PICTURE SPEAK

TRAVEL TRAVAILS: Policemen frisk passengers at the New Delhi railway station after the US sounded an alert on possible terror strikes "People across the nation need to be sensitised to the new threat. Grassroot intelligence will now be crucial." M.K.NARAYANAN, NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER

For as the thwarted London plot to cause "mass murder at unimaginable scale" showed the perpetrators were literally the "nice guys" next door. A neighbour described one of the suspects who was arrested as a "very caring boy" who even commiserated her on her dog's death. In the Gateway of India blasts in Mumbai last year, it was shockingly a family of four that put together the explosives and then planted them in taxis. In this year's Mumbai's train blasts, one of the suspects arrested included a doctor. Nobody, it seemed, was anybody's friend.

As Indian security agencies gear up to meet the new forms of terror, they are coming to grips with such hard truths. That it was not just a matter of beefing up the Central intelligence agencies such as the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) or the Intelligence Bureau (IB) that would help. But it would be the beat constable and the people living in the area that would now have to become the key providers of intelligence. As National Security Adviser M.K. Narayanan told

EXTERNAL INTELLIGENCE

RAW Wounds Leaks outside and dissent within, India's premier external agency is in a crisis when the country needs it the most   PICTURE SPEAK TOUGH TASK: RAW chief Hormees Tharakan; the agency's headquarters in Delhi Cross-border terrorism and its globalised manifestation place India's external intelligence agency at the frontlines of national security. The Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) snoops on their camps, intercepts their conversations and is one of the key resources which gives the government the inputs to foil likely terror attacks. It prides itself on its astute technical intelligence. At the height of the Kargil war, it intercepted a lengthy conversation between General Pervez Musharraf and his deputy which proved beyond doubt Pakistan's involvement in the incursions. Recent events, however, have thrown the agency into turmoil. It has been penetrated twice in as many years, both the times by agents of new-found strategic partner, the US. In June 2004, the CIA whisked away its mole Rabinder Singh, head of RAW's south-east Asia desk, to the US. Just when National Security Adviser M K Narayanan began a clean-up and restructuring exercise within the agency, which included the appointment of IPS officer Hormees Tharakan, the Delhi Police's special cell uncovered an espionage ring operating within the National Security Council Secretariat (NSCS). It included RAW's head of computers and training brigadier (retired) Ujjwal Dasgupta and commander (retired) Mukesh Saini, head of information security in the NSCS. They were allegedly passing classified information to CIA contact Rosanna Minchew they met at an Indo-US cyber security forum. The leak has directly impacted on the intelligence-sharing between the two countries, critical against fighting global terror. Fearful of further leaks, the government has halted the joint Indo-US forums on defence and terrorism set up over the past few years. However, unspoken is the growing dissension within the ranks of the RAW, which, insiders say, is suffering from low morale. The organisational drift comes at a time when global intelligence agencies like the CIA have made recruitment and retention among their topmost priorities. If RAW is to be a truly effective force, it will have to ensure that its newly-constituted National Technical Research Organisation stays ahead of the new breed of terrorists who use satellite phones and email to stay in touch as well as the human intelligence which will help it penetrate terror groups. "The agency needs to invest heavily in human and technical intelligence, develop its linguistic capabilities in Arabic and in monitoring the internet and breaking codes,'' says B Raman, RAW's former head of counter-terrorism. Of late, the agency has been taken by surprise by recent events even in its backyard-Nepal and Sri Lanka. The last three years have seen an exodus of trained personnel-four senior officials, including two joint secretaries and two deputy secretaries, from its highly-sensitive operations wing. Which explained Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's query (RAW works under him) to officials at a ceremony in the agency's Lodhi Road headquarters last September: "If the agency is so good, then why are so many people quitting?'' The Research and Analysis Service (RAS) set up by Indira Gandhi in the 1980s to seek out the eclectic talent to staff RAW, has not had any volunteers for the last two years. Recruits who traditionally come from services as varied as the Ordnance Factory Board and the army have to quit their parent cadre to become permanently absorbed into the RAS. They are given a four-year course which included military training and interpreter-level language skills in one foreign language. Of the six specialist officers recruited into the RAS in 2002, four have quit and gone back to their parent services. This, say insiders, is because of poor promotion prospects within the RAS. Last fortnight, Manmohan Singh approved a proposal allowing government servants to join the RAW on permanent deputation or permanent secondment. This, many say, has driven the final nail into the coffin of the RAS which makes up over half the agency's manpower of roughly 300 officers. Government officials on deputation join the RAW for a maximum of 12 years and then have the option of going back to their parent cadre. An option they exercise often because services like the IPS guarantee them faster promotions. The PM's latest decision, RAW officials say, legitimises the 'Aya Ram Gaya Ram' cadre of officers who can enter and leave the agency as they please, obtain the best foreign postings and revert to their parent cadre. They do not have to know a foreign language-a travesty in the intelligence business-and are more vulnerable to spy traps-all penetrations of the RAW have been effected by non-RAS cadre. "When India is emerging as a global power fighting terrorism, we need an expanding strategic vision therefore every intelligence input has to be dovetailed to the geopolitics of the day. This is much more than a police job,'' says defence analyst and former RAW official Colonel (retired) R.S.N. Singh. Permanent secondment wipes out the incentive for officers who join the RAS by resigning from their parent services. It realises what many say is Narayanan's vision of a homogenous IB-type organisation which will virtually convert the RAW into a police organisation. Clearly, these are fears that will have to be addressed if the RAW is to be a truly effective national security tool. -By Sandeep Unnithan

India Today: "People across the nation need to be sensitised to the new threat. Grassroot intelligence is now crucial. If we get a great deal of information at that level then the battle against terror could be won."

Like a fast-mutating virus, terrorism in India has come a long way in the past five years. Spreading out of Jammu & Kashmir, terrorists are now striking at India's hinterland, increasingly choosing soft targets and trying to disrupt the common man's life. Experts detect several new patterns in the way terror strikes are being carried out across the country. While Pakistan continues to be the fount of terror, with India's anger rising and faced with international pressure, Pervez Musharraf's Government is increasingly using the strategy of deniability as a key counter.

While Pakistan's focus continues to be on a low cost (for itself), proxy war, there is a shift away from fidayeen (suicide) attacks that involved highly-trained and motivated jehadis sent to India to execute high-value strikes. The change came after the failed attack on Ayodhya last year where the terrorists were gunned down and also the foiled attempt to strike at the RSS headquarters. With Indian agencies finding clues of the Pakistan origin of these jehadis whether it was the weapons they carried, their personal belongings or the calls they made to their masters at home, Islamabad found it hard to dismiss these charges.

For a while, terror groups started using car bombs especially in J&K. But security agencies were able to trace the registration of the cars and detect who had bought them and expose the terrorist groups involved. Now as Home Secretary V.K. Duggal points out: "The strategy seems to be striking at soft targets across India's hinterland. They are using local people in smaller, self-contained modules that are difficult for agencies to track down."

The training of the local Indian collaborators continues to be given in Pakistan but tactics are different. The Indian recruits usually cross over to Pakistan via Nepal and Bangladesh or using the Haj pilgrimage as an excuse. They are then made to spend several months in camps set up either by the ISI or militant organisations. Here, instead of handling guns, they are increasingly being trained to fabricate home-made explosives using locally available material like ammonium nitrate used in fertilisers.

Public transport, market places and tourist infrastructure have replaced VIPs as targets. Captured terrorists have also indicated plots to attack software hubs across cities including Bangalore and Hyderabad, and disrupt economic activity or shake people's confidence. A former principal security officer to the Lashkar chief, apprehended in India recently, revealed that while the camps run by militants had religious indoctrination and recruits had to live a spartan life, those staged by the ISI were far more liberal and allowed creature comforts like a TV and hot baths.

After the training, instead of the traditional routes of infiltrating them across the loc, Pakistani agencies usually send the recruits back using the porous borders of Nepal and Bangladesh to provide safe passage. The strategy allows Pakistan to maintain a high amount of deniability. When Duggal, as part of the ongoing peace process, met his Pakistan counterpart recently and confronted him with evidence of such training camps and infrastructure, he got the standard response: an outright denial.

So the task and the threat that India faces is now even greater. As C.D. Sahay, a former RAW chief, says, "The message is coming louder and clearer and more intense. Now terror groups are laying a greater emphasis on using local resources, network and skills." He also points out that modules are increasingly moving away from metropolitan centres and being located in the hinterland towns like Kanpur, Aligarh and Aurangabad. That is a serious problem because as M.P.S. Aulukh, a former intelligence chief of Punjab Police, says, "The intelligence system is largely urban-oriented and there is an inherent hesitation to explore the rural areas."

Others worry over whether the overall security set-up in India is sufficiently geared up to meet the challenge. General V.P. Malik, former chief of army staff, says, "The new threat of terror is far more ominous and widespread than our intelligence agencies estimate it to be. Its spread and stealth demands a complete re-assessment of the anti-terror wherewithal. It calls for multi-directional endeavours."

The answer is a massive reorganisation of the police and intelligence machinery especially at the state level to deal with the new phantom menace. It is going to be a long haul. Given the size of the police forces in states compared to their populations, it's evident that terrorist organisations have understood where India's true vulnerability lies. While in highly advanced, democratic countries like the US and the UK, the ratio of police force to the people is 1:300, in India the average is 1:728 with states like Bihar and Uttar Pradesh with even higher ratios.

Ranged against highly motivated and innovative terror groups, are state police forces that are out of the last century. Most of them, like the Maharashtra Police, spend a staggering 90 per cent of their budgets on salaries; they are equipped to tackle robbers and dacoits and for whom intelligence gathering means snooping on political opponents. They are often clueless when dealing with trained and indoctrinated terrorists armed with explosives, assault rifles and who communicate using the Internet and satellite phones, they could prove a liability in the fight against terror.

"Today, terrorism is a technology-intensive international phenomenon which utilises international banking channels. There is a need to update the gadgetry and electronic surveillance available with the state police," says former Mumbai police commissioner Mahesh Narayan Singh.

Often, even special funds granted by the Centre are underutilised. In West Bengal, the state is a sanctuary for terrorists from new terror source Bangladesh. Five years after the American Center attack, the police are yet to buy modern equipment like MP-5 submachine guns and night vision goggles because the state Government has failed to match the Rs 392 crore sanctioned by the Centre for the modernisation of the police force. The Centre has now frozen further grants.

In Andhra Pradesh, a small cohesive counter intelligence group, headed by a deputy inspector-general of police, gets inputs from different sources on the activities of Muslim fundamentalists including a handful of ISI-backed modules that were busted in the state in the last 10 years. Andhra is not alone. Most state police forces' role are limited to picking up suspects or offenders on specific information made available to them by Central intelligence agencies. "What we are doing now is treating cancer with a pain balm instead of chemotherapy," laments a senior police official in Hyderabad. "If we do not create appropriate infrastructure now we may have a major problem on our hands."

Intelligence gathering has other problems. The Central intelligence agencies continue to lack coordination. There has been improvement lately with multi-agency meetings being held regularly to share intelligence at the operational level. But there is still considerable amount of turf war between them and a game of oneupmanship.

The problem too is that while intelligence agencies may now have much more data collection than before, there is a need for sound interpretation of the information. Some experts advocate a new terror law which would give the police sweeping powers to arrest and investigate suspects but with harsh penalties for misuse by the police. "The law does not deter a terrorist who is prepared to die, but it can deter the sympathisers whose help he seeks," says former IB chief Ajit Doval.

PICTURE SPEAK

SOFT TARGETS: Market places like this one in Delhi now have metal detectors and security posts

Cabinet Secretary B.K. Chaturvedi makes a different but equally significant point when he says much of the success in combating the new forms of terror would depend on people co-operating with local police. The London airline bombing plot was unravelled when police officials received a worried call from a member of the Muslim community who reported general suspicions in an acquaintance.

This battle for hearts and minds within the community, say anti-terrorism officials, is at the very cornerstone of any war against terror. "We have to interact with local community leaders, the local schoolteacher and the local preacher if we are to make any headway in this new war," says an anti-terrorism official.

Other experts call for a single nodal point or agency that would identify all the vulnerabilities and co-ordinate the response. Much as the US did by bringing its various intelligence agencies under a single Department of Homeland Security. Experts feel it would lead to less of "baton passing" and greater accountability among agencies. The key, they say, is integration at operational levels where the different agency personnel are trained together. Narayanan feels that the co-ordination is already happening. As for following the US model, he says, "The jury is still out on whether it has been a success."

Ajai Sahni, executive director, Institute for Conflict Management, argues that India needs to change its "strategy of permanent defence" and move to an offensive mode. His point is that faced with a relentless enemy, what India needs to do is set into a motion a complex set of measures that would impose unbearable costs on Pakistan if they persist with its terrorist agenda.

That would include economic strangulation by aggressively luring over their markets and pushing them to bankruptcy. Increasing defence spending is another option. Given the size of its economy, a 1 per cent increase in GDP on defence expenditure by India would mean an 8 per cent increase for Pakistan if it had to match it. Says Sahni, "We can hit at the very source of terrorism and cripple it."

Part of that strategy would be a major diplomatic offensive to isolate Pakistan. Already many countries are sympathetic to India's concerns. Countries which were earlier not willing to deal and share information on an equal footing are willing to do so, say intelligence sources. India has been getting useful information from countries like the US, Britain, France, the EU and Israel.

But relying on nations like the US would help only to some extent. As Sahay says, "No one is going to fight your battle against terror. For whatever others may say, there is still neither a global war on terrorism nor a war on global terrorism."

What India needs to do is to focus on the tiny terror cells that have sprouted all across the country and neutralise them with it own resources and resolve. India, like Bhisma had advocated, has to learn to change the circumstances so that its enemies become its friends.

-with Saurabh Shukla, Ramesh Vinayak, Amarnath K. Menon, Swagata Sen, Prerana Thakurdesai and Anand Natarajan

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