The prime challenge to ensuring coastal security is coordination between various security and intelligence agencies, says K. Padmanabhaiah, former Union Home Secretary and presently Director of Centre for Human Security Studies (CHSS).
“There is no coordination between premier intelligence agencies such as the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) and the Intelligence Bureau (IB). It is even worse between these agencies and the State police or, for that matter, with various Defence and central police intelligence departments,” he said while delivering a lecture on “India’s coastal and cyber security challenges” at GITAM University here on Wednesday.
“Every terrorist or extremist would have been arrested by the police of some State in one case or the other at some point of time. In the absence of coordination and intelligence sharing, tracking such terrorists becomes difficult,” he said.
“Similar is the case with coastal security. There are multiple agencies such as Coastal Security Police, Marine Police, Coast Guard, and Navy. But there is hardly any coordination or sharing of intelligence between them,” he said.
“Whether it is Mumbai terror attack in 2008 or Mumbai serial blasts in 1993, there were intelligence inputs. In fact, a few days before the serial blasts, the Nav Pada Police had arrested a small-time gangster by name Gul Noor Mohammad Sheikh. During interrogation, he had confessed to being part of the serial blast team. He had also given information on the impending blasts. But it was not shared with other agencies as each was busy protecting its own turf,” said Mr. Padmanabhaiah.
