Indian Homeland Security News and Updates

Chidambaram proposes an overhaul of India's internal security system

(Source - domain-b.com)

Union home minister P Chidambaram has proposed the setting up of a National Counter Terrorism Centre (NCTC) as part of a radical restructuring of the country's security architecture.

Delivering the 22nd Intelligence Bureau Centenary Endowment Lecture in New Delhi today, the minister said India must be able to set up the National Counter Terrorism Centre by the end of 2010.
The NCTC must have the broad mandate to deal with all kinds of terrorist violence, directed against the country and its people, he said.

"The duties of NCTC will include preventing a terrorist attack, containing a terrorist attack should one take place, and responding to a terrorist attack by inflicting pain upon the perpetrators. Such an organisation does not exist today. It has to be created from scratch. I am told that the United States was able to do it within 36 months of 11 September 2001. India cannot afford to wait for 36 months. India must decide now to go forward and India must succeed in setting up the NCTC by the end of 2010," Chidambaram said.

Once NCTC is set up, it must have the broad mandate to deal with all kinds of terrorist violence directed against the country and the people. All intelligence agencies would have to be represented in the NCTC.

Some agencies like NIA, NTRO, JIC, NCRB and the NSG would naturally have to be brought under NCTC. The positioning of R&AW, ARC and CBI would have to be re-examined and a way would have to be found to place them under the oversight of NCTC to the extent that they deal with terrorism.

The intelligence agencies of the ministry of defence and the ministry of finance would continue to remain under the respective ministry, but their representatives would have to be deputed mandatorily to the NCTC.

Given the overarching responsibility of NCTC and its mandate, it must be headed by a highly qualified professional with vast experience in security related matters.

At the government level, and in order to be accountable to parliament, it would be logical and natural to place the NCTC under the ministry of home affairs.

The home minister also suggested restructuring of the ministry of home affairs and said that the home minister should devote the whole of his time and energy to matters relating to security.

He said the states and union territories together had a sanctioned strength of 1,746,215 policemen as of 1 January 2008. Against that number, only 1,478,888 policemen were in place. There are 13,057 police stations and 7,535 police posts in the country. The ratio of available police to per 100,000 people for the whole country is about 130. The international average is about 270.

"The first step, therefore, in devising a new security system in the country is to recruit more policemen and policewomen. In my estimate, states would have to recruit over 400,000 constables this year and in the next two years in order to fill the vacancies and in order to provide for expansion of the police forces," the minister said.

The central government, he said, is implementing an ambitious scheme called "Crime and Criminal Tracking Network System (CCTNS)." The goals of the system are to facilitate collection, storage, retrieval, analysis, transfer and sharing of data and information at the police station and between the police station and the state headquarters and the central police organisations, he added.

Greater emphasis should be given to intelligence-gathering for fighting insurgency or insurrection or terror and it is, therefore, important that state governments adopt "community policing" and establish a toll-free service under which a citizen can provide information or lodge a complaint.

He proposed the setting up of more police stations and recruiting more constables - some exclusively for gathering intelligence - a system of community policing, a toll-free police service, and a network to store, retrieve and access data relating to crimes and criminals.
 
At the district and state levels, the home minister said, the `Special Branch' is the key to better intelligence and more intelligence-based operations. There should be at least one police officer in each police station exclusively for intelligence gathering.

Quick response teams must be positioned in every district capital and in important towns. Commando units must be raised and placed at different locations. He said the centre is supporting and funding the conversion of two companies of selected IR battalions into commando units.

A special anti-terrorist unit should be created at the state level to preempt terrorist activities and investigate terrorist crimes. While states have begun to take steps on these matters, the pace is still slow, he pointed out.

"I, therefore, propose a bold, thorough and radical restructuring of the security architecture at the national level," he said.

The present intelligence architecture consists of political, administrative, intelligence and enforcement elements. At the political level, there is the Cabinet Committee on Security. The administrative element is the ministry of home affairs, the prime minister's office and the cabinet secretariat.

The Intelligence Bureau reports to the home minister; the Research and Analysis Wing, which falls under the cabinet secretariat, reports to the prime minister; the Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC), the National Technical Research Organisation (NTRO) and the Aviation Research Centre (ARC) report to the National Security Adviser. There is also the National Security Council Secretariat under the NSA, which serves the National Security Council.

The armed forces have their own intelligence agencies, one each under the Army, Navy and the Air Force and an umbrella body called the Defence Intelligence Agency.  There are other agencies, which specialise in financial intelligence. These are the Directorates in the Income Tax, Customs and Central Excise departments, the Financial Intelligence Unit, and the Enforcement Directorate.  The enforcement element of this architecture consists of the central para-military forces such as CRPF, BSF, CISF, ITBP, Assam Rifles, SSB and the NSG.

"There is no single authority to which these organisations report and there is no single or unified command which can issue directions to these agencies and bodies," Chidambaram pointed out.

In order to remedy the deficiency of a data grid, the central government has decided to set up NATGRID. Under NATGRID, 21 sets of databases will be networked to achieve quick, seamless and secure access to desired information for intelligence/enforcement agencies. This project is likely to be completed in 18 - 24 months from now.

Two more projects will commence early next year. The first is the Business Process Re-engineering of the Foreigners Division at a cost of about Rs20 crore. The second is the more ambitious Mission Mode Project on Immigration, Visa and Foreigners' Registration and Tracking with the objective of creating a secure and integrated service delivery framework for facilitating legitimate travellers and strengthening security. The scheme will network 169 missions, 77 ICPs, 5 FRROs and over 600 FROs with the Central Foreigners' Bureau. It is estimated to cost Rs1,011 crore, but the rub is it is slated to be implemented over a period of four and a half years. He said the project needs to be put on a fast track and completed within 24 months.

While the security meeting held every day under the chairmanship of the home minister with the NSA, home secretary, secretary (R&AW), DIB, chairman of JIC, and special secretary (IS) have helped to bring about better coordination in all aspects of intelligence gathering, analysing and acting upon the intelligence, "it has not increased our capacity to pre-empt or prevent a terrorist threat or attack has been enhanced significantly," the minister added.

"It is this assessment which leads me to argue that the security architecture at the top must be thoroughly and radically restructured," Chidambaram said.
 
The ministry of home affairs now performs a number of functions that have no direct relation to internal security.  While all these may be necessary functions of the state,  internal security is an equally, if not more, important function that deserves the highest attention.  "In my view, given the imperatives and the challenges of the times, a division of the current functions of the ministry of home affairs is unavoidable."

The home minister should devote the whole of his/her time and energy to matters relating to security, he said.