Govt extends LTTE ban for 5 years

New Delhi: The Centre on Tuesday extended the ban on Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) for another five years as per provisions of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act. India had banned the LTTE after the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi in 1991 and it was last extended for five years in 2014.

According to the home ministry notification the main objective to the terror outfit is to fight for a separate homeland or a Tamil Eelam for all Tamils.The LTTE’s continued violent and disruptive activities are prejudicial to the integrity and sovereignty of India, it said. “The group continues to adopt a strong anti-India posture and also continues to pose a grave threat to the security of Indian nationals,” the notification adds.

The home ministry claimed that despite the military defeat in May, 2009 in Sri Lanka, LTTE has not abandoned the concept of ‘Eelam’ and has been clandestinely working towards this cause by undertaking fund raising and propaganda activities, and the remnant LTTE leaders or cadres have also initiated efforts to regroup the scattered activists and resurrect the outfit locally and internationally.

It will ultimately have a strong disintegrating influence over the territorial integrity of India, hence, the strong need continues to exist to control all such separatist activities by all possible lawful means, the notification said. The home ministry claimed that the cases were registered under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act 1967, against LTTE, pro-LTTE elements and chauvinist groups between May 2014 and May 2019 besides cases under the provisions of Explosive Substances Act 1908 and IPC.The diaspora continue to spread amongst the Sri Lankan Tamils by holding Indian government  responsible for defeat of the LTTE and such propaganda through Internet.