PFI challenges Centre’s five-year ban on it by UAPA tribunal in SC

New Delhi: The Popular Front of India (PFI) has moved the Supreme Court against an Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) tribunal confirming the five-year ban imposed on it by the central government.

A bench of Justices Aniruddha Bose and Bela M Trivedi, which was scheduled to hear the plea, adjourned the matter saying the petitioner has circulated a letter for adjournment.

In its petition, the PFI has challenged the March 21 order of the UAPA tribunal by which it had confirmed the September 27, 2022 decision of the Centre.

The Centre had banned the PFI for five years for its alleged links with global terrorist organisations such as ISIS and trying to spread communal hatred in the country.

It had declared as “unlawful association” the PFI and its associates or affiliates or fronts, including Rehab India Foundation (RIF), Campus Front of India (CFI), All India Imams Council (AIIC), National Confederation of Human Rights Organisation, National Women’s Front, Junior Front, Empower India Foundation and Rehab Foundation, Kerala. More than 150 people allegedly linked to the PFI were detained or arrested in raids across seven states in September last year.

A pan-India crackdown by agencies against the 16-year-old group had led to the arrest of over a hundred of its activists and seizure of several dozen properties. The Ministry of Home Affairs said some of the PFI’s founding members are the leaders of the Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI), and the PFI has linkages with Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB).