By IANS,
Shillong : The National Council of Churches in India Tuesday demanded repeal of the Armed Force (Special Powers) Act (AFSPA) in India’s northeastern states and Jammu and Kashmir.
“The law and order situation has improved considerably in these states (northeastern states and Jammu and Kashmir), and the government ought to find new ways to build the confidence of the local people so as to sustain peace and stability,” NCCI vice president P.B.M. Basaiawmoit said.
He said the NCCI also strongly supported the call of Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah for the withdrawal of AFSPA in some parts of Kashmir.
Strongly demanding the repeal of the draconian act, the NCCI leader said the union government should rethink and review its present policy of dealing with the states in the northeast and the Kashmir crisis.
“We in the NCCI strongly feel that violence cannot be responded to with state-sponsored violence, and the member churches of the NCCI hold firmly to the conviction that there can be peace only when justice is assured,” Basaiawmoit said.
The AFSPA, which is enforced in large parts of Manipur, Tripura, Assam and Nagaland and some parts of Meghalaya in the northeast besides Jammu and Kashmir, gives the armed forces authority to fire upon or detain terror suspects in insurgency-prone areas.
However, army officials dealing in counter-insurgency maintained that it is for the central and the state governments to decide whether to repeal the act or let it continue.
In fact, Meghalaya Governor R.S. Mooshahary, who favoured the repeal of AFSPA in the region, had said its prolonged use had alienated the civil society.
“We cannot contain insurgency-related violence by alienating the citizens; we can do so more effectively by involving them,” said Mooshahary, a former chief of the Border Security Force and the National Security Guard.
Irom Sharmila Chanu, a human rights activist, has been on indefinite strike for nearly a decade in Manipur, demanding the withdrawal of the APSPA from the state.
Several human rights groups, including the powerful North East Students’ Organisation (NESO), have also been demanding withdrawal of the AFSPA from the northeastern region.
In view of the outcry against the AFSPA, the central government had appointed a five-member committee headed by Supreme Court judge B.P. Jeevan Reddy a few years ago to examine whether the act was required or not.
After visiting all affected states, the committee submitted its report to the central government in October 2006. The government has not yet made the findings public.