|
Truncated Mandate
|
|
NCTC is expected to subsume the MAC and coordinate all counter-terrorism actions |
Such instances are not uncommon
_________________________________________________________ |
|
A FORCE Report
The ambitious National Counter Terrorism Centre (NCTC) to coordinate and collate terror intelligence and disseminate it to various security agencies is a scaled down version of the original specialised anti-terror body envisioned by Union home minister P. Chidambaram in his address to a DGP meet in 2009. The watered down version is seen as a fallout of serious reservations expressed by the ministries of finance and defence against bringing the agencies reporting to them directly under the NCTC and, indirectly, under the home ministry.
|
|
|
|
|
The two ministries had complained that too much power would be concentrated in one centre if all intelligence and security heads were to report to the all-encompassing counter-terror organisation. Originally, it was billed to be an overarching body to which all the country’s intelligence agencies would report insofar as terror matters were concerned. But, the MHA’s initial desire to set up an independent anti-terror body was shot down within the government, after it received a negative response from the finance ministry.
The nod to set up the NCTC was given by the Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS), the country’s highest decision making body on security issues, at its meeting chaired by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, after it considered a proposal by the Union home ministry. The NCTC, to be headed by a senior IPS officer of the rank of additional DGP, will be under Intelligence Bureau and report to its director, the Union home secretary and the home minister.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|