K’taka HC rejects petition challenging PFI ban

A PLEA FILED BY PFI ACTIVIST NASIR PASHA SAID THE NOTIFICATION ABOUT PFI’S BAN WAS ARBITRARY AND ILLEGAL

The Karnataka high court on Wednesday dismissed a petition challenging the Centre’s September 28 notification banning the Popular Front of India (PFI) under section 3 of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) for five years.

A plea filed by PFI activist Nasir Pasha, currently in judicial custody, through his wife argued that the under UAPA, it was obligatory to record “separate and distinct” reasons to bring the ban into force with “immediate effect,” which the

Centre had not done.

The Centre banned PFI and its affiliate organisations two months ago for their alleged involvement in terrorist activities, a move that came after a crackdown on the group’s leaders and office bearers across several states in which nearly 350 people were rounded up. On Wednesday, the single judge bench of Justice M Nagaprasanna dismissed the plea arguing that a “perusal of the notification under challenge would indicate that reasons are present in the notification itself” and that it did not find any “warrant that would entail interference at the hands of this court.”

Pasha’s plea argued that the PFI was registered under the Karnataka Societies Registration Act from 2007-08, and the organisation worked for the empowerment of the downtrodden.

“...Declaring it unlawful with immediate effect that too without specifying any reason is arbitrary and illegal,” the plea said.

Justice Nagaprasanna, however, said: “A perusal at the notification would indicate that reasons are present in the notification itself. Article 19(1)(c) of the Constitution of India, on which much emphasis is laid, is also hedged with reasonable restrictions to be imposed in certain circumstances… and the fact that reasons are found in the impugned notification itself, I do not find any warrant that would entail interference...”