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Informist, Monday, Oct. 28, 2024

 

NEW DELHI – The Delhi High Court Monday rejected a petition by Visuvanathan Rudrakumaran, self-styled prime minister of the "transnational government of Tamil Eelam", seeking to be made party to the hearings at a tribunal constituted under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967, to adjudicate on the declaration of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam as an unlawful association.

 

A bench of Justice Prathiba M. Singh and Justice Amit Sharma said judicial review ought to be exercised with "utmost caution" in matters involving the country's security and integrity. Allowing Rudrakumaran to be made party to the case would have "far-reaching" implications, the court said. His stand could have implications for policy and for relations with other countries. These matters are not to be determined either by the tribunal or by the court, the judges said.

 

The fact that the state of Tamil Nadu and sympathisers of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam based in India are being heard by the tribunal, by way of interventions, shows that the basic principles of fairness and natural justice were being adhered to, the court said. "Under these circumstances, this Court is of the opinion that the order of the Tribunal does not require to be interfered with," it said.

 

The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam was an organisation formed with the objective of setting up a separate Tamil state in Sri Lanka. It was designated a terrorist organisation by the UN and the US, apart from Sri Lanka and several other countries, including India. In 2009, an all-out war took place in Sri Lanka which led to the decimation of the organisation and the killing of its leader, Velupillai Pirabhakaran.

 

In India, the government declared the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam an unlawful organisation under the 1967 Act in 1992 after the group planned and executed the assassination of former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi in the run-up to the general election of May 1991. The declaration was renewed every two years till 2014, after which it was renewed for five years in 2014 and again in 2019.

 

In May, the government issued a fresh notification banning the organisation for another five years. It also constituted the tribunal to adjudicate whether there was sufficient cause to declare the organisation unlawful. 

 

The petitioner said that owing to the war that took place in 2009 in Sri Lanka, almost all the leaders of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam were killed, captured, or exiled, and the organisation was dismantled. Sympathisers of the organisation then felt that the cause of the Sri Lankan Tamils should be agitated through peaceful means. This resulted in the constitution of the "transnational government of Tamil Eelam" consisting of sympathisers of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam and its cause, the petitioner said.  End

 

Reported by Surya Tripathi

Edited by Rajeev Pai

 

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