t. Here are some facts :

1. Between 1999 - 2004, while the NDA was in power, total civilian casualties from terrorist acts were 4,405 whereas between 2004 - 2008 (till September 11, 2008), these were 1,623.

... contd.