UPA,BJP agree: SC’s Naxal order guided by ideology

Making an intervention during a discussion on internal security in the Upper House,Jaitley brought up the recent order while dwelling on the subject of left-wing extremism. “I must say I am extremely disturbed with the recent pronouncement of the Supreme Court (on the issue),” he said.

“Since 1861 onwards (since the establishment of the Indian Police Act,1861),community members are actively encouraged to aid and help the civilian police. Village defence committees have been active in many states for a number of years. The concept of SPOs and these committees is that since police cannot be present everywhere all the time,members of the community must come forward to contribute in safeguarding itself,” Jaitley said.

On July 5,the Supreme Court had ordered the Chhattisgarh government to “immediately cease and desist from using SPOs in any manner or form in any activities,directly or indirectly” in the fight against Naxalites. SPO is a term used to refer to former Naxalites who changed sides and helped the police forces in anti-Naxal operations. They were armed,given some elementary training,and were then used by the police forces as important sources of information against their former colleagues.

Said Jaitley: “Instead of leaving matters related to internal security for the government to handle,ideology of the authors (of the order) seem to have become the ground for declaring the constitutionality of a mechanism… Judges don’t have to fight terror. The security forces have to. The government has to. I don’t think our constitutional mechanism has ever taken away from the government its responsibility to maintain law and order and fight terror.”

CPI’s D Raja intervened to say that courts cannot overlook police excesses. Jaitley said the courts had every right to intervene in instances of misuse of powers or if a law was not being properly implemented. “But the courts must not say that this or that is the reason for people turning violent and taking up arms against the government. How insurgency has to be fought is a matter completely under the jurisdiction of the government,” he said.

Replying to the debate,Chidambaram said the government was exploring legal options available to it to seek remedial measures. “I have consulted the Attorney General. The government is on the anvil of taking an appropriate decision in this regard. We will inform the Parliament when we finalise our course of action,” he said.

He said he had asked the Orissa government whether it too was “inclined to promulgate an Ordinance”,like Chhattisgarh,to recruit all affected SPOs within its police forces.