UP govt can't withdraw Pota charges: Apex court

The Mulayam Singh government's attempt to extricate Raghuraj Pratap Singh (Raja Bhaiyya) and two associates from the charges under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (Pota) hit a roadblock today when the Supreme Court declared that the cases could not be withdrawn by the state government without the consent of the central government.

The state government has been asked to show the Centre's consent for withdrawing the charges against them at the next hearing if it wants to withdraw the charges against the notorious criminals. Otherwise it would be a "futile exercise", the judges said.

The Bench headed by Justice Rajendra Babu was hearing a few petitions moved by witnesses and victims of the high profile criminals against the Mulayam Singh government's move to undo what his predecessor Mayawati government had done.

In May this year, Mayawati invoked Pota charges against them.

Immediately after the Mulayam Singh Yadav government took over in September, it directed the public prosecutor to withdraw the charges. It amended the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC) to enable the prosecutor to do it. According to the Supreme Court judges, who quoted Section 321 of the Criminal Procedure Code, this was not legal.

Moreover, Pota is a parliamentary law where the Centre is in full control. Pota specified that charges under it could not be withdrawn without the consent of the Centre. Ram Jethmalani, counsel for the state government, virtually conceded the legal position.

In its judgment passed on Tuesday, the Supreme Court had emphasised that Parliament alone had the competence to pass an anti-terrorist legislation as it dealt with national security, sovereignty and integrity of the country.

Terrorism was not a mere question of public order, but an extraordinary challenge to the civilised world, with transnational links, it said. Therefore, the state government had no business at all to withdraw the Pota charges, the judges observed.