MHA releases India’s first national counter-terrorism policy ‘PRAHAAR’

NEW DELHI: The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) on Monday released India’s first comprehensive national counter-terrorism policy and strategy titled PRAHAAR, outlining a structured and intelligence-driven framework to prevent and combat terrorism in all its forms.

The eight-page policy lays emphasis on the prevention of terror attacks, swift and proportionate response mechanisms, and strengthening coordination among government agencies. It advocates a “whole-of-government” and “whole-of-society” approach, grounded in human rights and the rule of law, while also focusing on mitigating conditions that enable terrorism, including radicalisation.

The policy is “predicated on the prevention of terror attacks to protect Indian citizens and interests; responses, which are swift and proportionate to the threat posed; aggregating internal capacities for achieving synergy in a whole-of-government approach; human rights and ‘Rule of Law’ based processes for mitigation of threats; attenuating the conditions enabling terrorism, including radicalization; aligning and shaping the international efforts to counter terrorism; and recovery and resilience through a whole-of-society approach”.

MHA releases the first national counter-terrorism strategy ‘Prahaar’, which it says aims to criminalize all terrorist acts and deny access to funds, weapons and safe havens to the terrorists, their financiers and supporters. pic.twitter.com/uoQ1iZUiES

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The policy states that India follows a proactive and intelligence-guided counter-terrorism strategy. It underlines the central role of the Multi Agency Centre (MAC) and the Joint Task Force on Intelligence (JTFI) functioning under the Intelligence Bureau (IB) for real-time intelligence sharing and coordinated action across the country.

As part of its counter terrorism strategy, the policy says India follows a proactive approach to prevent and counter terrorist threats. “This approach is primarily ‘Intelligence-Guided’, in which primacy is accorded to intelligence gathering and its dissemination to executive agencies for neutralisation of threat. Operationalisation of Multi Agency Centre (MAC) along with the Joint Task Force on Intelligence (JTFI) in the Intelligence Bureau (IB) remains the nodal platform for efficient and real-time sharing of CT-related inputs across the country and subsequent prevention against disruptions”, it read.

It further says, “close partnerships for counter terrorism operations have been created with Central Agencies and State Police Forces under the mechanism of Multi Agency Centre (MAC), and Joint Task Force on Intelligence (JTFI) in Intelligence Bureau (IB).”

Noting that terrorists and violent extremists misuse the internet for communication, recruitment, glorification of jihad and other terror-related activities, it says Indian Law Enforcement Agencies make sustained efforts to counter misuse of the internet through proactive disruption of such cyber activities, online networks of terrorist groups and their propaganda and recruitment.

“Law enforcement agencies also regularly disrupt the overground workers (OGW) modules, through which terrorists are extended logistic, material and financial support. In recent times, the nexus between illegal arms syndicates and terrorist groups has emerged, and for combating it, coordinated interventions are being made by the intelligence agencies along with the respective Law Enforcement Agencies, in various Indian states,” the policy notes. “Special emphasis is given to disrupting terror funding networks through the legal framework under Indian laws.”

India faces terrorist threats on all three fronts, such as water, land and air. Indian border guarding forces (Defence, Central Armed Police Forces) as well as immigration authorities are equipped with state-of-the-art tools and technologies to secure Indian borders. Capacities have been developed to protect the critical sectors of the Indian economy, including power, railways, aviation, ports, defence, space and atomic energy from state and non-state actors,” it mentions.

The move comes as India has long been affected by sponsored terrorism from across the border, with Jihadi terror outfits as well as their frontal organisations, continuing to plan, coordinate, facilitate and execute terror attacks in India. It also highlighted how India has been a target of global terrorist groups such as Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), which have been trying to incite violence in the country through sleeper cells.

It noted that violent extremists operating from the soil of foreign countries have hatched conspiracies to promote terrorism, and that their handlers from across the border frequently use the latest technologies, including the use of drones, for facilitating terror-related activities and attacks in Punjab and Jammu and Kashmir. Increasingly, terrorist groups are engaging organised criminal networks for logistics and recruitment to execute and facilitate terror strikes in India.

For propaganda, communication, funding and guiding terror attacks, the policy pointed, these terror groups use social media platforms as well as ‘instant messaging applications’. The policy flags technological advancements like encryption, the dark web, and crypto wallets, which have allowed the terror groups to operate anonymously.

“Disrupting and intercepting terrorist efforts to access and use CBRNED (Chemical, Biological, Radiological, Nuclear, Explosive, Digital) material remains a challenge for Counter Terrorism (CT) agencies. The threat of state and non-state actors misusing drones and robotics for lethal purposes remains another area of concern, even as criminal hackers and nation states continue to target India through cyber-attack.”

In the policy, it is mentioned how India has been at the forefront of the ongoing fight against terrorism for several decades now. The policy says that while the nature of threats continues to change and present new challenges, India has remained consistently opposed to terrorism in all its forms and manifestations.

It mentions that there has been a history of sporadic instability in the immediate neighbourhood of India, which has often given rise to ungoverned spaces. Besides, a few countries in the region have sometimes used terrorism as an instrument of state policy.

Reaffirming India’s “zero tolerance” stance, the policy states that terrorism cannot be justified on religious, ethnic or ideological grounds. It reiterates India’s long-standing position of unequivocally condemning terrorism in all its manifestations and standing firmly with victims of terror worldwide.

“India has always denounced terrorism and its use by any actor for achieving any stated or unstated ends, unambiguously and unequivocally. India has always stood by the victims of terrorism and has been steadfast in its belief that there can be no justification whatsoever for violence in the world. It is this principled approach which informs the Indian policy of ‘zero tolerance’ against terrorism,” read the policy. (ANI)