New Delhi, Aug 14: A delegation of MPs from DMK, MDMK and PMK today urged the Pota review committee to declare the detention of MDMK leader Vaiko and eight other MDMK party functionaries under Pota by the Tamil Nadu government as "gross misuse and blatant abuse of the act" and sought their immediate release.
"Every individual and every political party has sympathised with and supported Eelam Tamils in Sri Lanka who have been subjected to untold atrocities and gruesome genocide at one time or the other. To accuse Vaiko as one to be supporting terrorism on the ground of his verbal support to the cause of Eelam Tamils is far-fetched and politically motivated", they said in a memorandum submitted to Justice Arun Sahariya, heading the committee.
Vaiko's speech had never abetted anyone to indulge in terrorism and therefore it did not attract Pota, they said adding that the Centre had given assurances that the act would not be misused and abused and yet Tamil Nadu had blatntly "misused and flagrantly abused" the act.
Citing the affidavit filed by the Centre in the Supreme Court on the issue, the memorandum said that the Centre had enacted Pota and so the stand of the enacting authority be valid and given more weight.
Members of the delegation are : M Kannappan, Gingee Ramachandran and C Krishnan (all MDMK), Kuppuswamy and Viduthalai Virumbi (DMK) and Ponnuswamy of PMK.
Bureau Report