THE Public Safety (Special Provision) Amendment Bill which the Home Minister moved in the Parliament on Sunday and the oppositionless House promptly sent to the relevant standing committee for its scrutiny, sounds worse than the original Act. The fundamental safeguard against any abuse of the PSA which lay in section 13 (5) of the law is being dropped from the Act altogether. It provided for criminal prosecution against wilful lapses, or dereliction of duty or Ineptitude on the part of any police official conducting Investigation or initiating a case under the law. What is being prescribed now is a mere departmental action against the official concerned which trlviallses the concern over the law, almost to a point oi ridiculing it. It may lead to shielding an offending functionary. to say nothing of providing an opening for an excessive use of power by the police on top of other strong clauses like section 54 and those of the Special Powers Act being In the hands of the law enforcers. The real danger comes from the fact that with the deletion of the provision for criminal prosecution of wrongdoing police officials political abuse of the law will be indulged in. even openly encouraged. *

When the Public Safety Bill was first brought to the fore by the government it met with instant public outcry, opposition criticism and stridency from the Jurist community on the ground that it infringed on the fundamental rights of the people as embodied in our Constitution. The express fear was that it could be applied to satisfy political or personal vendetta. On the other hand, the government's selling point against all this was the provision for criminal prosecution of police officials found guilty of any abuse of the law. The proposed removal of that safety-valve basically confirms the widely held suspicion about the possible draconian use of the law. If we had regarded it as a dubious superfluity earlier on in view of the existence of the Penal Code which could take care of the offences sought to be combatted by the new law. It is now completely devoid of any raison detre whatsoever after the amendment proposal. More so because this is not an amendment the President had visualised when he assented to the bill subject to an understanding that an ordinance would be passed to remove 'some objectionable' features of it. This amounts to a breach of commitment. The PSA better be withdrawn.