Who gains from NCTC? Not the people

The National Counter Terrorism Centre (NCTC) debate has consolidated the arguments into the states versus Centre. The states and the Centre are claiming to hold the best interest of the citizens and therefore, are best suited and equipped to protect them from terrorism. While discussion and debate on this - for real or upcoming 2014 election purpose - may continue, the citizens of India must be better armed with information.

I was in the forests of Thailand with some of the active disaster risk reduction professionals from Israel to Solomon Islands, totaling eleven countries (all the countries blessed with terrorism, anti-terrorism authorities and laws and citizens questioning the whole effort). Though our formal discussion was around sustainability of disaster resilient initiative such as making schools safer after Tsunami in Maldives or Sri Lanka and after cyclone in Myanmar or Indonesia, we discussed other matters that often started after the main session and into the slow meals. Let me capture what came up in discussion.

First, terrorism is not explained well and enough to the citizens of most countries. Citizens are told about how bad the impact is and this fear is nurtured well and deep. Citizens face the violent acts and suffer loss of life. But widespread understanding of what is terrorism, why it comes up, who supports it, and why authorities need more power to suppress it remain unclear to most citizens. People share the fear of terrorism and this fear is enough for authorities to make citizens agree to accept any new authority or law or tools or tax or top-down control measure. This strikingly high level of ignorance about terrorism is the biggest handicap of citizens to think about ways of addressing terrorism and most convenient to the authorities to keep the
citizens away.

Second, most measures to dig out terrorism in fact institutionalises it. Once you have an authority, it needs terrorism to start work, expand, attract more resources, and become prosperous. More money is spent on policy analysis and review making strategic counter terrorism plans, developing operational guidelines for controlling terrorism, and so on. Anti-terrorism authorities have grown everywhere. Nowhere terrorism or its threat has decreased. Terrorism is institutionalised with plans, staff, and budgets. Where is the evidence to show that anti-terrorism authorities have reduced terrorism? And when terrorism is reduced, it is due to many other factors but none of the dominant factor points to the effective performance of authorities. A chair of his country's largest emergency health van service said that the suppliers of what is called "security infrastructure" have no interest in reducing terrorism. And these suppliers are worldwide.

Third, no single agency can stop or reduce terrorism. Anti-terrorism acts call for joint action. And such authorities are patently poor at partnership. The anti-terrorism authorities do not make effective partnerships across various departments of the government but more importantly with the citizens. Such authorities develop stronger vested interest but do not develop a stronger community of practitioners. Such authorities forge partnerships that are poor in scope and performance; their partnerships are overtly centralised, poorly governed, and push out citizens from most processes.

A professional beekeeper with rehabilitation experience in coastal cyclones and now working with teenagers who grew up in an extended civil conflict pointed out how much teenagers had to offer in terms of ways to keep their peers away from terrorism.

But who is listening? Hardly any victims of terrorism or his or her family is asked about what they think is the way out. Nor the terrorist or his/her family is asked what it will take to heal the wounds and lower the levels of reasons that lead to terrorism.

Sure, these two cannot be the only two sources of information for making decision about NCTC. At the same time they cannot be totally kept out of the process without a decisive say in shaping NCTC.

Are we reduced to a nation that wants to stop terrorism by spending money on policing for the singular purpose of pushing economic reforms ahead and GDP upward? Perhaps it is time for the citizens to have a better and launder say in this ongoing Centre versus the states debate around NCTC.

The author is a city-based disaster mitigation expert