The Hindu Business Line : Tightening intelligence

There has for long been a general impression that the Union Home Minister, Mr Shivraj Patil, has been ineffective in handling his portfolio, and the Delhi blasts have only added grist to the critics' mill. Even his own Cabinet colleague, Mr Lalu Prasad, directed a veiled barb at him implying that he was not up to the mark. Mr Patil's detractors descended to the depth of subjecting his change of clothes at short intervals to taunts, as if it was evidence of some kind of insensitiveness to human suffering.

When a traumatic event occurs, it is human nature to look for a scapegoat. On the well-known principle of the buck stopping with the top person, the Minister in charge of security becomes the target of public anger. He, certainly, bears the responsibility to ensure that the various agencies under his Ministry function at the highest level of efficiency. The most important such agency in the Home Ministry is the Intelligence Bureau which is meant to exercise constant vigilance and furnish advance intimation about likely threats to security to enable setting in motion appropriate preventive action.

The Home Minister himself, as also the National Security Adviser, Mr M. K. Narayanan, have admitted openly about `actionable' intelligence being scanty and the available intelligence being vague and generalised, without any specific indication of the time, mode, place and nature of brewing danger. Some of the Chief Ministers have been harsher, likening the intelligence provided to `weather reports'. The frustration is understandable.

In the present context, every important city and town and every high-ranking Constitutional functionary and political figure in the public eye is fair game for terrorists. A piece of intelligence that merely warns of likelihood of terrorist attacks on such-and-such-city or that such-and-such-a-person is on the hit list hardly helps in putting through counter-measures. Even a layman can indulge in this type of guesswork without fear of contradiction

COMPREHENSIVE REVIEW

In an ideal situation, with precise information on hand, there would never be any untoward event at any time, since the threat would have been met head on and the perpetrators rounded up. But the situation is not ideal. Apart from the fact that the intelligence agencies have to work under severe handicaps, there are too many cooks spoiling the broth.

The sharpness and precision are considerably blunted by the existence of a multiplicity of agencies under the Home, Finance and Defence Ministries, the Cabinet Secretariat, and the State Governments, collecting and collating intelligence to meet the respective requirements of the authorities with jurisdiction over them.

The first step towards streamlining the system of intelligence collection is, as the US did after 9/11, to set up an umbrella mechanism to forge a united approach in assessing the significance and implication of the intelligence collected.

The Joint Intelligence Committee and the National Security Council are supposed to bring about this unified thrust towards common security goals, but even Parliament is not privy to information about their manner of functioning and their track record in achieving the objectives entrusted to them. There is yet another matter of compelling urgency needing attention. And that is undertaking a through and comprehensive review of the structure, adequacy and deployment of manpower, recruitment and training procedures, resources and facilities, and most important of all, intelligence gathering techniques matching the technological advances.

A committee of knowledgeable, experienced and independent professionals in their prime, not the usual run of retired toadies, should be asked to undertake this task and report to the Government within, say, three months. Without looking into these fundamental reforms critically and remedying the systemic deficiencies, it is futile to expect any Home Minister to measure up to his job.

B. S. RAGHAVAN