“New POSA Will Allow ED To Quell Protests Using The Army”
25 April 2019
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1. Acc to s213 of the Constitution, the President’s power to deploy the army is to be exercised ‘subject to the Constitution’. The Bill violates freedom of assembly & freedom to demonstrate peacefully (s58 & s59) as s8 allows the reg authority to prohibit a gathering or demo. https://t.co/sIMlPOmLwE
2. What this means is that if a peaceful demonstration or gathering is planned but the regulating authority does not want it to go ahead (eg for political purposes), the President can authorize the deployment of the army to quell the demonstration.
3. The reg authority has no power to take away a Constitutional right – see s2. Crucially, the President should not have the power to deploy the army to suppress a peaceful mass gathering or demonstration. This is exactly what the gripe with POSA has been all along.
