The Supreme Court on Monday extended its interim order continuing the ban on SIMI [Images] for another six weeks as the hearing on the Centre's petition challenging the decision of a Special Tribunal to lift curbs imposed on the organisation remained inconclusive.

"The matter is important. We are ready to hear it," a Bench headed by Chief Justice K G Balakrishan said after an hour-long hearing.

"We are extending the stay on the Tribunal's order by another six weeks," the Bench, also comprising Justice P Sathasivam, said and posted the matter for further hearing on September 24 asking the Centre to place before it the synopsis of arguments and other documents in support of its stand to ban Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI).

The apex court's interim order extending the ban on SIMI was opposed by Dr Shahid Badr, who was the President of the outfit till September 27, 2001 when the Centre had come out with its first notification to declare it as an proscribed organisation. Advocate Kamini Jaiswal, who was countering the arguments of the Centre, clarified that at present no advocate was appearing for the banned organisation and she was standing only for Badr.

However, when Additional Solicitor General Gopal Subramanium was contending that the Tribunal had gone wrong in lifting the ban, Jaiswal questioned the stay granted by the apex court raising technical grounds. She said the stay was granted a day after the tribunal passed the order when even the Special Leave Petition (SLP) was not filed by the Centre.

However, Subramanium said the stay was obtained after urgent mentioning was made before the Bench and the advocate who had filed the SLP on behalf of the Centre had informed Badr's counsel about it but he had refused to accept the petition.

The ASG further said even in the tribunal nobody appeared for the SIMI.

The Centre, which has alleged involvement of SIMI in subversive and anti-national activities including the recent

blasts in Ahmedabad [Images] in Gujarat, contended that the Tribunal failed to appreciate the 'background note', 'cabinet note' and 'intelligence reports' before arriving at its decision to lift the ban on the organisation.

This argument was opposed by Jaiswal who said the tribunal had gone into all these three aspects and was of the view that the averments in them were not supported by evidence and deposition of government witnesses.

She said the background note of Centre's February 7, 2008 notification extending the ban on SIMI till 2010, which was placed before the tribunal in a sealed cover, spoke about nine cases involving its members who were already acquitted after facing trial in the courts.

Jaiswal said the background note was not supported by the deposition of Centre's witnesses.

However, the court said "the background note can be a general statement while issuing the notification".

"The background note is only a synopsis which could be substantiated in future," the Bench observed.

 Differing with it, Jaiswal said tribunal can only go into the validity of the notification which has to be based on the documents available at the time of issuing it and no subsequent documents could be considered for justification.

"Technically the tribunal found the notification invalid," she said.

However, the Bench said the tribunal order at two or three places considered the material placed by the Centre.

The ASG said the Centre had given details about the July 2006 Mumbai train serial blasts to support its allegation of involvement of members of SIMI which was ignored by the tribunal.

 "Our concern is that the tribunal should have discussed the merits of these deposition," he said referring to the deposition of 77 witnesses who were officials of the Centre and state governments.

The ASG said the tribunal set up under the Unlawful Activities (prevention) Act, in its 263-page order has not expressed anything on the merits of the case even when the government has provided Intelligence Bureau reports pointing towards members of SIMI indulging in terrorist activities.

"Being a group of students and youth, SIMI is easily influenced by hardcore Muslim terrorist organizations operating from Jammu and Kashmir [Images]. Hizb-ul-Mujahideen and Lashker-e-Toiba have successfully penetrated into SIMI cadre

to achieve their goals," the petition said.

Subramanium objected to the tribunal's order which said that it was not going into the merits of the case, saying it was the merit which was to be gone into.

The tribunal headed by Delhi [Images] High Court judge Justice Geeta Mittal on August 5 had lifted the ban on SIMI saying no new evidence was placed against the organisation to justify the ban.