The Indian authorities this week declared the Widespread Entrance of India (PFI) an illegal affiliation, banning the Muslim group and its associates for 5 years.
The choice beneath the Illegal Actions Prevention Act (UAPA) on Wednesday got here after safety businesses final week carried out countrywide raids and arrested dozens of individuals linked to PFI in a number of states.
The house ministry stated in a press release on Wednesday that the PFI and its associates “have been discovered to be concerned in severe offenses, together with terrorism and its financing, focused ugly killings, disregarding the constitutional arrange”.
PFI has repeatedly denied the costs, saying it’s the sufferer of a “witch-hunt” by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s authorities.
What’s the PFI?
The PFI was established in 2007 after the merger of three influential Muslim teams – the Nationwide Democratic Entrance (NDF) in Kerala, the Karnataka Discussion board for Dignity in Karnataka, and the Manitha Neethi Pasarai in Tamil Nadu. Two years later, it introduced that its political wing, the Social Democratic Get together of India (SDPI), would run in elections.
The PFI has stated it goals to empower Muslims and different minorities in India, and the SDPI has been contesting municipal polls within the southern states of Kerala and Karnataka.
“They’ve been energetic for Muslim points,” NP Chekkutty, a journalist and columnist based mostly in Kerala, instructed Al Jazeera. “Their primary concept of empowerment is related to Kerala society. They have been electorally profitable in a lot of municipal polls in Karnataka.”
Its primary base stays Kerala, the place it enjoys overwhelming assist in Muslim-dominated areas and the place many of the arrests have been made.
Although SDPI has not been formally banned, a few of its leaders have been amongst these arrested.
Accusations
The primary accusations meted out in opposition to the group contain the “funding of terrorism and terrorist actions, organising coaching camps for offering armed coaching and radicalising individuals to hitch banned organisations”.
India’s Nationwide Investigation Company stated in a September 22 assertion that “a lot of prison instances have been registered by completely different states over the previous few years in opposition to the PFI and its leaders and members for his or her involvement in lots of violent acts.”
Proper-wing Hindu teams, together with Modi’s governing Bhartiya Janata Get together (BJP), have accused the group of violent assaults on its members in Kerala and Karnataka.
In 2010, the PFI got here beneath hearth in Kerala after its members have been allegedly concerned within the chopping of the hand of a school professor for alleged blasphemy. In 2015, 13 individuals linked to the group have been convicted of the crime.
The PFI has additionally been accused of funding protests in opposition to the controversial Citizenship Modification Act (CAA) and inflicting violence. In 2020, Muslims throughout India took to the streets to protest in opposition to CAA, laws that fast-tracked Indian citizenship for non-Muslim minorities from neighbouring international locations however excluded Muslims. Among the PFI members who have been on the forefront of the protests have additionally been arrested.
In current months, Karnataka’s state authorities has additionally accused the group of instigating protests in opposition to a call by authorities in February to bar college students from sporting hijab. Rights teams have criticised the hijab ban as “discriminatory”.
Muslims comprise 14 p.c of India’s 1.4 billion inhabitants. Members of the group stated they’ve been dealing with rising hostilities amid a local weather of worry because of what they described because the “impunity loved by Hindu supremacist forces”.
Below the act, people could possibly be jailed for years with out being confirmed responsible. The regulation has stringent bail provisions.
In March 2019, UAPA was invoked to ban Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Entrance (JKLF), a pro-independence group, and Jama Jamaat-e-Islami, a socioreligious political organisation in Indian-administered Kashmir.
Observers stated the ban on PFI was much like the one imposed on one other Muslim group, the College students Islamic Motion of India (SIMI), which was outlawed by the Indian authorities banned in 2001 within the aftermath of the 9/11 assaults in the USA. Dozens of alleged members of the group have been arrested beneath UAPA, however have been freed years later after the courtroom stated the prosecution was unable to provide proof in opposition to them.
Mehmood Pracha, a New-Delhi based mostly lawyer, stated the transfer in opposition to the PFI “is just a concerted effort to transform India right into a ‘Hindu Rashtra’ (Hindu Nation ‘… that’s their [government’s] concept and every little thing is working in that path”.
He added that the PFI “has declared insurance policies on their web site and of their literature that they observe the Structure of India they usually wish to wrestle beneath the Structure of India to struggle for the rights of the oppressed together with Muslims.”
He famous that “the PFI might or might not have a hidden agenda that’s the subject material of investigation by the federal government.”
However Pracha identified that there are a lot of Hindu right-wing organisations in India that decision for violence in opposition to Muslims and search to show secular India into an unique Hindu state – with none motion being taken in opposition to them.
“The federal government doesn’t assume that these sorts of actions warrant ample banning of those our bodies. So, except the PFI has executed greater than this, then solely the federal government shall be justified in banning them. The brink of the federal government admittedly is that the actions of [Hindu right-wing groups] don’t warrant UAPA.”
Chekkutty, who can be a former editor of the PFI-owned Thejas newspaper, which stopped publication in 2018, termed the ban “a politically motivated calculation on the a part of central authorities”.
“They [PFI] did make some errors; some PFI individuals have been concerned within the hand chopping of a school professor in Kerala. They have been plenty of different points like involvement in violent instances. However they have been remoted incidents,” Chekkutty stated, denouncing what he described as an environment of “Islamophobia” in India.
“This [PFI ban] is mainly a political motion for the approaching election,” he added, referring to India’s subsequent normal vote in 2024.