India extends ban on LTTE for five more years

New Delhi: The central government on Tuesday extended for five more years the ban on the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), a terror group that was behind the assassination of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi.

The ban has been extended under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967, a notification issued by the Union Home ministry stated.

India had banned the LTTE after the assassination of Gandhi in 1991. The ban on the group was last extended for five years in 2014.

The LTTE, a terror outfit based in Sri Lanka but has its supporters, sympathisers and agents in India, came up in 1976.

Its objective for a separate homeland (Tamil Eelam) for all Tamils threatens the sovereignty and territorial integrity of India, and amounts to cession and secession of a part of the territory of India from the Union and thus falls within the ambit of unlawful activities, the notification said.

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 said.

Even after its 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 fundraising 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, the Home Ministry said.

The separatist Tamil chauvinist groups and pro-LTTE groups continue to foster a separatist tendency amongst the masses and enhance the support base for LTTE in India and particularly in Tamil Nadu, it said.

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 said 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 Indian Penal Code, etc.

"The diaspora continue to spread through articles in the internet portals, anti-India feeling amongst the Sri Lankan Tamils by holding the government of India responsible for the defeat of the LTTE and such propaganda through Internet, which remains continued, is likely to impact Very Very Important Persons (VVIP) security adversely in India," the notification said.