Ban in PFI: What is UAPA Act?

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• Sep 29, 2022 | Dhupali Das

As per Section 4 of the UAPA Act, after the Union Government declares any organization as unlawful, its notification must reach...

Digital Desk: After a nationwide crackdown by central agencies along with states police against radical outfit Popular Front of India (PFI), the Centre on Wednesday declared PFI and its associates as an "Unlawful Association", banning them for a period of five years under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA).

With this, the PFI has been added to the list of 42 banned terrorist organizations under Section 35 of the UAPA. Days after law enforcement agencies launched a nationwide crackdown against the Popular Front of India, the Centre on Wednesday banned the PFI and its affiliates for five years.

Invoking the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act to effect the ban, the Ministry of Home Affairs said the PFI and its affiliates are linked to terror groups like ISIS, propagate "anti-national sentiments" and "radicalize a particular section of society with the intention of creating disaffection" and constitute a "major threat to the internal security of the country."

As per Section 4 of the UAPA Act, after the Union Government declares any organization as unlawful, its notification must reach the tribunal within 30 days to adjudicate whether or not there is sufficient cause for the move.

According to the UAPA Act, "unlawful activity" is not limited to terror activities causing direct violence or attacks, it also includes any activities that endanger the sovereignty or territorial integrity of the nation, undermine its economic stability, or cause disharmony or feelings of enmity, hatred, or ill-will between different religious, racial, language or regional groups or castes or communities in the country.

This ban can be considered necessary as the organization threatens the political and secular integrity of the nation. The workers of the PFI and its predecessor National Development Front (NDF), were involved in 27 cases of communally motivated murders, 86 cases of attempts to murder, and 106 cases of a communal nature and many more uncountable instigations and indirect violence.