Zeenews Bureau
New Delhi: In view of the threat of terrorist attacks within the country, Union Home Minister P Chidambaram on Wednesday recommended radical changes in the security apparatus of the country to boost India’s terror response.
Delivering Intelligence Bureau Centenary Endowment Lecture, Chidambaram said, “Twelve to thirteen terror attacks neutralised in 2009 which could have been like Mumbai or Delhi attacks. Sooner than you think, there might be another crisis like the hijack of IC-814 and we need to restructure the security apparatus to avert such tragedies.”
Stressing that such violence is mostly hurting civilians, the Home Minister proposed the formation of National Counter Terrorism Centre (NCTC) by the end of 2010 and suggested sweeping powers for it to be the nodal agency tackling terror in India.
"Such an organisation does not exist today and it has to be created from the scratch. I am told that the United States was able to do it within 36 months of September 11, 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," he said.
Giving details of the proposed NCTC, Chidambaram said, “NCTC should be setup under Home Ministry with a sweeping mandate with power to respond to all sorts of terror attacks.”
Outlining the new structure of the security apparatus, Chidambaram said, “All intelligence agencies viz. NIA, NTRO and NSG should come under NCTC.”
The NSG, he pointed, did not respond as swiftly as it should have.
Stressing that the restructuring is must for swift response to the terror attacks, Home Minister recommended that, “NCTC head will be responsible for all security and he should be someone with impeccable credentials.”
"While the nature of the response to different kinds of terror would indeed be different and nuanced, NCTC's mandate should be to respond to violence unleashed by any group – be it an insurgent group in the North East or the CPI (Maoist) in the heartland of India or any group of religious fanatics anywhere in India acting on their own or in concert with terrorists outside India..
"NCTC would, therefore, have to perform functions relating to intelligence, investigation and operations....But I am clear in my mind that, without 'operations', NCTC and the security architecture that is needed will be incomplete. It is the proposed 'operations' wing of the NCTC that will give an edge– now absent– to our plans to counter terrorism," he said.
He also said India needed more foot soldiers to fight terror as the response during 26/11 was inadequate. “We need to recruit 400,000 policemen. They all need to be well trained and equipped. Its better to have no policeman rather than having a bad one.”
Chidambaram also suggested bifurcation of his Home Ministry, saying subjects not directly related to internal security should be dealt with by a separate ministry.
"Subjects not directly related to internal security should be dealt with by a separate ministry or should be brought under a separate department in the MHA and dealt with by a minister, more or less independently, without referring every issue to the Home Minister.
"The Home Minister should devote the whole of his/her time and energy to matters relating to security," he said.
"There are other divisions or desks that deal with centre-state relations....disaster management, census etc. These are undoubtedly important functions and deserve close attention. However, internal security is an equally, if not more, important function that deserves the highest attention," he said.
‘Billion plus people felt humiliated after 26/11’
A billion plus people felt they
had been humiliated by the Mumbai terror attacks and the
country had been brought to its knees by a small band of
terrorists, Home Minister P Chidambaram said today.
"The security establishment was in disarray and numerous
questions were being asked," he said.
"Had the intelligence agencies failed? Did the first
responder, the Mumbai police, prove to be totally inadequate?
Was the famed National Security Guard too slow to get off the
block?
"Did the leadership of the police let down its men? Did
the security forces take too long to neutralise ten
terrorists? Did the Central and State Government fail to
provide strong leadership?" he said, delivering the
'Intelligence Bureau Centenary Endowment Lecture' here.
Summarising the situation as he found it on December 1,
last year, he said, "Two days after the terrorist attack in
Mumbai was repulsed - after paying a heavy price of 164 lives
- the nation was in shock and anger.
"Did the crisis management system collapse? Did the
country pay too heavy a price before it repulsed the terrorist
attack? Did the Government fail the people in not mounting a
swift counter-attack on the perpetrators of terror?
"These questions continue to haunt me and many others even
today. I think I have found the answers to some of these
questions, but I do not intend to fill this lecture with those
answers," he said.
First Published: Wednesday, December 23, 2009, 19:18