New Delhi: More than three dozen mass and democratic organisations in Punjab came together at a convention in Jalandhar on July 21 to oppose the recently implemented criminal codes and the sanction given by the Lieutenant Governor of Delhi to prosecute Arundhati Roy and Professor Sheikh Showkat Hussain under the UAPA.

“We must not harbour any illusion about the present government being weak. It will be in an offensive mode more than what it was in its earlier avatar. On the other hand, Arundhati Roy symbolises how to struggle, write, speak and smile in difficult times. The powers that be fear only this smile and the people’s struggles,” said veteran journalist Bhasha Singh, speaking at the event.

“Arundhati Roy is the voice of these struggles; and the government is terror-stricken because of this voice. That is why she is being implicated in criminal cases. If the opposition would not raise its voice against such injustices, the people would also not care about it,” said Veteran journalist Bhasha Singh, speaking at the event,” Singh added.

The convention was addressed by professor Jagmohan Singh, President of the Association for Democratic Rights, Rajinder Bhadaur, Organising Secretary of Rationalist Society, and advocates N.K. Jeet and Daljeet Singh besides Bhasha Singh.

Professor Jagmohan Singh pierced through the claims of the central government that the new criminal codes have come out of the hegemonic shadow of the colonial laws and discerned in them the spirit of the infamous Rowlatt act.

Their real intent is to turn the Indian state into a police raj, he said.