Liaqat case, and a flawed idea of special courts for Muslims

It didn’t need the drama over the arrest of Liaqat Shah, who is caught in a tug-of-war between the Delhi Police and the Jammu and Kashmir government authorities over whether he was returning from Pakistan-occupied Kashmir to plot terror or start his life anew, to remind us of a problem in our security agencies’ response to terror attacks and conspiracies. The problem is this: anecdotal evidence of innocent people being framed or falsely implicated in terror cases is abnormally high. In Liaqat Shah’s case, even if one acknowledges that the truth of his circumstances is yet to be established, the two versions that have been trotted out are so widely contradictory that it is evident that one of them is a pack of lies. The Delhi Police stands by its claim that Liaqat Shah was returning from PoK via Nepal to India in order to unleash urban jihad in Delhi on the lines of the November 2008 attack on Mumbai.  But as _Firstpost_ has noted , the Delhi Police narrative is so full of holes that it is hard to take it seriously. Yet, their officials continue to trot out “incriminating evidence” that makes a mockery of their claim: the latest  they have is that Liaqat Shah had  known Hizh-ul-Mujahideen militants on speed dial on his mobile phone. Jammu and Kashmir authorities on the other hand insist that Liaqat Shah was returning with his family under a ‘rehabilitation’ scheme for reformed ‘militants’. If that version bears out as true - and Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde has promised an investigation by the National Intelligence Agency to establish that - it’s fair to say Liaqat Shah is being framed under false pretences. [caption id=“attachment_343596” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  The move to set up special courts to take up cases of innocent Muslims falsely implicated in terror cases is problematic. AFP[/caption] This is symptomatic of a larger problem of security agencies influencing investigations into terror cases with their own agenda - or, at any rate, of being less than professional. Far too often, the kneejerk response of police and investigating agencies is to round up the “usual suspects”. As Firstpost  has noted ( here   and here ), this has led, in many cases, to innocent Muslims being falsely implicated on terror charges. As happened in the Mecca Masjid blast case of 2007, the entire evidence against those who were arrested and had served jail term was a house of cards that collapsed in court. And yet, right after the blasts in Hyderabad in February this year, investigators were looking to round up the “usual suspects” again. The Union Home Ministry’s decision to set up special courts to conduct speedy trials in cases where innocent people are falsely implicated in terror cases is, therefore, not without intrinsic merit. Even given the challenges that security agencies face in investigating terror cases, falsely implicating  innocent people in terror cases is a perversion of the law. Even if, in the end, the courts acquit them and establish their innocence, nothing can take away from the injustice of being incarcerted in jail for years - and the taint of being branded for years as a suspected terrorist. The Home Minister has noted that arresting innocent people and keeping them in custody - knowing that they were innocent - is a serious a crime.  He has also promised strong action against officers responsible for such false cases. So far so good. But where the Union Home Ministry, or the Minority Affairs Ministry (which proposed the establishment of special courts), err is in limiting these proposed special courts to take on only the cases of innocent Muslims. Even if one acknowledges that the preponderance of such cases relate to innocent Muslims - and investigative reports in the media have established that beyond doubt ( here and  here and here) - a proposal to establish special courts for Muslims alone certainly tests the limits of constitutional propriety and makes for bad political optics. As this editorial points out, the intended special courts and the mechanisms that sustain them ought to be carefully thought through so that nothing transpires to boomerang on the good intent that underlies it. These courts “should be aimed primarily at clearing a backlog, not serve as a long-term prophylactic against future mis-steps by the law enforcement and investigating agencies.” And the intent of framing such a measure must be to catalyse administrative and police reform by ridding the system of social prejudice, and upgrading investigative procedures. Far too often, political considerations have led parties to embrace potentially unconstitutional positions as a quick-fix to address what are genuine problems in society. That way only lies ruin, and the possibility that a flawed approach can undermine the larger objective. Constitutional propriety demands that special courts that take up the cases of innocent people arrested on false charges in terror cases should be blind to the religious background of the falsely accused. By narrowing the focus in the way it proposes to, the government is guilty of the same social prejudic that investigators and law-enforcement agencies stand accused of.