- India
- Feb 24
Govt unveils counter-terrorism policy titled ‘PRAHAAR’
The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) unveiled the country’s counter-terrorism policy titled ‘PRAHAAR’ on February 23.
Significance of this policy
• India has been at the forefront of the ongoing fight against terrorism for several decades now.
• 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.
• There has been a history of sporadic instability in the immediate neighborhood of India, which has often given rise to ungoverned spaces.
• Besides, few countries in the region have sometimes used terrorism as an instrument of State Policy.
• Violent extremists operating from the soils of foreign countries have hatched conspiracies to promote terrorism. Their handlers from across the border frequently use latest technologies, including use of drones, for facilitating terror-related activities and attacks in Punjab and Jammu & 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, these terror groups use social media platforms as well as instant messaging applications.
• Technological advancements like encryption, dark web, crypto wallets, etc, have allowed these groups to operate anonymously.
• Disrupting/intercepting terrorist efforts to access and use CBRNED (Chemical, Biological, Radiological, Nuclear, Explosive, Digital) material remains a challenge for counter-terrorism agencies.
• India has always denounced terrorism and its use by any actor for achieving any stated or unstated ends, unambiguously and unequivocally.
• India has a ‘zero tolerance’ policy against terrorism.
• The coordinated multi-agency actions have greatly contributed towards success in Indian counter terrorism efforts.
• However, there remains a scope for further cooperation and collaboration among various agencies for intelligence collection and investigation.
• Further, the domestic counter-terrorism legal regime needs to be amended from time to time to respond to the emerging challenges.
• In addition, there is a continual need for capacity building of the counter-terrorism units/Anti-Terrorism Squads of states/UTs to respond to, neutralise and investigate terror-related incidents.
• Uniformity in their structure, resources, training, and methodologies of investigation becomes important.
• To make appropriate cases against the perpetrators of acts of terrorism, there is a need to associate legal experts at every stage of investigation, right from registration of FIR to its culmination in prosecution.
• To build consensus on the understanding of terrorism and the rights of victims of terrorism, India will continue to work for a comprehensive framework on international terrorism while pursuing its counter-terrorism policy and strategy.
• Besides, investment in technology and partnerships with private enterprise have been included to mitigate futuristic terror threats.
Seven key pillars of PRAHAAR:
1) Prevention of terror attacks to protect Indian citizens and interests
• India faces terrorist threats on all three fronts — 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.
• Terrorists and violent extremists misuse internet for communication, recruitment.
• India follows a pro-active 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) remain the nodal platform for efficient and real time sharing of counter-terrorism related inputs across the country and subsequent prevention against disruptions.
• Indian law enforcement agencies make sustained efforts to counter misuse of Internet through pro-active disruption of such cyber activities, online networks of terrorist groups and their propaganda/recruitment.
2) Responses which are swift and proportionate to the threat posed
• The local Police is the first responder to any attack, assisted by specialised state and central anti-terror Forces.
• The National Security Guard (NSG) is the nodal national counter-terror force under MHA, for assistance to state forces in responding to major terror attacks.
• Responding to a terror attack is a multi-stakeholder exercise involving various agencies at central, state and district levels.
• There exists a Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) issued by the MHA, for coordination at the apex-level that includes intelligence dissemination, analysis and follow up action, through the platform of Multi Agency Centre.
• Central Armed Police Forces (CAPFs) are regularly deployed in states and these forces perform a wide range of duties, including maintenance of law and order and counter-terrorism operations.
• The National Investigation Agency (NIA) and state police agencies conduct counter-terrorism investigations in India and high prosecution rates of these investigations ensure a deterrent to future terror incidents.
3) Aggregating internal capacities for achieving synergy in a whole-of-government approach
• Modernisation of security and law enforcement agencies plays an important role in counter-terrorism responses. There is regular acquisition of latest tools, technology and weaponry, besides training for new skills and tactics for counter-terrorism agencies.
• Efforts have been made to further modernise the training modules and infrastructure of the training institutes, besides upgrading the training faculties, to provide training on best practices for responding to terrorist situations.
4) Human rights and ‘Rule of Law’ based processes for mitigation of threats
• Indian laws, including anti-terrorism laws, give due importance to human rights. India adheres to the ‘Rule of Law’, where laws are just, applied evenly and protect fundamental rights.
• Besides, the Protection of Human Rights Act, 1993 specifically deals with cases of violation of human rights in India.
• India is also a signatory to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights 1948, besides ratifying the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
• Multiple levels of legal redressal is available to any accused through an elaborate infrastructure of justice system from the districts, through states, right up to the higher judiciary at the central-level.
• A robust and independent criminal justice system ensures that all are properly represented and get affordable legal services.
5) Attenuating the conditions enabling terrorism, including radicalisation
• Terrorist groups are continuously making efforts to recruit Indian youths. To thwart these efforts, Indian intelligence and law enforcement agencies have been continuously disrupting the designs of terrorist groups.
• Once identified, these youths undergo a graded police response, aimed at comprehensively addressing the problem of radicalisation and violent extremism in a multi-stakeholder setting.
• Legal action is initiated against the individual based on their level of radicalisation.
• Community and religious leaders, moderate preachers and NGOs are engaged to spread awareness about the adverse consequences of radicalisation and extremist violence.
• Issues of poverty and unemployment among vulnerable communities are addressed through various government schemes and initiatives to prevent inimical elements from misusing these conditions to their advantage.
6) Aligning and shaping the international efforts to counter terrorism
• International partners are very important to Indian counter-terrorism efforts, given the trans-national character of terrorism.
• Besides agency-to-agency engagements for intelligence sharing, India has entered into various agreements/arrangements like Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (MLAT), Extradition Treaty/Extradition Arrangement (ET/EA), Joint Working Group (JWG) and Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with foreign partners for information/evidence sharing and other legal cooperation.
• This cooperation has resulted in disruption/ indictment of many terrorist/radical entities in India and abroad.
7) Recovery and resilience through a whole-of-society approach
• India follows a whole-of-society approach in countering terrorism. Public-private partnership has been a key component in our fight against terrorism. This partnership helps in faster recovery and resilience in case of a terror attack.
• The government engages a team of doctors, psychologists, lawyers and other members of civil society, including NGOs, religious and community leaders, to sensitise and reintegrate the affected community.
• The civil administration takes the lead in reconstruction and restoration efforts. The police administration strengthens preventive security measures in and around their area, which reassures the community and promotes their resilience.