Ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to the United States, the Home Ministry signed an agreement on Thursday to join the global terror database maintained by the Terrorist Screening Center (TSC) of the U.S.
Mr. Modi will be on a two-day visit to the country on June 7 and 8.
“An arrangement between the authorised governmental agencies of the Government of India and the Government of the United States of America for exchange of terrorist screening information was signed here today. The arrangement was signed by Union Home Secretary Rajiv Mehrishi and Richard Verma, Ambassador of the United States of America to India,” a press statement issued by the Home Ministry said.
The U.S. has already finalised such agreements with 30 countries and the Terrorist Screening Center has details of 11,000 terror suspects on its database, including nationality, date of birth, photos, finger prints (if any) and passport number.
Under this arrangement, both sides will give each other access to terrorism screening information through designated contact points, subject to domestic laws and regulations, said the statement.
The proposal was initially made by the U.S. in 2012, but had made little progress due to objections raised by security agencies.
The Research and Analysis Wing (R&AW) and Intelligence Bureau (IB) had opposed giving the United States unhindered access to the database of terror suspects in India.
