India declares Muslim organization PFI 'unlawful'

By Ahmad Adil

NEW DELHI (AA) - The Indian government has declared the Popular Front of India (PFI) and its affiliates an "unlawful association" with immediate effect for five years, according to a gazette notification issued Wednesday.

The action against the Muslim organization under a stringent terror law comes after police carried out raids across several states and arrested dozens of its members for alleged terror links.

The government accuses the PFI of having links with “terrorist” outfits, a charge denied by the organization.

The organization, formed in 2006, calls itself a "neo-social movement that strives for the empowerment of marginalized sections of India."

The gazette notification declared the PFI and its eight affiliated organizations an “unlawful association" under India's Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act.

"The central government...is of firm opinion that it is necessary to declare the PFI and its associates or affiliates or fronts as an unlawful association with immediate effect," the gazette notification said, adding the notification would "have effect for a period of five years from the date of its publication in the official gazette."

Stating that the group has "become a major threat to the internal security of the country," the government said in the notification that "the PFI and its associates or affiliates or fronts have been involved in violent terrorist activities with an intent to create a reign of terror in the country."

The notification also said "the state governments of Uttar Pradesh, Karnataka and Gujarat have recommended to ban the PFI."

It noted that "there had been a number of instances of international linkages of the PFI with global terrorist groups like the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria" and the group raises funds from within India and abroad as part of a "well-crafted criminal conspiracy to project them as legitimate and eventually using these funds to carry out various criminal, unlawful and terrorist activities in India."

On Tuesday, after security agencies conducted raids again in several parts of the country against the organization’s members, including in the capital New Delhi, the PFI in a statement said the raids intended to "generate terror."

It said the raids are an attempt to generate a "feeling of terror" among people about the Popular Front of India, which it said is a "legally and transparently functioning organization."

"We urge the secular, democratic political parties, organizations and citizens to come forward and raise their voices against the undemocratic and unjust witch hunt against the Popular Front of India," the statement said.