Excerpts from the UAP Bill debate in 1967

Congress is at the receiving end of the parliamentarians cutting remarks, and some speaking against the law would go on to join the BJP

Reading the parliamentary debates when the UAPA law was first introduced in 1967 is an edifying experience. What is striking is how some of these concerns — that the law will encroach on individual freedoms, that it will be wielded as a political tool to curb dissent — are prescient not just in predicting the Emergency but also our current predicament.

The irony is that it is Congress that is at the receiving end of the parliamentarians cutting remarks, and some of the people speaking against the law would eventually go on to join the BJP. Edited excerpts researched by RTI activist Venkatesh Nayak follow:

J B Kripalani, MP and member of the Swatantra party

I have absolutely no doubt that the intentions of the Government are good. They want to use this law only for the purposes for which it is designed. I have absolutely no doubt about it. I do not doubt their credentials. They are honest, but they must know that no Government, when they can get short cuts, refrain from making use of those shortcuts and to take the trouble of going to the law courts. So. whatever they may intend, this law, as all laws are used, will be used also for purposes for which it is not designed. Their intentions are good, but it is just like putting a sword in the hands of Hanuman. Hanuman may not like to kill, but somehow the sword kills.

Atal Bihari Vajpayee, MP from the Bharatiya Jana Sangh

The Joint Advisory Committee was handed a donkey and given the task of transforming it into a horse. The result is that it has become a hinny [offspring of a male horse and a female donkey. The hinney is good enough to bear the burden of the home ministry, but the home minister seems to think that he can fight for the sovereignty and integrity of the nation sitting astride this hinny and I have to politely disagree with him...

I am not in support of keeping someone in jail without a trial. Individual freedoms should be protected. I have been unable to understand the thought process of the government, the difference between its words and action, the reason for bringing this law — perhaps even the house is unable to understand it.

We are afraid that these laws will be misused... The minister says the government has the inherent right to declare any organisation political and now the government wants the authority to declare any organisation illegal.

The challenges to the integrity and sovereignty of the nation should be faced with determination (dhrudata). If the government is unable to face these challenges it is not because it does not have the authority but because it does not have strength to do so.

“To make the backbone tough” is an English saying. This government has a spine like a banana. Its intentions to misuse this authority to reconstruct an India according to its ideology is clear now.

George Fernandes, MP from Samyukta Socialist Party

One thing is clear: In this country, the Congress is losing when it comes to a clash of viewpoints, which is why the party wants to take shelter under such laws, which are slowly eroding democratic principles in this country...

You speak of integration but which party in this country is working to end the integration of this country? If you want to apply a test here, then look at the economic policies of your party over the past 20 years, the policies regarding development. If there is a state of disintegration in the land, then these policies are to blame.

We are afraid that these laws are steps which will completely end democracy in this country.

I believe that this government and this party will never hand over power based on the popular mandate. This law is brought here in preparation for that — when everything else goes out of their hands, then they will use these laws to declare other political parties illegal and hold onto power forever. We condemn these fascist tendencies and oppose these laws totally.

G Viswanathan, MP from the DMK

Dictatorship comes to a country through a military junta or by a revolution. But this is a unique occasion where democracy marches towards dictatorship by passing legislation. This legislation is going to be a weapon in the hands of the Congress Party to fight other political parties.

The enactment of this legislation means that the Congress Party is not prepared to fight other political parties at the political level. They are going to use this Black Act to fight other political parties with a legal weapon. They are not going to fight them with political weapons. Whichever party crosses the path of the Congress or its interests, they are going to declare it unlawful. These drastic powers are being given to the Government and they are going to pass this bill for that purpose.

Erasmo De Sequeira, MP from United Goans Party

If you convict the people and jail them, you send them in as agitators and they come out as heroes.

Why are the people backing these organisations? They are backing them, if such organisations exist, because there is hunger in this country, because there is frustration, because there is poverty, because there is insecurity. If you want this movement to stop, then you have to solve the problem politically and not by banning or sending to jail or things like that.

Piloo Mody, MP from the Swatantra Party

I am ashamed of this Government, I am ashamed of this country; I am ashamed because I find that my Government, and it is mine as well as it is theirs, has to resort to these low means to arm themselves with such sweeping powers without once having defined or justified why they want to arm themselves with these powers. Sir, I would like to warn this Government that they will be here only for another year or two, at the very most four. Let the ruling party realise that the same Act will be on the statute-books and the same Act may someday be used against them

Nath Pai, MP from Praja Socialist Party

This is too wide a power that the executive is arming itself with. There are two constant diseases from which this government suffers: an incredible greed for power and its total incompetence to use the power it has. So it constantly goes on seeking more powers for its armoury.

Will the baton of the police be the final guardian of the liberties, freedom and unity of this country? Can we trust the police to be the only fighter for the delicate fabric of our democracy? If there are dangers in this country, has the Congress made up its mind that it cannot trust the people of India. If they can trust the people of India, there was not an iota of necessity for this Bill.

The danger is, often the danger to the Congress Party is made synonymous with the danger to the country. If we disagree with the Congress immediately it is regarded by the Congress spokesmen and protagonists as a danger to the unity of India, to the fabric of freedom. It is not so.

There are enough powers with the Government of India to combat all the dangers that may be either to territorial integrity or freedom or democracy of India. Some of us are very alarmed at how this Party tries to throttle any opposition to the party by pretending that opposition aimed at Congress is to the State of India. State and the Party are totally different things.

I have a thousand quarrels with Shri Chavan, but I have no quarrel with my country. When I attack Congress I do not attack India.

Y B Chavan, Home Minister, Congress

The police have to be used, because no government can function without police. I am not living in that sort of paradise to believe that the government can run its administration without police or the army at all. I believe in the police. The police is certainly useful, inevitable, a necessary instrument to be made use of; but. it has to be made under the law. It is to be used for the establishment of law. That is why I have come to this House. And I know that when I ask for extraordinary powers. I must plead from the beginning till the end why these powers are necessary in the interest of democracy and in the interest of the sovereignty and integrity of this country.

But even with stability there must be some sort of dynamism. When the world is changing we will have to change and if there are elements which come in the way of change in a manner which is dangerous to the stability, sovereignty and integrity of this country, certainly the instrument of law will have to be used. This is why I came to this House to have this Instrument.

Niren Ghosh, Rajya Sabha MP from CPM

“The cession of a part of the territory of India from the Union, or which incites any individual or group of...” You can import any meaning into this wording, whatever you like. It is like a rubber that can be pulled or stretched to any length. Whatever meaning you want to import, you can do that. That is precisely why they have kept it a little vague in order to do whatever they please at their sweet will.

Though the amendment, as the hon. Minister said, seeks to put reasonable restrictions, this Bill seeks to arm the Government with almost fascist powers and complete annulment of the rights and powers and freedom of speech guaranteed in the Constitution. As such it is unconstitutional and ultra vires the Constitution and the House should not take it into consideration.