Home Min for two-pronged plan to deal with Naxals

New Delhi: Identifying terrorism, insurgency in the Northeast and Naxal violence as the three biggest challenges facing the country, Home Minister P Chidambaram on Monday said state governments need to do more to stamp out the threats to India's internal security.

"Let me recall the three challenges to internal security. Firstly, terrorism; secondly, insurgency in the North-eastern states; and thirdly, Left wing extremism or naxalism," Chidambaram said while addressing chief ministers at the internal security conclave.

"Our collective record has been a mixed one. Our best achievements have been in the reiteration of our determination to fight terror, in the sharing of intelligence, in the unanimous support for new laws and new instruments; and in acknowledging that police reforms have been neglected for too long," he said.

"On the other hand, there are still critical deficiencies in budget allocations for the police, recruitment, training, procurement of equipment, introduction of technology, and personnel management."

Detailing the steps taken by states to counter these challenges, the home minister emphasised that better intelligence and preparedness was required to thwart potential terror attacks.

"We have one instrument to confront and defeat the three challenges, and that is the police. In the final analysis, it is the policeman and the policewoman who will help us win these battles," said Chidambaram.

"To that policeman and policewoman, this conference must send out a clear message that government at every level is duty bound to provide them every kind of support -- monetary, material and moral."

The Home Minister pointed out that in seven-and-a-half months, over 303 men and women belonging to the police and paramilitary forces had died while battling terror.

The Home Minister stressed that state governments were not pitching hard enough to the tasks ahead, especially the task of removing deficiencies.

"While preparing for this conference, we had circulated a questionnaire to the state governments requesting them to indicate the present status under a number of heads and on a number of issues. I regret to point out that the response from the states is far from satisfactory, and I am sure chief ministers would have reached more or less the same conclusion," he said.

Echoing Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's warning that cross-border terrorism was still a major threat, Chidambaram said the threat of terror had not vanished or receded.

"It is better intelligence and better preparedness that have helped us thwart potential terror attacks. We have cracked several terror modules and made several significant arrests, but the gravity of the threat is undiminished. We cannot afford to lower our guard, and we shall not."

On insurgency in the Northeast, the home minister lamented there had not been much progress.

"I regret to say that I cannot report much progress in the North-eastern states. At times, we find that some state governments have allowed themselves to bend before insurgent groups, making the fight against insurgency that much more difficult."

He pointed out that state-specific strategies would be drawn up to deal with the insurgent groups in the three most affected states of Assam, Nagaland and Manipur.

Chidambaram pointed out that an elaborate counter-offensive operation would be launched in Maoist strongholds especially when the country had witnessed 1,128 incidents of Maoist-related violence till June 30 leaving 455 civilians and security forces dead.

"We believe in the two-pronged approach of development and police action. However, the naxalites are anti-development and have targeted the very instruments of development - school buildings, roads, telephone towers," he said.

"Our response therefore will be police action to wrest control of territory that is now dominated by the Naxalities, restoration of civil administration and undertaking developmental activities - in that order."

A separate session has been earmarked for discussion on issues related to Left wing extremism where chief ministers from the seven affected states will interact with Chidambaram.

The states are Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra, Orissa, Bihar and West Bengal.