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"The government has granted in principle
approval for the MHA's (ministry of home affairs)
proposal to set up (the National Counter-Terrorism
Centre)," Chidambaram told reporters here.
The plan to set up the terror-related intelligence
hub, which had been opposed by many ministries,
was given the go-ahead in a Cabinet Committee
on Security (CCS) meeting chaired by Prime Minister
Manmohan Singh here.
The agency, worked out on the model of the US'
National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC), is aimed
at combating terrorism by collecting and analysing
threats, sharing the inputs and information with
other agencies and converting these into actionable
data.
The counter-terrorism agency will be a separate
body under the control of the ministry of home
affairs.
Chidambaram said the government will soon appoint
its head, an additional director general-level
police officer, and other officials who will form
the core team of the agency. The NCTC will report
to the union home secretary.
The full NCTC team consisting of officers drawn
from intelligence, security agencies and state
police would be formed after getting clearance
for funds, the home ministry said.
He said the NCTC would be the nodal agency for
all counter-terrorism activities of the government
and the Multi-Agency Centre (MAC) of the Intelligence
Bureau will be subsumed into it.
It would have to coordinate with agencies such
as the Intelligence Bureau (IB), the Research
and Analysis Wing (R&AW), the Joint Intelligence
Committee (JIC) and state intelligence agencies,
the sources said.
Chidambaram had floated the idea to set up the
NCTC after the 26/11 Mumbai terror attack in 2008.
Intelligence agencies and state police had complained
in the aftermath of the Mumbai attacks that sharing
of information among them was one of the biggest
worries.
Despite intelligence inputs given prior to the
attack, the Mumbai police had said the information
was not good enough for them to act upon.
In the wake of this complaint and also because
there was no agency to integrate the inputs, the
home minister had proposed a centre aimed at putting
the intelligence in the right place at the right
time.
The main job of this agency would be to warn
and also pre-empt terror strikes after all other
agencies dealing with counter-terror measures
provide their information to the NCTC.
A panel of experts at the centre would then analyse
the inputs with the help of a data base about
suspected terrorists and terror outfits.
The National Intelligence Grid (NATGRID), approved
by the government in June last year with a data
bank of nearly 20 types of database, will work
separately. But it will also provide terror inputs
to the NCTC.
The agency will be set up through an executive
order to be issued soon.
(IANS)
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