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Vaiko arrested under POTA

· Chennai

Vaiko arrested under POTA
Rajsankar, CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons

MDMK leader Vaiko was arrested under the Prevention of Terrorism Act for a speech supporting the LTTE and spent over a year and a half in jail.

The Tamil Nadu police arrested Vaiko, general secretary of the Marumalarchi Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (POTA) over a speech in which he expressed support for the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam. He was held in Vellore jail for about a year and a half before being released on bail. The case became a national debate on the use of anti-terror laws against political speech. POTA was repealed by Parliament in 2004.

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