Chidambaram on Wednesday made it clear that he is ready to wait for the NCTC but will not compromise on its powers to search and arrest.
Union home minister P Chidambaram on Wednesday made it clear that he is ready to wait for the National Counter Terrorism Centre but will not compromise on its powers to search and arrest as they are the bare minimum requirement for agency’s operational capability.
“If NCTC must have counter terror operational capacity then it must have bare minimum powers to search and arrest,” he said explaining the NCTC will be required to hand over an arrested person to the local police without unnecessary delay. To draw home the importance of NCTC, Chidambaram revealed busting of a Lashkar-e-Toiba plot to bomb crowded localities by central agencies and Delhi police. The LeT module was planning to detonate bombs in one or two crowded localities. But this is only initial information, sustained interrogation will reveal more, he said adding it is to deal with such situation the country requires NCTC.
Hoping to resolve NCTC logjam during home secretary RK Singh’s meeting with state chief secretaries and DGPs on March 9-10, Chidambaram indicated that it may probably take longer than expected to get a positive message from the chief ministers who have opposed the NCTC.
“I am a very patient man. I have been patient since December 2009 and I am ready to be patient for some more time,” he said. The home minister tried to clarify certain misgivings about NCTC when he was asked whether its power to arrest will be open to judicial scrutiny.
“Only the operations wing of the NCTC will be given the power under 43(A). And immediately after arrest, the persons have to be handed over to the nearest police station then the case will be registered in the nearest police station. You don’t anticipate any legal difficulty. This has been examined carefully by the Intelligence Bureau,” Chidambaram said.
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