"E-mail authors identified, claim police," read the headlines of an article in The Hindu newspaper, in which, the Rajasthan police claimed that the terror e-mail which was sent by the Indian Mujahideen to media houses a day after the 13 May serial blasts in Jaipur was authored by Abu Bashir and Tauqeer alias Abdul Sudhan (allegedly involved in the Ahmedabad blasts as well). The article went on to describe that the police have identified four individuals from Kota who were suspected of taking part in the activities of the banned Student Islamic Movement of India (SIMI).

SIMI, which is a well-known fundamentalist student Muslim organization, has become very prominent lately, but, unfortunately for all the wrong reasons. SIMI was founded in 1977 at Aligarh, Uttar Pradesh. It is known to be an organization that despises secular ideology and would like to establish India as an Islamic State. SIMI was banned in 2001 during the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government at the centre, which itself is well-known for its affiliation with right-wing Hindu institutions also allegedly responsible for terror activities in India. The allegation was that it (SIMI) incites hatred between religious communities and was thereby destroying the 'peaceful harmony' between the communities as indicted under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act of 1967. The ban was re-imposed for the second time from September 2003 to September 2005, after the first ban period came to an end. The ban was imposed for a third time on 8 February 2006 after a four-month gap.

However, many scholars believe that, if, SIMI was banned under such allegations by the police and the government, then the same should apply to Hindu fundamentalist outfits, like the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), Bajrang Dal, Shiv Sena, and so on since they too incite hatred between communities as can be established by the comments and speeches made by the Shiv Sena Supremo, Bal Thackeray, and the VHP's International General Secretary, Praveen Togadia.

Regarding the cases registered against the individuals, Jawahar Raja, a counsel for SIMI, explains that, to charge an individual involves three steps - first, establishing the fact that the act or the event happened; second, that the person had some link with the act, and third, some link with SIMI. However, beyond just stating that these cases have been registered, the government has done nothing. When asked about the so-called "confessions" that the government was bandying about, that supposedly established links between SIMI and unlawful activities, Jawahar adds that the confessions do not have any legal validity for the reason that the law does not accept the use of torture and abuse of police power. Therefore, confessions to the police are not admissible in a court of law. And merely presenting the confessions is of no legal effect.

Even if one considers that the men arrested had some links to Indian Mujahideen one cannot associate the views of these men, necessarily to those of SIMI. One of the pre-requisites to be a SIMI member is that the person should be under 30 years of age. Hence, these men who have been arrested have long been disassociated from SIMI in terms of its requirements. The organization cannot be held responsible nor can it be held accountable for the acts of its ex-members even if they were to be proved.

The alleged links to SIMI of the individuals arrested by the police on different occasions for terror activities are yet to be proven. One has to bear in mind the effects of such accusations on an organization which already has a strong fundamentalist approach. In most cases, acts like these would only push these people, who despise the system to the fringes of society causing them to lose all faith in the system and leading them to still more radical approaches. One should have an active dialogue rather than shunning them from society and branding them as terrorists since this will lead nowhere. Tarnishing a religious outfit would not yield any favorable outcome with that particular religious community either. With Bajrang Dal activists going on the rampage destroying Christian religious institutions and physically abusing people from other religions, the government by not trying to control these inhumane acts and instead accusing other religious outfits of terrorism is not helping the system either.

What kind of message does a government with such double standards send to the people.