A separate body is being set up at the home ministry to spearhead India’s counter-terrorism efforts drawing upon resources of nearly two dozen security agencies as part of a plan unveiled by home minister P. Chidambaram.
It will be called the National Counter-Terrorism Centre (NCTC),
loosely based on western models specially as in the US, and will be part of the home ministry. The same blueprint proposes the hiving off the home ministry’s non-security functions such as examining state legislations and human rights.
“The home minister should devote the whole of his/her time and energy to matters relating to security,” said Chidambaram at the 22nd Intelligence Bureau Centenary Endowment lecture on Wednesday.
The architecture very simply is this: bring under one roof India’s counter-terrorism apparatus — the home ministry, which must be left unencumbered to deal only with matters related to security.
This would institutionalise an arrangement put together by Chidambaram after he took charge of the ministry following the Mumbai attacks – of daily meetings with security agencies including the Research & Analysis Wing that reports to the Prime Minister to share and act on intelligence.
Post-Mumbai, it was felt that India failed to prevent the attacks not because of lack of intelligence, but for not reacting to available information, which was very specific.
Listing out the security agencies, the minister said, “There is no single authority to which these organisations report and there is no unified command which can issue directions to these agencies.” The Intelligence Bureau reports to the home ministry, the Research and Analysis Wing reports to the PM, the Joint Intelligence Committee and National Technical Research Organisation and the Aviation Research Centre to National Security Adviser M.K. Narayanan.
“The positioning of R&AW, ARC and CBI (which also reports to the Prime Minister through the department of personnel) 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,” said Chidambaram.
The minister said he realises this “bold, thorough and radical restructuring ” is not going to be easy. But he said, “It is my fervent plea that this should not result in turf wars.” “India cannot afford to wait for 36 months (that it took the US to set up its own counter-terrorism centre – see box),” said Chidambaram.
He plans to have it up and running by 2010 end.