Justice Gita Mittal of Delhi High Court headed the tribunal to decide the continuance or ban on Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI), an indigenous jihadi organisation born in Aligarh Muslim University in 1977. It spread its wing throughout the country, specially among radical Islamist Muslim youths. SIMI is also well connected with similar International jihadi outfits.

Those who scan newspapers, must have read about barbarous terrorism acts being perpetrated in the country. It is quite similar to Lashkar-e-Taiba. Terrorist attacks and operations that recently took place in Karnataka, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Malegaon, Hyderabad, Varanasi, Ayodhya, Lucknow and other places, highlighted SIMI's involvement.

The pan-Islamic jihadi outfit, SIMI, was banned in 2001. Since then, after periodic confirmation of its terrorist activities, the ban has continued. Justice Mittal's tribunal shockingly did not confirm the continuation of ban, setting SIMI free. The public and the press reacted angrily against the Home Ministry, which did not provide fresh evidence of SIMI's involvement in terrorist acts. This is not my comment. Justice Mittal herself commented on this. The tribunal castigated the Home Ministry and the Intelligence Bureau (IB) due to non-compliance to Justice Mittal's order for fresh evidence and personal appearance of the Home Secretary and the IB Director. The tribunal's orders were ignored. In that given situation, the SIMI ban was automatically lifted.

The Government immediately woke up to public outcry and the Supreme Court stayed the tribunal's judgement. It does not mean that Supreme Court has quashed the verdict; it has only stayed that. To me, it was not surprising as this is the same Government that withdrew POTA to indicate its softness to the Muslim masses to buy their electoral favour. The Government that fought elections in Andhra Pradesh and Assam in alliance with Maoists and ULFA and others must have thought of lifting the ban on SIMI for similar reasons.

The present Minister of State for Home had once pleaded for lifting the ban on SIMI. In UP, Mulayam Singh Yadav denied objectionable activities of SIMI. In fact, the Samajwadi Party has always been against the ban. SP General Secretary, Amar Singh, produced a feature film to dispel the suspicion about existence of indigenous terrorism. The leaders of SP and Rashtriya Janta Dal welcomed lifting of the ban on SIMI. The Home Ministry officials reacted cautiously stating that "the Ministry will examine the order of the specially designated tribunal in detail and take remedial action."

One should not be surprised if there has been a full-fledged conspiracy for electoral gains. Why do I say so? It is public knowledge that the CBI has been holding the sword of Damocles on Mulayam to fall in line with the ruling Congress to save the Government after withdrawal of support by the Left Front.

This exercise was on for past many months. This was the precise time when the Home Ministry was to present before the Tribunal fresh evidence in support of its plea for the continuance of the ban on SIMI. The Home Ministry's soft paddling to support its own and SP's vote-bank can be understood. Initially, SIMI was instrumental in distributing cassettes and literature on Al-Qaida and Osama-bin-Laden openly. It should be remembered that, in her report, Justice Gita Mittal wrote about SIMI's intrinsic threat to the secular fabric of India. After the recent bomb blasts in Gujarat, Indian Mujahideen, a Lashkar-SIMI front, also owned up to the earlier bombings in Rajasthan and UP.

The Indian Mujahideen issued no manifesto before that. Their recently e-mail calls on Hindus to "realise that the falsehood of your 33 crore dirty mud idols and the blasphemy of your deaf, dumb, mute and naked idols of Ram, Krishna and Hanuman are not at all going to save your necks from being slaughtered by our hands." It demands that Hindus change their attitudes, lest "another Ghouri shakes your foundations, and lest another Ghaznavi massacres you, proving your blood to be the cheapest of all mankind."

Moreover, it has been reported that the ISI has maintained contact with key SIMI operatives during their trips to Saudi Arabia and other Middle East countries under the garb of either Haj or fund-raising activities -- (Daily Excelsior, October 9, 2001). In early 2003, a senior police official in Lucknow, given the task of investigating SIMI in UP, warned that the group was trying to re-organise itself with the help of the ISI. His claim was based on confessions of two SIMI operatives; Obaid Ullah and Mohammed Arif (Press Trust of India, January 27, 2003).

In the background of all these reports, it seems that for the Government, Hindu blood is cheapest and the Muslim vote bank is more precious.

Courtesy: www.dailypioneer.com, August 10, 2008