Newsroom Staff

New Delhi: Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar today informed the Rajya Sabha that no Armed Forces personnel serving in areas notified as “disturbed areas: under the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, 1958 have been prosecuted during the last three years.

The Defence Minister in a written reply, in response to a query by Avinash Pandey of Congress party also said that no prosecutions have been initiated for offences under Section 64, sub-sections (a) and (f) of the Army Act, 1950 during the last three years.

Sub section (a) of Section 64 of the Army Act covers any person subject to this Act who is in command at any post or on the march, and receiving a complaint that any one under his command has beaten or otherwise maltreated or oppressed any person, or has disturbed any fair or market, or committed any riot or trespass, fails to have due reparation made to the injured person or to report the case to the proper authority.

Sub-section (f) of Section 64 of Army Act concerns any person subject to this Act who commits any offence against the property or person of any inhabitant of, or resident in, the country in which he is serving; shall, on conviction by court- martial, be liable to suffer imprisonment for a term which may extend to seven years.

The Defence Minister’s reply blasts allegations of rape by Army personnel in Kashmir. The sedition accused Jawaharlal Nehru University student leader Kanhaiya Kumar after his release on conditional bail recently had accused the Army of committing rapes in Kashmir while addressing students in the JNU campus.