Country longitude - India and terrorism

Context and background

On the night of November 26, 2008, suddenly the noise of Mumbai firing took place. The attackers targeted their two-five star hotels, the railway station and a Jewish center in Mumbai. Initially, no one was convinced that the attack was so big but gradually the attack was judged.

• On the night of November 24, 2008, top officials including the Mumbai Police and NSG commandos, along with Hemant Karkare, head of the Anti-Terrorist Squad, took charge and many officers lost their lives in this attack.
• The funk of terror started from the Poll Café and the Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus was over at the Taj Mahal Hotel.
• Meanwhile, it took more than 60 hours for security personnel to overcome or finish it. In this entire operation, 164 people lost their lives.

Where and why terrorism in India?

• In 1979, Pakistan adopted a policy that it would resort to terrorism in Kashmir and its political language was blitze india i.e. pieces of India.
• For this, Pakistan has created two terrorist organizations: ISI Trend and ISI Control. These are also called Inter Services Intelligence.
• The Inter Services Intelligence was an organization, which is still the LeT-e-Taiba, and the other organization that was formed is named Jaish-e-Mohammed.
• These two organizations were entrusted with the responsibility of spreading terrorism in Kashmir and outside Kashmir, as well as providing all kinds of help.
• The religion was taken in and the guidelines given were called 'terrorism is a duty and assassination is sunna'. Sunna means 'the way of profit'. Thus terrorism was worn by religion.
• On the other hand, the Russian forces had become effective in Afghanistan. In the 1980s, the US had to control Russia, Pakistan was its ally, and they did not want Russia to move forward. There, the organization CIA took the help of the radical Islamist group. And there also two institutes formed. One was named Al-Qaeda and the other was named Taliban.
• The incident of 26/11 will have to be understood by the fact that these four organizations, including the groups of Pakistan and Afghanistan, met each other. Their motive was to increase Islam by resorting to terrorism. 
  Therefore, he first started attacking cultural centers and destroyed Bamiyan Buddha in March 2001.
• Their second objective was the attack on the economy which appeared in 2001 as an attack on the World Trade Center and then the Pentagon.
• The third incident appeared in 2001 as an attack on the Indian Parliament. In this way their purpose was to attack trade, commerce, innovation, cultural institutions, symbols and democracy.
• The purpose of the terrorist attack in Mumbai was to thwart India's economy as Mumbai is the economic capital of India.

What is a comprehensive convergence on international terrorism?

• India is committed to the efforts to combat global terrorism and has consistently supported the policy of 'Zero Tolerance' against terrorism at various international forums.
• In this context, in 1996, India had proposed to accept "The Comprehensive Convention on International Terrorism-CCIT" in the United Nations General Assembly in 1996.
• Recently in the 73rd session of the United Nations General Assembly, Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj reiterated the demand for a Comprehensive Convention on International Terrorism (CCIT).
• India has been suffering from cross border terrorism. That is why India took cognizance of the matter of global peace and security before major global powers.
• CCIT provides a legal framework that makes all signatory countries binding to not give money and safe shelter to terrorist groups.
• On December 15, 1997, international conventions were adopted for the suppression of terrorist bombings. On December 9, 1999, the International Convention was adopted for the elimination of terrorism financing and the International Convention was adopted on April 13, 2005 to suppress the activities related to nuclear terrorism.
• Presently six ad hoc committees have been set up to fight for international terrorism and for consensus on legal aspects, among which the discussions are still underway.
• There are many issues on which general opinion has not been made, in which it is also a key issue to not become a consensus on the definition of terrorism.
• Determining the definition of terrorism has never been easier. After the terrorist attacks in Europe in 1937 and the assassination of a leader, the League of Nations decided to adopt a treaty on the Convention on Terrorism.
• But this treaty could not get ratification of the countries, nor could it be implemented. The International Criminal Court is there but terrorism is excluded from its scope.

Objectives of CCIT

• For the universal definition of terrorism all 193 members of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) will adopt this criminal law.
• To ban all terrorist groups and stop terrorist camps.
• To prosecute all terrorists under special laws.
• Declaring cross-border terrorism at the global level as an extraditable offense.

Definition of terrorism according to the convention

According to this convention, any person by whom the purpose of crime is to intimidate people or to stop the government or international organization from doing any work or to do such a thing, due to which-

1. Any person's death or serious physical injury, or
 
2. Public or private property damage, including public access, any government facility, public transport system, infrastructure or environment, or
 
3. Property, location, facilities or systems harm, resulting in huge economic losses will be considered under the definition of terrorism.

Reason for circumvention on the definition of terrorism

• The United States wanted a draft to keep out of acts done by the military forces of the state during the secession. Concerned about the application of CCIT on its forces in the United States, especially in Afghanistan and Iraq.
• Organization of Islamic countries (OIC) wants to keep national liberation movements out of the scope of CCIT. From the National Liberation movements, OIC stands for the Israel-Palestine conflict, notably.
• It was argued that the activities of freedom movements and terrorism need to be separated so that legitimate movements can not be classified as criminal acts of terrorism.
• The Latin American country wanted to include 'State Terrorism' and also in the CCIT violation of international human rights laws by the states.
• This definition of terrorism is not controversial. Controversy is about the application of this definition. Will this definition also apply to any state's armed forces and independence movements?

What major changes have been made to prevent terrorism in India?

• After the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks, a comprehensive change has been made in the field of India's internal security.
• The National Security Guard (NSG) has been major reform along with the creation of the National Intelligence Agency (NIA), the National Intelligence Agency (NATGRID).
• Close and effective coordination between intelligence and security agencies has been increased at the Center and at the state level.
• Intelligence and security agencies are looking at such matters to identify potential ISIS recruitment and are also taking further action if necessary.
• In order to deal with internal security challenges, the government has increased the strength of the Central Armed Police Forces.
• NSG hubs have been set up in Chennai, Kolkata, Mumbai and Hyderabad.
• In any emergency, the power of seeking aircraft for NSG personnel has been given to DG, NSG.
• The government has taken stern steps to stop the growing immigration.
• Siege border, flood light, modern and high technical monitoring equipment have been deployed.
• Intelligence setup has been upgraded and coastal security has been strengthened.
• Penal provisions have been further harsh on dealing with terrorism by amending the Illegal Activity (Prevention) Act, 1967, 2008 and 2012.
• The government has set up the National Intelligence Grid (NATGRID) to deal with terrorism and internal security threats, which aim to collect intelligence and link it to the database.
• As part of its zero tolerance policy towards terrorism, India has raised issues of cross-border terrorism, including financing of terrorism at various multilateral and bilateral fora.

Do big steps need to be taken?

• All security agencies need to be independent, free from political interference.
• There is a need to look into terrorism problems in the North-East as our focus is to keep Pakistan's border safe. Here satellites and other technical equipment have been deployed but the borders of Northeast India have not been taken care of.
• Bangladesh's terrorist organization Jamaatul Mujahidin is active in the northeast. The border of Assam, Nagaland and Manipur is still open from which the entry of drugs is being done with speed, which needs attention.
• There is more sea boundary in the Northeast. In the terrorist attack in Punjab's Pathankot, terrorists had entered India through the river route.
• The electromechanical fencing on the river and the task of installing sensors under the river has not yet been done, which needs to be noticed.
• There is a need to keep track of financial intelligence as well as money from the funds for the terrorism.
• India's land border circle is 15,000 kilometers and the coastal circle is more than 7,500 kilometers, in such a situation unless the technology upgrade is done, the border can not be secured.
• Marine police are still very weak, neither do they have a boat nor a manpower or equipment.

National Counter Terrorism Center

• The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Home Affairs has recently recommended in a report submitted to the Rajya Sabha that the government should immediately consider the formation of a National Counter Terrorism Center (NCTC) as an integrated counter terrorism agency.
• The panel has also asked the Home Ministry to play a key role in making consensus to all stakeholders on this issue.
• It has mainly been included in the formation of the National Investigation Agency (NIA), National Intelligence Grid (NATGRID) as well as the National Security Guard (NSG).
• Under the NCTC Multi Agency Center (MAC), Intelligence Bureau (IB), there was an offer to act as a "Fusion Center" for sharing intelligence information and its operators were asked to give power to arrest all over India.
• But according to India's disappointing record of building the institution in the security domain, it is the biggest disappointment after the NCTC 26/11 reform process.
• The purpose of the proposed NCTC was to prevent terrorist attacks, counter action, due to political bitterness about the state-state relations during the previous United Progressive Alliance (UPA) rule, it could not take the formula.
• In particular, non-Congress ruled states of Gujarat, Tamil Nadu, Odisha, Karnataka, Bihar, Tripura and West Bengal allegedly opposed the proposal. Their main objection is about the possible violation of the principle of federalism because they argued that the NCTC would encroach the states' powers.
• India is facing constant threat from terrorism, cross border and locally fundamentalist jihadis.
• But after nearly a decade after the 26/11 incident, the Central Government has not been able to reach a certain conclusion on the NCTC.

Conclusion

Over the last several decades, many steps have been taken to overcome terrorism and there is a lot to be done. Despite all the efforts, terror groups continue to realize their presence by attacking the security forces several times even today. It is true that for the past few years, there have been better coordination between the different security agencies on the exchange of intelligence inputs and it has also tried to bring the local population in the role of cooperation, thereby reducing the incidence of terrorism. Has come. Ironically, despite repeated warnings from India and a reprimand on international fora, Pakistan does not bother to take any concrete action against terrorist organizations such as Lashkar-e-Taiba.