Children's parliament held to mark 53 yrs of AFSPA
Source: Hueiyen News Service
Imphal, May 22 2011:
It has been 53 years, since the Armed Forces (Special) Power Act came into being.
To mark the entering of the 54th year, the Just for Peace Foundation organized a 'parliament for the children' at the conference hall of Hotel Imphal today.
The children's parliament was composed of ruling and opposition benches and the agenda 'time has come to remove AFSPA' was tabled for discussion.
Seven students represented the ruling members of the parliament which was conducted by former member of the Manipur Human Rights Commission, Yambem Laba as speaker while only one student represented the opposition bench.
However, the parliament passed a declaration to scrap AFSPA.
The Just Peace Foundation organized the parliament as part of marking the 53 years completion of AFSPA.
The Act came into being as an executive ordinance on May 22, 1958 even though it was passed on September 11, 1958 by the Parliament of India.
The Act conferred special powers to the armed forces in what the language of the act calls "disturbed areas" in the states of Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland and Tripura.
It was later extended to Jammu and Kashmir as the Armed Forces (Jammu and Kashmir) Special Powers Act, 1990 in July 1990 .
The programme was part of the commencement of a series of awareness programme on AFSPA throughout the country which would be conducted till August of this current year, said human rights activist, Babloo Loitongbam.
The awareness series is to be organized by Just Peace foundation in association with other human rights bodies, Union for Civil Liberty, National Alliance for People with support of other civil societies.
Discussions and staging dramas depicting extra-judicial killings, illegal detention, rape, torture, etc.
by the security in the name of counter insurgency operation in the state where the Act is in force will be the main theme of the campaign, he added.
"Whether we are going to live under this draconian law for another 50 years," asked human rights activists who converged to attend the parliament of children.
Babloo Loitongbam observed that hundreds of ordinary citizens have been victims of the draconian Act.
The act is a symbol of oppression since extra-judicial killings, illegal detention, rape, torture, has become a routine.
Security forces which are supposed to protect life, liberty and dignity of the people has become a thing of hate and an instrument of discrimination and high handedness under the Act, he said.
When the draconian law completes its 53th year of enactment today, the youth of today need to discuss the pros and cons of the Act.
Elders of today who have experienced the ordeal of the Act for the last half century need to share with today's youth their sufferings under the Act, he went on to observe.
Other rights activists said that it is the duty of everybody including those from mainland India to join hands with the oppressed demanding scrapping of AFSPA.
The time has come to join Irom Chanu Sharmila, who has been on a fast demanding scrapping of the Act for the last 10 years.
"AFSPA must go now.
Enough is enough," they demanded.
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