Rajasthan tables Disturbed Areas Bill to curb ‘improper clustering’; offences non-bailable with up to 5-year jail term

Last month, Law Minister Jogaram Patel had said: “In many areas of our state, the widespread impact of increasing population of a particular community, demographic imbalance, communal tension, and a lack of public harmony has been seen in society for quite some time”.

“In particular areas, riots, mob violence, and unrest are created; and many long-time residents are even forced to sell their assets at throwaway prices,” he had said.

The Bill says “‘improper clustering of persons of one community’ means concentration or congregation of persons of a community in any locality or area arising from coercive, distress-driven, or otherwise unhealthy circumstances, or which causes or is likely to cause demographic imbalance, segregation, communal tension, or disturbance of public order, social harmony or the mixed-community character of the locality or area.”

An area may be declared a Disturbed Area if an “improper clustering” of persons of a community “has taken place or is likely to take place with the ill intention of disturbing the demographic equilibrium of persons of different communities residing in that area in a manner that mutual and peaceful coexistence among different communities may go haywire in that area.”

Violation of provisions of the Act will invite 3–5 years’ imprisonment as well as a minimum fine of Rs 1 lakh or 10 per cent of the fair value of the property, whichever is higher, and all offences under the Act would be non-bailable and cognisable.

An area may be notified as a disturbed area for a period of up to three years or the period specified in the notification, whichever is less, and in these areas no property may be transferred “except with the previous sanction of the competent authority.”

Notably, the proposed law will have retrospective effect. It says that in cases of transfers declared null and void, the seller has to refund the buyer within six months: if such a transfer was made before the commencement of the Act, the refund must be within six months from the date the Act comes into force; if made after enforcement, within six months from the date of transfer.

Moreover, the buyer will have to return the property to the transferor within six months.

The Bill also proposes a Monitoring and Advisory Committee which shall conduct or organise “studies in the disturbed areas to ascertain from time to time whether the proper clustering of persons of the community is maintained.”

The government will also have to constitute a Special Investigation Team for any area where a complaint of improper clustering is received, “comprising the competent authority, a police officer not below the rank of Assistant Police Commissioner or Deputy Superintendent of Police, as the case may be, and the Municipal Commissioner or Chief Executive Officer of the municipality concerned.”

Targeting the BJP government over the Bill, Congress state president Govind Singh Dotasra had said earlier that, “The BJP government is completely failing to maintain law and order. Instead of solving real problems, they are conspiring to incite riots and cover up their failures by bringing unconstitutional laws and speaking unconstitutional language.”

“We will fight on the streets as well as in the House. The BJP leaders, intoxicated with power, only want to rule irrespective of how much unrest the state descends into. They want to impose the Gujarat model of fear and terror on Rajasthan,” he had said, adding, “But they are forgetting that Rajasthan is the land of the brave. This is the land of Maharana Pratap, who never bowed down. Their evil intentions will never succeed here.”

Similar laws for the designation of disturbed areas were first passed in Punjab and Gujarat in 1983 and 1986, respectively. However, the application of the law eventually ceased in Punjab, with then Union Minister of State for Home Affairs Kiren Rijiju saying in 2016 that Punjab was not a disturbed area. “Punjab is no more under the Punjab Disturbed Areas Act and Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA), as the situation has improved,” he had said in a statement.

In August last year, the Assam Cabinet approved a standard operating protocol (SOP) to regulate the transfer of land between members of different religions, which included checks by the Special Branch of the Assam Police to examine “coercion” or illegality, the source of funds for the purchase, the potential effect on “social cohesion”, and “national security” implications.