Editorial Board Contents - Bureau of Police Research and ...

an Intelligence agency. He used to emphasize forinstance, that in Intelligence ‘there is no substituteto reading’. The logic here is that you cannotdiscard information or data before examining it.The ability to sieve through the material, as youare going over it, is important. I recall that oneof the Chiefs of IB, would scan a report so fastthat we thought he had taken a course in rapidreading.An Intelligence organization remains anonymousby choice. This flows from the principle thatwhat it knows about the adversary, proves tobe an advantage, only so long as it is handledconfidentially. Anonymity and its upshot, thelack of recognition in public, are two basicfeatures of management, not built into any otherorganization of the Government. One littleadvantage an Intelligence officer might enjoy atthe social level is that people might regard himas being privy to some exciting information or tosome sensational subterranean action. A reticentsmile to the occasional leading question, isregarded as the display of professional perfectionand leaving a party early, an evidence of someextremely important call of duty. I recall howa family friend of ours in the late seventies hada hazy idea that I was an officer of the rank ofDirector in the Ministry’s hierarchy and that I wasconcerned with the problem of communal riots. Iwas amused when at a dinner party at his househe introduced me to some guests, and addedthat I was the Director of communal riots in theGovernment.My three years as Joint Director heading theZonal SIB at Chandigarh, between 1986 and1989, gave me a hands-on experience of Punjab,during a highly disturbed situation there. Thehighly successful operation, "Black Thunder",was designed in a way that would totallyeliminate the chances of any collateral damage.In recognition of the success of the counterterrorismefforts in Punjab, the Governor firstrecommended the award of Padma Shri to thePolice officers of the State and in the followingyear made the same recommendation for theheads of central organizations stationed atChandigarh who had contributed to this success.The officers of the BSF and CRPF got the award,and in a subsequent year the then DIB also gota Padma Shri.An Intelligence organization attaches equalimportance to operational skills and the abilitiesto communicate information to the actiontakers.Security fails, if there is a failure of eithercommunication or action. An interesting aspectof communication of intelligence is that theIntelligence organization willingly assumes theextended responsibility of ensuring not only thatthe report reaches the recipient, but also that itattracts the attention of the action takers. I recallhow an important piece of actionable intelligencein relation to the goings-on in the state of J&K,failed to evoke a prompt action compelling me,as DIB, to request the highest executive to havethe matter looked into. The failure of action wasdetected in the unavoidable long turn aroundperiod that the nearest armed force unit required,on the ground. Necessary corrective deploymentwas then made for the future, in line with theprinciple that security must always learn fromexperience.Reference to J&K also reminds me of a plenarymeeting, chaired by the then Prime MinisterLate P V Narsimha Rao, in connection with thedevelopments in the State. The meeting wasattended among others by the Governor and theArmy Chief. There was a strong line of suggestionin favour of a particular course of action. The PMwent along with my view, as DIB, that we shouldwait a while longer. When pressed for taking animmediate decision, the PM famously remindedthe gathering that ‘not taking a decision is also adecision’.Intelligence being an instrument of nationalsecurity does not cross the path of politics. Theonly reason, why in a democratic system a studyof the political spectrum from the point of viewof security might be in order, is that arrangementsmust exist to detect subversion by alien forces forcausing political instability to the detriment ofinternal security. India is a strong nation and atested democracy where there are no such fears.In the last week of June, 1996, while I wasout of the country attending the first SAARCSecurity Conference at Colombo, as DIB, thethen PM assigned me the Chairmanship of JIC,a technically higher post, being in the rank ofSecretary to Government of India. JIC was anenriching experience.The Indian Police Journal, October - December, 2012, Special Issue 55