Andhra govt not to renew ban on PWG

Removing the final stumbling block to peace talks with the People's War Group (PWG) in the state, the Andhra Pradesh government yesterday took a significant decision to not renew the ban on outfit and its six frontal organisations.

The ban which has been renewed every year for the last eight-and-half years will lapse on Thursday.

Announcing the decision after a prolonged meeting with the representatives of the PWG and final consultations with the chief minister, state home minister K Jana Reddy told the media that the government took the decision hoping that it would lead to lasting peace in the state.

"Our decision is in response to those appeals made by various sections of the society, particularly several democratic organisations for the past several years, which were not heeded all these years.

According to their view, the lifting of the ban only will ensure restoration of democratic processes in the state. We felt it not necessary to renew the ban and hope for the co-operation by all the parties concerned, including the PWG," the home minister said.

Stating that the government's decision was based on the aspirations and sentiments of people and was in the larger interests of the state, the home minister said the decision did not amount to any unconditional yielding to the demands of the PWG group.

Also stating that there were no preconditions in discontinuing the ban, he expressed hope that the PWG would cooperate and comply with the requirements of a democratic framework. He reiterated his appeal to the PWG cadres not to carry weapons while moving around in villages and other public places.

After a three-hour meeting between the home minister and the three People's War Group representatives in the mediating team, S R Sankaran, the government mediator and the coordinator of the proposed peace talks said that the entire group unanimously told the home minister that the ban on PWG should not be renewed.

The three PWG emissaries "� Varavara Rao, Gaddar and I Kalyan Rao "� who met the home minister on the issue of lifting the ban on the PWG, said that there was no place for a ban on political beliefs and political organisations in a democracy.

The other prominent persons on the mediating panel include civil liberties activist K G Kannabhiran, senior journalists ABK Prasad and P Venkateshwar Rao.

Ironically, the ban on the PWG, which was first imposed in the year 1992 by the then Congress chief minister N Janardhan Reddy is now being scrapped by a Congress government led by Y S Rajasekhara Reddy.

In between, soon after returning to power in the 1994 Assembly elections, the late N T Rama Rao lifted the ban on the PWG, which was one of his election promises.

But within three months after coming to power after dethroning N T Rama Rao, his son-in-law, the then chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu reimposed the ban on the PWG along with its frontal organisations in June 2006.

The issue of naxal related violence in the state had assumed alarming proportions with killings from either side going up in the recent past.

Naidu decided to go for early elections on the issue of naxal violence alone, hoping to gain from the sympathy factor, after a bid on his life by the PWG squad in Tirupathi on October 30, 2003.

The home minister did not agree that the decision to impose ban on the extremist outfit in the year 1992 was wrong.

"The circumstances and the mood and sentiment of the people drove the then government to take such a decision. The present circumstances and the mood and will of the people made us take a diametrically opposite decision," Jana Reddy said.