Yakub Memon case shows effect of strong laws
Terrorist and 1993 Mumbai blasts' ‘driving spirit' Yakub Abdul Razak Memon has got what he deserved. On Thursday, the Supreme Court rejected his review petition for the commutation of death sentence, thus clearing the way for his hanging. The terror convict had moved the review plea after the apex court in March 2013 upheld a lower court's verdict of 2006, which had given capital punishment to the accused. The Supreme Court had thereafter stayed his execution pending the disposal of the review petition, partly also because a new ground had been raised by the accused: That his review plea should be heard in the open court and not in the judges' chamber, as the practise commonly is with review petitions.
The apex court then accepted the request, and has now pronounced the rejection of the plea in the open court. The series of attacks which Memon masterminded at various places in Mumbai had claimed more than 250 lives and injured nearly 700 others. Full credit goes to the police, the investigators and the prosecutors of Maharashtra for their meticulous work that eventually led to the conviction and its endorsement by the country's highest court. Indeed, the apex court Bench of Justices AR Dave, J Chelameswar and Kurian Joseph observed that they did not “find any error apparent on the face of record or any other ground so as to warrant interference in exercise of our review jurisdiction”. In other words, the Bench noted that the order of the lower court was appropriate. By extension, the probe agencies and the prosecutors had, through material evidence, convinced the court of Memon's heinous crime, and the court then put him on the death row.
The main sticking point in Memon's case was that he had been prosecuted under the Terrorist and Disruptive Activities (Prevention) Act, which no longer exists. Tada was the first anti-terror law to be enacted by the Union Government. It came into force in 1987 against the backdrop of the Punjab militancy but was allowed to lapse in 1995 after much criticism from human rights groups. However, cases that were tried under Tada continue to hold legal validity. In 2002, the BJP-led NDA Government brought back a strong anti-terror law with the Prevention of Terrorism Act. However, one of the first things that the Congress-led UPA regime did when it came to power in 2004 was to scrap that law.
Pota, like Tada, was also severely criticised for being a draconian law; both have been the favourite whipping boys of the Congress and a few other ‘secular' parties. Memon’s conviction under Tada — and that of Afzal Guru, the mastermind of the 2001 Parliament attack who was hanged to death in 2013, under Pota — shows that stringent laws are necessary to fight the scourge of terrorism. Those who are now opposing the anti-terror law that Gujarat has legislated, will do well to keep this in mind. They must also not forget that a similar law exists in Maharashtra, brought in by a Congress-led coalition Government of the past. Memon and Guru may have been brought to book even without Tada or Pota, but it is doubtful whether they would have got the death sentence. The two terrorists would have had many opportunities to escape from the loop-holed routine laws.