Respected Prime Minister, Hon'ble Union Home Minister, fellow Chief Ministers, Ministers from the States, Senior Officers of the Government of India and the States.

At the outset, I would like to thank the Hon'ble Prime Minister and the Union Home Minister for convening this important meeting to take the State Governments into confidence and involve them as full partners in the process of operationalisation of NCTC which is aimed at addressing the challenges posed by Terrorism.

Terrorism knows no physical boundaries. As we all understand, terrorists operate across Districts, States and Countries, taking advantage of inherent weaknesses in co-ordination among various agencies of the Districts, the States and the Centre.

If India, as a nation have to fight terrorism effectively, we need to look beyond the physical boundaries of the States and ensure that there is a seamless co-ordination among various Agencies dealing with counter terrorism, between the Districts within the State and between the States within the Country on 24 x 7 basis.

As policy makers, we all need to work at evolving a zero tolerance framework against terrorist violence. While evolving this framework, we need to treat the challenges of terrorism as apolitical issues by being more mature and accommodative. Out of every 100 attempts made by a terrorist to strike, security agencies may succeed 99 times in neutralizing the threat but their inability to prevent one attempt may cause a great disaster to the fragile fabric of the Indian society.

The repercussions of a terrorist attack are not only confined to the loss of life and the property, but it affects the overall psyche of the nation in terms of physical and emotional well being. At a time when the country is facing serious challenges from terrorist violence, the concept of NCTC is a timely and well planned initiative to evolve a zero tolerance frame work against terrorist violence.

NCTC would lead our nation's effort to combat terrorism by analyzing the threat, sharing that information with all partner States and Agencies and integrating all instruments of counter terrorism to ensure unity of effort and purpose. NCTC will act as a repository of all information relating to terrorism including the data pertaining to the incidents of terrorist violence.     NCTC is expected to provide a common platform for integrating, analyzing and sharing all intelligence pertaining to counter terrorism.

Objections have been raised over empowering of the NCTC with search, seizure and arrest. These powers already exist under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) as amended from time to time including the latest amendments made during the year 2008. The recent order of the Government of India on NCTC only operationalises the provisions of the law in terms of their implementation. The power of search, seizure and arrest under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) is confined only to the offences listed under UAP Act relating to Counter Terrorism.

The powers of NCTC in terms of search, seizure and arrests should be read with the requirement that every such arrest made or seizure done should be forwarded by the officer of NCTC to the SHO of the nearest police station without any delay who in turn will take action as per the law based on the evidence available. The SHO of the local police station is well within his powers to take action strictly in accordance with the law based on evidence available. This will act as safeguard against all apprehensions in regard to centre usurping the powers of the State.

The NCTC which is expected to deal with counter terrorism effectively, must have necessary operational capability especially in situations where the terrorists are about to strike, escape, flee from the country etc. The powers of search, seizure, arrest for the officers of the NCTC is only confined to the areas of counter terrorism so as to prevent the possibility of an imminent terror strike or prevent escape of suspect due to delay, lack of co-ordination, leakage of information etc.

In all other situations, the intelligence agencies are bound to take the help of local police for effecting searches, seizures, arrests etc., in pursuance of  the information available with them. The Standing Council comprising of officers of Central Agencies as well as the State Agencies envisaged under NCTC will ensure effective inter-state and centre-state co-ordination in all counter terrorism related operations.

Further, for effective functioning of the NCTC, Standard operating Procedure (SOPs) have also been designed.  Depending upon the functioning of the NCTC, the SOPs may be modified or additional guidelines will be recommended by the Standing Council for its effective functioning. Given the structure and functions of NCTC, it will act as an effective agency for control and co-ordination of all counter terrorism measures including 1) Integrating of Intelligence pertaining to terrorism 2) Analysis 3) Effective response through intelligence based operations.

The apprehension that the Centre is encroaching upon the powers of the States is not based on sound reasoning in the present context. I am confident that once NCTC is operationalised, it will function as smoothly as other central agencies like NIA which has been investigating several cases of terrorist attacks across many states in the country.