Withdrawal from mass arrest

The government has cried a halt to its mass arrest campaign. But, we believe, the damage has already been done in terms of enormity of public suffering, our democratic image, and governance credibility. Still, to the extent sanity has prevailed, there would be a sigh of relief. The immediate need, however, is to alleviate the suffering of the huge number of innocent youngsters who remain in captivity. They would have to be relieved of their trauma by a fast-track release operation.

The dramatic announcement betrays a certain lack of conviction, though. The reason why we say this is because there is still an attempt to justify the mass arrest already made. The need for continuing with the sweeping raid ended because 'a conspiracy' hatched to topple the government by April 30, has been 'foiled', thanks to the mass arrest -- that seems to be the perception in the home ministry. In other words, the winding up of the operation is hardly the product of any spontaneous self-realisation. Actually, the government had to retrace its steps in the face of relentless media exposes, raging public consternation, and under intense pressure from civil society and human rights groups. That the government at last paid heed to criticism is some consolation provided the recourse taken to mass arrest in not repeated.

Our paramount concern is now for the multitudes of young people languishing in police stations and jail houses. They are crammed in places scarcely enough to accommodate even one-sixth of the arrested victims. As a result, they are having to squat without sleep, thoroughly famished and terribly weakened; dehydrating without any water to drink and sickened from lack of minimal toilet facilities. The paperwork should be completed immediately to release them en masse on a timetable announced to the public at once so that their relatives are relieved of their anxieties.

Basically, somebody must be held responsible for the mass arrest that rocked the nation's sensibilities violently. Whose decision was it -- the cabinet's, the PMO's, the home ministry's, or any other adjunct to power? People would like to know where it went wrong and see some heads roll for it.