Security Issues
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U.S. to help India face new security challenges
Washington has agreed to throw open its specialised agencies for advanced training in a range of skills Three months after the U.S.-India Homeland Security Dialogue in Washington, India is all set to send its officers to various agencies across American federal organisations to sharpen their skills and acquire new ones to fight terrorism. Indian officials and security officers would soon be visiting the U.S. for training in an array of courses — from cyber security, megacity policing and forensics, to critical infrastructure protection, financial terrorism and anti-terrorism intelligence. The U.S. government has agreed to give Indian officers access to its specialised agencies under the Department of Homeland Security, particularly the Georgia-headquartered Federal Law Enforcement Training Centres (FLETC), to help them deal with the changing face of international terrorism. “The dialogue between Union Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde and U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano in Washington in May this year paved the way for this cooperation... Through these specialised training programmes, India will gradually build an army of experts who can handle new technologies and mechanism to deal with various kinds of terrorism and antinational activities,” a senior Home Ministry official told The Hindu. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security, created after the 9/11 terror attack, along with the FLETC has fashioned several advanced courses. “We have identified around a dozen departments and organisations whose officials would take part in these programmes... The U.S. has also agreed to help us in creating specialised training institutions to develop skills in various anti-terrorism measures. Sharing of technology for technical surveillance, capacity building and technology development will also be a part of the U.S.-India cooperation,” the official said. Broadly, the U.S. programmes will deal with four aspects of terrorism — ‘Global supply chain, transportation, port, border and maritime security,’ ‘Megacity policing and sharing of information among federal, State and local partners,’ ‘Illicit finance, smuggling of cash, financial fraud and counterfeiting,’and ‘Cyber security and critical infrastructure protection.’ Indian officials who will participate in these programmes will be drawn from various law enforcement agencies and government departments, including the National Security Council Secretariat, the National Investigation Agency, the Intelligence Bureau, the National Technical Research Organisation, the Central Bureau of Investigation, the paramilitary and State police forces, the Customs, the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB), the Enforcement Directorate, the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI), the Ministry of Telecom and Information Technology, the Coast Guard and the Bureau of Civil Aviation Security. “The list of training programmes include ‘Land Transportation Anti-terrorism’; ‘Weapons of Mass Destruction’; ‘Seaport Security’; ‘International Border Interdiction Training’ and ‘International Sea Interdiction Training’ to check smuggling and trafficking; ‘Handling of equipment for screening men
against radiological, chemical and explosive materials’ and ‘Handling of intrusive detection at airports and seaports.’ The NCB and the DRI officials will be trained on detection of narcotic drugs, currency, arms and ammunition and other contraband through canine squads. There is also a plan to set up a Customs Canine Training Academy,” the official said. Megacity policing With the growing population in cities and increasing threat perception, the U.S. has also offered India to help develop the concept of megacity policing, a step it has been promoting since the 9/11 attacks. “An advance course in surveillance, control room design and its operation by various security agencies and police authorities are key elements of this concept. A high-level workshop is being planned for senior police and intelligence officers from both sides in megacity policing. Similarly, various agencies involved in emergency services will also be trained on public safety and crisis management, while specialised Operation Security for Public Safety Agencies Counter Terrorism Training Programme and Critical Incident Response Training Programme jointly by the FLETC and the U.S. Border and Custom Protection are also being planned,” the official said. Another area of focus would be in cyber security and critical infrastructure protection, where training modules would comprise best practices in cyber security and cyber forensics, advance course in technical surveillance counter measures, control systems security programme for end-toend network and systems security for servers, routers, switches, transmission and all information and communication technology (ICT) hubs and facilities. An ambitious collaboration plan for setting up an advance institute for master trainers in the area of encryption/decryption was also in the pipeline. For critical infrastructure protection, the programmes planned are for sectors like ICT; oil and energy; telecom; banking and financial services; civil aviation and transport where technocrats and officials from concerned ministries will be trained.
Law Enforcement And Intelligence Agencies And Cyber Security Best Practices In India
Intelligence agencies and law enforcement technology in India is still trying to catch up with the contemporary law enforcement requirements. Law enforcement and intelligence agencies of India must also establish and follow cyber security best practices for their investigations. Cyber security best practices in India are still to be established. Similarly, we have no dedicated cyber security laws in India. We must ensure cyber law awareness in India andcyber security awareness in India. The cyber security policy of India is yet to be formulated and implemented. There is an urgent need to establish the cyber security infrastructure of India. Fortunately, a legislation mandating strict cyber security disclosure norms in India is in pipeline. Further,regulations and guidelines for effective investigation of cyber crimes in India may also be prescribed very soon. Cyber attacks against India have increased significantly. Recently, the computer systems of DRDO and security officials were breached and sensitive files were leaked. Further,companies and banks in India are not reporting cyber attacks, cyber crimes and cyber frauds. The real impact and consequences of cyber attacks against India are not ascertainable in these circumstances. A crisis management plan of India for cyber attacks and cyber terrorism is need of the hour. The same may be helpful in investigating not only cyber terrorism cases in India but also cases of traditional terrorist activities. Institutions like national cyber coordination centre (NCCC) of India, national counter terrorism centre (NCTC) of India, etc may be helpful in preventing cyber attacks against India. Further, these institutions may also help in acquiring the offensive and defensive cyber security capabilities in India. However, there is an urgent need develop cyber security skills development in India andtechno legal skills development in India of law enforcement and intelligence agencies of India. Further, parliamentary oversight of intelligence agencies of India is also required. Recently, the national investigation agency (NIA) of India published an advertisement in a newspaper that many labelled as lacking professionalism and good cyber security practice. In the advertisement, NIA had announced a reward of Rs 10 lakh for information on the 21 February Hyderabad blasts. In addition to the landline phone number and postal address of its Hyderabad branch, the agency has given a gmail id on which people can send information/ leads that will help apprehend those responsible for the blasts. On the face of it this seems to be a normal advertisement. But from the perspective of cyber security, this is a nightmare. If NIA is receiving such sensitive information on servers of third party private companies this may compromise not only the blast investigation but also make the sensitive
information so received susceptible to third party scrutiny without even India or NIA knowing the same. In the absence of uniform email ids provided by the national informatics centre (NIC), it is a common practice for government departments to exchange information on servers of private companies. The only solace in this situation is the fact that it is much easier to crack NIC servers than cracking the servers of Google. Recently Indian national informatics centre’s (NIC) server were compromised and used to attack computers of other nations. NIC has to make its cyber security more robust and resilient. However, this does not mean that NIA or Indian government agencies must host their emails upon third party servers. India must invest upon developing its cyber security infrastructure and all sensitive emails must be sent and received through such infrastructure alone. In United States the proposed laws like Computer Fraud and Abuse Act 2013 would provide many esurveillance powers to US law enforcement and intelligence agencies. Even existing laws of US would allow law enforcement and intelligence agencies to do eavesdropping without court warrant in many circumstances. Further, in US e-surveillance and eavesdropping has become very easy by active use of executive orders. Even the controversial cyber intelligence sharing and protection act (CISPA) would allow sharing of sensitive information by network service providers (NSPs) with the intelligence agencies very easy. In the past, the White House threatened to veto the CISPA if Congress approves it in its current form. Through a statement of administration policy on cyber intelligence sharing and protection act (CISPA), the Obama administration said CISPA treats domestic cyber security as an intelligence activity whereas it should be a civilian one. CISPA was reintroduced to the US House in February 2013 that would allow the exchange of electronic information between Internet service providers and US government possible. TheWhite House has threatened to veto the cyber security law, CISPA, once again citing privacy concerns. When US is so serious about civil liberties why cannot India be serious about the same? Let us hope that Indian cyber security infrastructure would be established very soon and NIA would use well secure Indian e-mail infrastructure to deal with its internal communications.
Coastal Maritime Security Initiatives
Introduction Since Nov 2008, several initiatives have been taken by the Government to strengthen security of the coastal areas against threat of non-state actors from the sea. One of the most significant achievements has been the integration of all maritime stakeholders, including several State and Central agencies into the new coastal security mechanism.Indian Navy has established four Joint Operations Centres (JOC) at Mumbai, Visakhapatnam, Kochi and Port Blair. As a result of this there is good coordination, synergy and understanding between all agencies. All coastal security operations are now coordinated from the Joint Operations Centre, which are manned round the clock by Naval and Coast Guard teams. In addition, the State Marine Police and other agencies such as Customs, Intelligence Bureau and Ports etc. are also networked with these centres. Awareness Campaigns In a focussed drive, to integrate the fishermen community into the coastal security structure, awareness campaigns have been carried out in coastal villages across the country since 2009. Navy, Coast Guard and State Police teams have visited coastal villages and fishermen have been made aware of possible threats from the sea and their important role towards strengthening coastal security. This has paid rich dividends in last few years as there have been many incidents, reported by them, leading to successful interceptions. Surveillance patrols There has been a significant increase in the coastal surveillance patrols by Naval and Coast Guard ships and aircraft. Patrols by the Indian Navy and Coast guard are closely coordinated so as to optimise their efforts and keep the entire coast under surveillance. Marine Police of each coastal state and CISF units deployed in major ports are also assisting in carrying out patrols closer to the coast and in harbours. Coastal Security Exercises In order to periodically review the readiness of the security agencies and the state administrations in thwarting threats from inimical elements, the Indian Navy has taken the lead in conducting coastal security exercises in every coastal states and in the Island territories in conjunction with the Coast Guard, Marine Police, Customs, and Immigration and Port Authorities etc. During these exercises several contingency scenarios are simulated, including hijacking of fishing crafts, landing of terrorists on the coast, stowaways on ships etc. All agencies with stake in coastal security participate in these exercises with a view to improve coordination, achieve integration and finally improve the coastal security mechanism. As a result of these exercises and drills, there has been a significant improvement in the coordination between all the agencies.
India’s Security Challenges A Futuristic Perspective
An essay by Ram Sevak, IIM Bangalore, Bangalore 1. INTRODUCTION “If you know your enemies and know yourself, you will not be imperiled in a hundred battles; if you do not know your enemies but do know yourself, you will win one and lose one; if you do not know your enemies nor yourself, you will be imperiled in every single battle” The Art of War, Sun Tzu (6th Century BC), Chinese general and military strategist India is widely believed to have arrived on the global stage. In fact, if one goes by the popular press both domestic and foreign, it is very difficult to not get swayed by the euphony being generated about India and her inevitable ascendance to rightful place in the comity of nations. Nonetheless this essay attempts to desist from merely joining the self-congratulatory chorus and instead objectively analyses the security threats - external, internal, covert and overt, state and non-state - posed to our country. Therefore at the outset, it must be emphasized though I am a strong believer in the idea of India, her resilience and ability to resurrect from every conceivable threat she has faced in the last two millennia; the essay tries to adopt a pragmatic strategist’s approach in the analysis of country’s security environment. As most of the armies of the world adopt, the paper bases the quantum of threat posed by a security threat through its capability and interest and not by purported intention. We will explicitly list all security threats as well as economic, social, political and technological factors that can give rise to an increased security threat level. We will first analyze external and then internal security threats before evaluating which of the two, if at all, be more threatening to India in the coming decades. 2. EXTERNAL SECURITY THREATS TO INDIA India has the disadvantage of being situated in close proximity to what is being described as “the epicenter of global terrorism” . Tribal region near the Afghanistan-Pakistan border is constantly drawing attention of America’s Global War on Terror (GWOT) since 2001. India’s increasing relevance to the US strategic canvas, troubled relationship with Pakistan since the independence of the country, deteriorating and unpredictable relationship with China, unstable political climate in Nepal along with Maoist insurgency, mistrustful relationship with Bangladesh, civil-war ravaged and still-healing Sri Lanka, authoritarian Myanmar have rendered any fair estimation of Indian preparedness to deal with these security challenges an onerous task. We will now analyze capabilities and interests of each of these players and then asses their influence on India’s strategic calculations. 2.1 THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA India’s relationship with the sole military and economic superpower of the world has been on the
rise during the previous decade. A new shift in Indo-US relations was witnessed during President Clinton’s visit in 2000, fortified by Presidents Bush and Obama’s visit to the country. That said, although India remains ideologically non-committal to signing the CTBT and NPT regime; there has been tremendous improvement in the nuclear energy field through singing the Indo-US Nuclear Treaty in 2006. The US has always been a practitioner of hard real-politick, its policies have always been defined by its own interests in the region. The US support to Pakistan’s military through CEATO arrangements in 1960s, later President Nixon’s visit to China in Feb 1972 which was secretly facilitated by Pakistan and resulted in melting the ice between the two nations, support to Pakistan‘s defense apparatus and Taliban through 1980s and now military offensive in the Af-Pak tribal region have all been calibrated on the US self-interests. All these steps have had a profound impact on India’s external security environment. The continued US presence in our North-West border is cited to be one of the main reasons behind Pakistan’s belligerent attitude in the aftermath of the Parliament attack in 2001 and 26/11mayhem in 2008. The Pakistani Army knows Indian options are severely limited to strike across Pakistani territory owing to military assistance she is providing to GWOT. Apart from limiting India’s punitive capability against Pakistan for its sponsoring terrorist attacks and their infrastructure in India, the US has also provided substantial financial and military to Pakistan which have adverse consequences to our strategic calculations. Nonetheless the US is likely to dominate world affairs for at least another two decades. India has to work towards minimizing adverse impact of the US-Pak assistance on our external security. On a lighter note, India should emphasize to the US that for fighting tribal insurgents in its North-Western region; Pakistan does not need F-16s and nuclear submarines! 2.2 PEOPLE’S REPUBLIC OF CHINA Indo-China relations have been marked with distrust and fear on both sides after 1962 border clash which resulted in China usurping Aksai Chin area in J&K giving it easy road access from the Tibetan plateau to remote Xinxiang region in the West. Additionally China’s rise in the past three decades has given it tremendous weight in international political and security circles. China has patiently been working towards building military-economic and political alliances around India’s periphery – termed as “strings of pearl strategy”. China remains India’s number one security threat. It has provided consistent military assistance to Pakistan for use against India, funded armed rebels in the North-East and has continued to up the ante in diplomatic circles through stapled visas, visa denials and spying on Tibetan Diaspora in India. Although India needs to be sensitive towards Chinese sensitivities towards Tibet, India has failed to play an assertive role in communicating its interests to the Chinese side. On the other hand, China has built up superior civilian and military infrastructure along Indo-Tibet border. Our defense preparedness vis-à-vis China leaves much to be desired. As has rightly been enunciated by one of our Army Chiefs , the possibility of Two-Front War scenario with both Pakistan and China should be factored in while preparing our doctrine of war and operational readiness. To match China’s might and thwart any misadventure from our Northern neighbor, we should invest heavily in our infrastructure in border areas, phase out obsolete military hardware, raise at least 3
mountain divisions for the Eastern sector and shore up anti-ballistic missile capability through expedited Agni programs. Fortunately Indian economy’s healthy growth in the past decade has ensured greater defense outlay but even now our defense budget at 2.1% is way below 4.5% and 4.7% of Pakistani and Chinese budgets as % of their respective GDP and even the allocated funds do not get fully utilized for modernizing the forces but for the lack of speedy and transparent procurement procedures. A look at the following chart shows the yawning gap between the defense expenditures of China and India . China is widely known to have unders tated its publicly announced defense budgets. The defense expenditure for Pakistan does not include capital outlay hence actual spending should be higher than shown here. Hence the need to selectively utilize our limited defense outlay for maximizing lethality of our forces.
To that end recent successful trial of indigenously designed and developed Light Combat Aircraft (LCA) Tejas is a welcome development. Similarly other big-ticket purchases for example C130s and Medium Multi-Role Combat Aircraft (MMRCAs) should also be expedited for induction into the Indian Air Force. Indian Navy’s recent announcement of forming an Andaman specific command is a right step towards influencing Malacca strait area which can be one of the pressure points on the Chinese Navy in the event of a prolonged conflict. But our Navy needs much awaited aircraft career to project military power away from the shores. Unfortunately Russian aircraft carrier Gorshkov is waiting for about a decade for acquisition. Other steps should be towards economically integrating countries in our immediate neighborhood to balance strategic Chinese investment in these countries. A strong political will is required to transform the forces and provide them necessary resources to successfully face the challenges on the external front.
2.3 PAKISTAN The perennial challenge before Indian defense apparatus to manage external covert and overt threat from Pakistan does not need any emphasis. Since the birth of that country, we have fought them four times in war - 1948, 1965, 1971 and 1998. Besides the country is facing low intensity conflict in J&K abetted and sponsored by Pakistani military, in the North-East and through support to various fringe extremist group within the country. The country also faces huge challenge before its economy in the form of fake rackets being operated from Karachi and Dubai and widely believed to have blessings of Pakistan’s infamous Inter-Services Intelligence – its external spy agency. As the following chart shows, though in absolute terms terrorism related deaths in India have shown a decline; the potential for disturbing communal harmony within the country through such machinations cannot be underestimated. The fatalities here include all three kinds of death – civilians, security forces personnel and the terrorists . We will during the later part of the article explore how external agencies with covert or overt support from nefarious elements within the country can potentially destabilize the security situation.
Thus Pakistan remains one of our principle worries at both external and internal security fronts. Besides on the basis of its long-standing strategic partnership with China, it can stretch our armed forces capabilities in the Eastern sector. The modernization plans of Karakoram highway, the development of Gwadar as a n aval port by the Chinese Navy and covert assistance to Pakistan’s nuclear and missile program are on the anvil; these two countries should be watched very carefully in our defense planning. Rapid implementation of the mooted Cold-Start Strategy should be pursued by the forces to neutralize Pakistani threat quickly in a two-front war scenario and deny the bigger neighbor to our North an advantage from the Western sector. 2.4 IMMEDIATE NEIGHBORHOOD
Unfortunately our other neighbors with the exception of Bhutan also don’t provide any succor to military planners and political leaders and are equally as challenging as China and Pakistan. While Nepal is in the grip of political turmoil since the ouster of unpopular King Gyanendra, India has to play its cards carefully lest it be seen with a big brother agenda. India and Nepal share an open boundary with free exchange of people and currency across the borders. Although few contentious points remain in the Indo-Nepalese relations; they should not be allowed to obstruct our efforts in ensuring political stability in this strategically important neighbor of hours. Perhaps Indian leftist parties can be utilized by the Central government to persuade Maoist leadership in Nepal to desist from mollycoddling too much with the Chinese to our and Nepal’s detriment. Bangladesh on the other hand is showing signs of delivering on the stated policy of the Government of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina of not letting her country’s soil for anti-India activities. Bangladesh has recently handed over many high profile terrorist leaders hiding in their country. India has also reciprocated with huge USD 1 billion economic assistance in the form of line of credit to Bangladesh . But India should actively continue to manage her somewhat uneasy relationship with the Opposition leader in Bangladesh former PM Mrs. Begum Khalida Zia. Seeking active Bangladeshi cooperation in destroying the terrorist infrastructure of Harkat-ul-Jihad-al Islami (HuJI) remains a challenge for Indian security agencies. Although India at first neglected their relationship with Burmese military rulers, there have been improvements in the past few years in our bilateral relations. China has been investing in Kyaukryu and Sittwe as commercial ports on the west coast close to our NE states. Both of these ports can be used as a naval base and should be a cause of concern. India also needs to co-opt Myanmar for curbing the North Eastern rebel groups e.g. NSCN, ULFA and Manipur rebels which find shelter in dense forests along the international border. For that increased economic and military cooperation without inviting international limelight is a challenge as recently the US has started objecting to our strengthening relationship with the junta. India also faces competition from China in keeping Sri Lanka attuned to our interests. The recently finished Civil War in the North-East Sri Lanka has incurred huge emotional and economic costs for the Indian Tamils. Thus encouraging cordial linguistic relations in Sri Lanka through persuading Lankan government towards equitable distribution of resources and fair treatment of ethnic minorities is a priority for Indian foreign policy mandarins. Bhutan has demonstrated sensibilities to our concerns by wiping off ULFA rebels in their territory in 2003 and India rightly assists in their economic, social and defense developments. Similarly India should also manage our closest ally during the Cold War era – Russia – to counterbalance China and procuring critical defense supplies. 3.INTERNAL SECURITY THREATS TO INDIA India’s internal security challenges can be categorized under two heads – insurgency and extremism. We will explore the internal security threats to India in these lines. 3.1 INSURGENCY India faces huge challenges in dousing the insurgency fires in many parts of the country – from the dense forests of Central India covering Chattisgarh, Jharkhand, few districts in Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, few parts of Andhra Pradesh (so called Red Corridor) to North-East India. We all know the
Pakistani sponsored and mooted terrorist activities in the state of J&K since 1989. Besides there are dozens of militant groups in ethnically diverse North Eastern part of the country. Indian strategy so far has been to first let a state handle its law and order situation and intervene only in cases of extreme urgency. This strategy needs a rethink because of signs of consolidation among many of the freedom-seekers e.g. there are indications that Maoists have tried to forge ties with Kashmiri separatists and ULFA to synergize their activities. Furthermore as Left-Wing Extremism (LWE) in India stretches has their proximity to important cities and both north-south and east west lines of communication - termed as “potentially dangerous” by the Indian Army . Therefore for successfully tackling the menace of LWE, two pronged strategy needs to be adopted – focus on socio-economic uplift of the affected areas as it is unfulfilled promise of the Indian state to her citizens (aka Directive Principles of the State) and secondly this is one of the root-causes of the rise of Naxal movement in the Indian hinterland. Sincere efforts must be taken to implement inclusive growth as an objective of public policy. On fighting the insurgency, inter-state cooperation is a must and jurisdictional issues should not be allowed to tackle a nation-wide insurgency. Failing which, it must be emphasized India will face sever governance crisis internally and might even descend into chaos. Insurgency in NE part of the country goes till 1950s and has its genesis in the way those states were integrated into the Indian Union. Much water has since flown down the river Brahmaputra to reverse the flow of time. Inter-ethnic and inter-religious harmony should be maintained in the highly sensitive region through grass-root level participation of people. Besides illegal migration from Bangladesh rightly fuels resentment among the rightful Indian citizens and there should be no votebank politics with this critical development in Assam and other states. Otherwise changed demographics of these states can wreck havoc on the internal security of the country in the coming decades. For tackling the issue of Jammu and Kashmir, numerous tomes have been written. But in a nutshell, the issue requires firm handling from the Centre. It is widely documented that Pakistani state fuels the seeds of alienation among the Kashmiri youth. Even within the state of J&K, Jammu and Ladakh have not shown secessionist movements and are well-integrated into the mainstream. It is only the Kashmir Valley which has seen such activities and adequate focus should be given towards job creation in this region. 3.2 EXTREMISM Religious extremism is other main internal security threat to the country. Without establishing cause-and-effect for this phenomenon as do most of the Right and Left wing intellectuals, there is urgency to tackle this issue. Fair and transparent law enforcement and quick, efficient judicial apparatus are required to stem the tide of religious extremism in the country – both minority as well as majority. Recent rhetorical statements from the politicians of certain political spectrum to milk this challenge for their advantage are indeed unfortunate. Other challenges to internal security are astoundingly high level of corruption, political factionalism and caste wars – all of which require seasoned and firm political vision. 4. WHICH IS GREATER THREAT - INTERNAL OR EXTERNAL? It is indeed a complex task to determine which of the two threats will be greater for India. In fact, in
highly dynamic external security situation and rapidly evolving internal socio-economic developments, the relative strengths of these challenges cannot be determined with certainty. But one can say that an internally weak nation cannot fight an external adversary successfully. So tackling internal insurgency successfully is a greater and immediate challenge than fighting wars abroad. Continued insurgency can provide a fillip to external aggression from our adversaries sensing internal weakness. For example, left wing ultras can cripple rail and road infrastructure in the event of war and our enemies can very well factor this into their calculations. Similarly insurgencies in India are abetted and supported by our adversaries and the impact of the two challenges cannot be isolated per se. CONCLUSION As has been argued throughout this article, in area as humongous as national security it is difficult to ascertain which of the two threats – external or internal – will pose greater security threat to the country going forward. But if we take nation as an organism, to fight an external adversary internal strength is prerequisite. Internal cohesion and external defense preparedness is what gives a nation lethal power to deter a potential aggressor and preserve freedom. Indian history has shown throughout millennia, we have lost our freedom and riches by neglecting our frontiers or through internal factionalism. Any nation which is getting rich without paying adequate focus on defense invites aggression. Are our policymakers ready for the challenge to steward safely an ascendant India of the 21st Century?
The essay posted here represents the views of the author only and not of INDIA Future of Change. This is one of the winning essays from the INDIA Future of Change Essay-Writing Contest 2010-11 as evaluated by Financial Times, the knowledge partner for the contest.
National Cyber Security Policy Of India Has Failed To Protect Privacy Rights In India
The National Cyber Security Policy (NSCP), 2013 has listed many Objectives that Indian Government wishes to pursue to protect the Cyber Security Interests of India. However, from the very beginning the NCSP is facing Implementation Hurdles. The NCSP is also not holistically drafted as it is in active conflict with other Projects and Initiatives of Indian Government. For instance, consider the example of the Central Monitoring System (CMS) Project of India. The CMS Project has been launched without any Parliamentary Oversight and Legal Framework. The problem has been further aggravated due to absence of Lawful Interception Law and Privacy Laws in India. The net effect of this situation is that Indian Government and its Agencies can do willful esurveillance and phone tapping without any Parliamentary Oversight and Judicial Scrutiny. Similarly, the Unconstitutional Aadhaar Project has already been Challenged before various High Courts in India. Aadhaar Project has serious Cyber Security and Data Security Issuesthat are still
unresolved. The truth is that Biometric Collection in India is done in an Illegal and Unconstitutional Manner as on date. So we have all sorts of private and sensitive personal and biometric information lying openly with Indian Government and its Agencies without any sort of Check and Balances. In these circumstances the claims of Privacy Protection by the NCSP of India have to be judged. The NCSP claims that it aims at enabling protection of information while in process, handling, storage and transit so as to safeguard privacy of citizen’s data and for reducing economic losses due to cyber crime or data theft. The Policy is silent as to how it would be able to do so. The Policy is also silent as to how it would Balance the Civil Liberty and National Security Requirements while enforcing Indian Cyber Security. The present Mental Framework of Indian Government as well as the Regulatory Regime of India is “Anti Privacy” and “Anti Civil Liberty” in nature. Despite contrary media claims, the NSCP has maintained this position and Status Quo. In nutshell, the NCSP of India has failed to protect Privacy Right of Indian Citizens. Rather, accompanied with Projects like CMS, Aadhaar, etc it would be actually violating the same. Let us wait for its actual implementation to see its true effect upon Civil Liberties Protection in Cyberspace.
Washington has agreed to throw open its specialised agencies for advanced training in a range of skills Three months after the U.S.-India Homeland Security Dialogue in Washington, India is all set to send its officers to various agencies across American federal organisations to sharpen their skills and acquire new ones to fight terrorism. Indian officials and security officers would soon be visiting the U.S. for training in an array of courses — from cyber security, megacity policing and forensics, to critical infrastructure protection, financial terrorism and anti-terrorism intelligence. The U.S. government has agreed to give Indian officers access to its specialised agencies under the Department of Homeland Security, particularly the Georgia-headquartered Federal Law Enforcement Training Centres (FLETC), to help them deal with the changing face of international terrorism. “The dialogue between Union Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde and U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano in Washington in May this year paved the way for this cooperation... Through these specialised training programmes, India will gradually build an army of experts who can handle new technologies and mechanism to deal with various kinds of terrorism and antinational activities,” a senior Home Ministry official told The Hindu. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security, created after the 9/11 terror attack, along with the FLETC has fashioned several advanced courses. “We have identified around a dozen departments and organisations whose officials would take part in these programmes... The U.S. has also agreed to help us in creating specialised training institutions to develop skills in various anti-terrorism measures. Sharing of technology for technical surveillance, capacity building and technology development will also be a part of the U.S.-India cooperation,” the official said. Broadly, the U.S. programmes will deal with four aspects of terrorism — ‘Global supply chain, transportation, port, border and maritime security,’ ‘Megacity policing and sharing of information among federal, State and local partners,’ ‘Illicit finance, smuggling of cash, financial fraud and counterfeiting,’and ‘Cyber security and critical infrastructure protection.’ Indian officials who will participate in these programmes will be drawn from various law enforcement agencies and government departments, including the National Security Council Secretariat, the National Investigation Agency, the Intelligence Bureau, the National Technical Research Organisation, the Central Bureau of Investigation, the paramilitary and State police forces, the Customs, the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB), the Enforcement Directorate, the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI), the Ministry of Telecom and Information Technology, the Coast Guard and the Bureau of Civil Aviation Security. “The list of training programmes include ‘Land Transportation Anti-terrorism’; ‘Weapons of Mass Destruction’; ‘Seaport Security’; ‘International Border Interdiction Training’ and ‘International Sea Interdiction Training’ to check smuggling and trafficking; ‘Handling of equipment for screening men
against radiological, chemical and explosive materials’ and ‘Handling of intrusive detection at airports and seaports.’ The NCB and the DRI officials will be trained on detection of narcotic drugs, currency, arms and ammunition and other contraband through canine squads. There is also a plan to set up a Customs Canine Training Academy,” the official said. Megacity policing With the growing population in cities and increasing threat perception, the U.S. has also offered India to help develop the concept of megacity policing, a step it has been promoting since the 9/11 attacks. “An advance course in surveillance, control room design and its operation by various security agencies and police authorities are key elements of this concept. A high-level workshop is being planned for senior police and intelligence officers from both sides in megacity policing. Similarly, various agencies involved in emergency services will also be trained on public safety and crisis management, while specialised Operation Security for Public Safety Agencies Counter Terrorism Training Programme and Critical Incident Response Training Programme jointly by the FLETC and the U.S. Border and Custom Protection are also being planned,” the official said. Another area of focus would be in cyber security and critical infrastructure protection, where training modules would comprise best practices in cyber security and cyber forensics, advance course in technical surveillance counter measures, control systems security programme for end-toend network and systems security for servers, routers, switches, transmission and all information and communication technology (ICT) hubs and facilities. An ambitious collaboration plan for setting up an advance institute for master trainers in the area of encryption/decryption was also in the pipeline. For critical infrastructure protection, the programmes planned are for sectors like ICT; oil and energy; telecom; banking and financial services; civil aviation and transport where technocrats and officials from concerned ministries will be trained.
Law Enforcement And Intelligence Agencies And Cyber Security Best Practices In India
Intelligence agencies and law enforcement technology in India is still trying to catch up with the contemporary law enforcement requirements. Law enforcement and intelligence agencies of India must also establish and follow cyber security best practices for their investigations. Cyber security best practices in India are still to be established. Similarly, we have no dedicated cyber security laws in India. We must ensure cyber law awareness in India andcyber security awareness in India. The cyber security policy of India is yet to be formulated and implemented. There is an urgent need to establish the cyber security infrastructure of India. Fortunately, a legislation mandating strict cyber security disclosure norms in India is in pipeline. Further,regulations and guidelines for effective investigation of cyber crimes in India may also be prescribed very soon. Cyber attacks against India have increased significantly. Recently, the computer systems of DRDO and security officials were breached and sensitive files were leaked. Further,companies and banks in India are not reporting cyber attacks, cyber crimes and cyber frauds. The real impact and consequences of cyber attacks against India are not ascertainable in these circumstances. A crisis management plan of India for cyber attacks and cyber terrorism is need of the hour. The same may be helpful in investigating not only cyber terrorism cases in India but also cases of traditional terrorist activities. Institutions like national cyber coordination centre (NCCC) of India, national counter terrorism centre (NCTC) of India, etc may be helpful in preventing cyber attacks against India. Further, these institutions may also help in acquiring the offensive and defensive cyber security capabilities in India. However, there is an urgent need develop cyber security skills development in India andtechno legal skills development in India of law enforcement and intelligence agencies of India. Further, parliamentary oversight of intelligence agencies of India is also required. Recently, the national investigation agency (NIA) of India published an advertisement in a newspaper that many labelled as lacking professionalism and good cyber security practice. In the advertisement, NIA had announced a reward of Rs 10 lakh for information on the 21 February Hyderabad blasts. In addition to the landline phone number and postal address of its Hyderabad branch, the agency has given a gmail id on which people can send information/ leads that will help apprehend those responsible for the blasts. On the face of it this seems to be a normal advertisement. But from the perspective of cyber security, this is a nightmare. If NIA is receiving such sensitive information on servers of third party private companies this may compromise not only the blast investigation but also make the sensitive
information so received susceptible to third party scrutiny without even India or NIA knowing the same. In the absence of uniform email ids provided by the national informatics centre (NIC), it is a common practice for government departments to exchange information on servers of private companies. The only solace in this situation is the fact that it is much easier to crack NIC servers than cracking the servers of Google. Recently Indian national informatics centre’s (NIC) server were compromised and used to attack computers of other nations. NIC has to make its cyber security more robust and resilient. However, this does not mean that NIA or Indian government agencies must host their emails upon third party servers. India must invest upon developing its cyber security infrastructure and all sensitive emails must be sent and received through such infrastructure alone. In United States the proposed laws like Computer Fraud and Abuse Act 2013 would provide many esurveillance powers to US law enforcement and intelligence agencies. Even existing laws of US would allow law enforcement and intelligence agencies to do eavesdropping without court warrant in many circumstances. Further, in US e-surveillance and eavesdropping has become very easy by active use of executive orders. Even the controversial cyber intelligence sharing and protection act (CISPA) would allow sharing of sensitive information by network service providers (NSPs) with the intelligence agencies very easy. In the past, the White House threatened to veto the CISPA if Congress approves it in its current form. Through a statement of administration policy on cyber intelligence sharing and protection act (CISPA), the Obama administration said CISPA treats domestic cyber security as an intelligence activity whereas it should be a civilian one. CISPA was reintroduced to the US House in February 2013 that would allow the exchange of electronic information between Internet service providers and US government possible. TheWhite House has threatened to veto the cyber security law, CISPA, once again citing privacy concerns. When US is so serious about civil liberties why cannot India be serious about the same? Let us hope that Indian cyber security infrastructure would be established very soon and NIA would use well secure Indian e-mail infrastructure to deal with its internal communications.
Coastal Maritime Security Initiatives
Introduction Since Nov 2008, several initiatives have been taken by the Government to strengthen security of the coastal areas against threat of non-state actors from the sea. One of the most significant achievements has been the integration of all maritime stakeholders, including several State and Central agencies into the new coastal security mechanism.Indian Navy has established four Joint Operations Centres (JOC) at Mumbai, Visakhapatnam, Kochi and Port Blair. As a result of this there is good coordination, synergy and understanding between all agencies. All coastal security operations are now coordinated from the Joint Operations Centre, which are manned round the clock by Naval and Coast Guard teams. In addition, the State Marine Police and other agencies such as Customs, Intelligence Bureau and Ports etc. are also networked with these centres. Awareness Campaigns In a focussed drive, to integrate the fishermen community into the coastal security structure, awareness campaigns have been carried out in coastal villages across the country since 2009. Navy, Coast Guard and State Police teams have visited coastal villages and fishermen have been made aware of possible threats from the sea and their important role towards strengthening coastal security. This has paid rich dividends in last few years as there have been many incidents, reported by them, leading to successful interceptions. Surveillance patrols There has been a significant increase in the coastal surveillance patrols by Naval and Coast Guard ships and aircraft. Patrols by the Indian Navy and Coast guard are closely coordinated so as to optimise their efforts and keep the entire coast under surveillance. Marine Police of each coastal state and CISF units deployed in major ports are also assisting in carrying out patrols closer to the coast and in harbours. Coastal Security Exercises In order to periodically review the readiness of the security agencies and the state administrations in thwarting threats from inimical elements, the Indian Navy has taken the lead in conducting coastal security exercises in every coastal states and in the Island territories in conjunction with the Coast Guard, Marine Police, Customs, and Immigration and Port Authorities etc. During these exercises several contingency scenarios are simulated, including hijacking of fishing crafts, landing of terrorists on the coast, stowaways on ships etc. All agencies with stake in coastal security participate in these exercises with a view to improve coordination, achieve integration and finally improve the coastal security mechanism. As a result of these exercises and drills, there has been a significant improvement in the coordination between all the agencies.
India’s Security Challenges A Futuristic Perspective
An essay by Ram Sevak, IIM Bangalore, Bangalore 1. INTRODUCTION “If you know your enemies and know yourself, you will not be imperiled in a hundred battles; if you do not know your enemies but do know yourself, you will win one and lose one; if you do not know your enemies nor yourself, you will be imperiled in every single battle” The Art of War, Sun Tzu (6th Century BC), Chinese general and military strategist India is widely believed to have arrived on the global stage. In fact, if one goes by the popular press both domestic and foreign, it is very difficult to not get swayed by the euphony being generated about India and her inevitable ascendance to rightful place in the comity of nations. Nonetheless this essay attempts to desist from merely joining the self-congratulatory chorus and instead objectively analyses the security threats - external, internal, covert and overt, state and non-state - posed to our country. Therefore at the outset, it must be emphasized though I am a strong believer in the idea of India, her resilience and ability to resurrect from every conceivable threat she has faced in the last two millennia; the essay tries to adopt a pragmatic strategist’s approach in the analysis of country’s security environment. As most of the armies of the world adopt, the paper bases the quantum of threat posed by a security threat through its capability and interest and not by purported intention. We will explicitly list all security threats as well as economic, social, political and technological factors that can give rise to an increased security threat level. We will first analyze external and then internal security threats before evaluating which of the two, if at all, be more threatening to India in the coming decades. 2. EXTERNAL SECURITY THREATS TO INDIA India has the disadvantage of being situated in close proximity to what is being described as “the epicenter of global terrorism” . Tribal region near the Afghanistan-Pakistan border is constantly drawing attention of America’s Global War on Terror (GWOT) since 2001. India’s increasing relevance to the US strategic canvas, troubled relationship with Pakistan since the independence of the country, deteriorating and unpredictable relationship with China, unstable political climate in Nepal along with Maoist insurgency, mistrustful relationship with Bangladesh, civil-war ravaged and still-healing Sri Lanka, authoritarian Myanmar have rendered any fair estimation of Indian preparedness to deal with these security challenges an onerous task. We will now analyze capabilities and interests of each of these players and then asses their influence on India’s strategic calculations. 2.1 THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA India’s relationship with the sole military and economic superpower of the world has been on the
rise during the previous decade. A new shift in Indo-US relations was witnessed during President Clinton’s visit in 2000, fortified by Presidents Bush and Obama’s visit to the country. That said, although India remains ideologically non-committal to signing the CTBT and NPT regime; there has been tremendous improvement in the nuclear energy field through singing the Indo-US Nuclear Treaty in 2006. The US has always been a practitioner of hard real-politick, its policies have always been defined by its own interests in the region. The US support to Pakistan’s military through CEATO arrangements in 1960s, later President Nixon’s visit to China in Feb 1972 which was secretly facilitated by Pakistan and resulted in melting the ice between the two nations, support to Pakistan‘s defense apparatus and Taliban through 1980s and now military offensive in the Af-Pak tribal region have all been calibrated on the US self-interests. All these steps have had a profound impact on India’s external security environment. The continued US presence in our North-West border is cited to be one of the main reasons behind Pakistan’s belligerent attitude in the aftermath of the Parliament attack in 2001 and 26/11mayhem in 2008. The Pakistani Army knows Indian options are severely limited to strike across Pakistani territory owing to military assistance she is providing to GWOT. Apart from limiting India’s punitive capability against Pakistan for its sponsoring terrorist attacks and their infrastructure in India, the US has also provided substantial financial and military to Pakistan which have adverse consequences to our strategic calculations. Nonetheless the US is likely to dominate world affairs for at least another two decades. India has to work towards minimizing adverse impact of the US-Pak assistance on our external security. On a lighter note, India should emphasize to the US that for fighting tribal insurgents in its North-Western region; Pakistan does not need F-16s and nuclear submarines! 2.2 PEOPLE’S REPUBLIC OF CHINA Indo-China relations have been marked with distrust and fear on both sides after 1962 border clash which resulted in China usurping Aksai Chin area in J&K giving it easy road access from the Tibetan plateau to remote Xinxiang region in the West. Additionally China’s rise in the past three decades has given it tremendous weight in international political and security circles. China has patiently been working towards building military-economic and political alliances around India’s periphery – termed as “strings of pearl strategy”. China remains India’s number one security threat. It has provided consistent military assistance to Pakistan for use against India, funded armed rebels in the North-East and has continued to up the ante in diplomatic circles through stapled visas, visa denials and spying on Tibetan Diaspora in India. Although India needs to be sensitive towards Chinese sensitivities towards Tibet, India has failed to play an assertive role in communicating its interests to the Chinese side. On the other hand, China has built up superior civilian and military infrastructure along Indo-Tibet border. Our defense preparedness vis-à-vis China leaves much to be desired. As has rightly been enunciated by one of our Army Chiefs , the possibility of Two-Front War scenario with both Pakistan and China should be factored in while preparing our doctrine of war and operational readiness. To match China’s might and thwart any misadventure from our Northern neighbor, we should invest heavily in our infrastructure in border areas, phase out obsolete military hardware, raise at least 3
mountain divisions for the Eastern sector and shore up anti-ballistic missile capability through expedited Agni programs. Fortunately Indian economy’s healthy growth in the past decade has ensured greater defense outlay but even now our defense budget at 2.1% is way below 4.5% and 4.7% of Pakistani and Chinese budgets as % of their respective GDP and even the allocated funds do not get fully utilized for modernizing the forces but for the lack of speedy and transparent procurement procedures. A look at the following chart shows the yawning gap between the defense expenditures of China and India . China is widely known to have unders tated its publicly announced defense budgets. The defense expenditure for Pakistan does not include capital outlay hence actual spending should be higher than shown here. Hence the need to selectively utilize our limited defense outlay for maximizing lethality of our forces.
To that end recent successful trial of indigenously designed and developed Light Combat Aircraft (LCA) Tejas is a welcome development. Similarly other big-ticket purchases for example C130s and Medium Multi-Role Combat Aircraft (MMRCAs) should also be expedited for induction into the Indian Air Force. Indian Navy’s recent announcement of forming an Andaman specific command is a right step towards influencing Malacca strait area which can be one of the pressure points on the Chinese Navy in the event of a prolonged conflict. But our Navy needs much awaited aircraft career to project military power away from the shores. Unfortunately Russian aircraft carrier Gorshkov is waiting for about a decade for acquisition. Other steps should be towards economically integrating countries in our immediate neighborhood to balance strategic Chinese investment in these countries. A strong political will is required to transform the forces and provide them necessary resources to successfully face the challenges on the external front.
2.3 PAKISTAN The perennial challenge before Indian defense apparatus to manage external covert and overt threat from Pakistan does not need any emphasis. Since the birth of that country, we have fought them four times in war - 1948, 1965, 1971 and 1998. Besides the country is facing low intensity conflict in J&K abetted and sponsored by Pakistani military, in the North-East and through support to various fringe extremist group within the country. The country also faces huge challenge before its economy in the form of fake rackets being operated from Karachi and Dubai and widely believed to have blessings of Pakistan’s infamous Inter-Services Intelligence – its external spy agency. As the following chart shows, though in absolute terms terrorism related deaths in India have shown a decline; the potential for disturbing communal harmony within the country through such machinations cannot be underestimated. The fatalities here include all three kinds of death – civilians, security forces personnel and the terrorists . We will during the later part of the article explore how external agencies with covert or overt support from nefarious elements within the country can potentially destabilize the security situation.
Thus Pakistan remains one of our principle worries at both external and internal security fronts. Besides on the basis of its long-standing strategic partnership with China, it can stretch our armed forces capabilities in the Eastern sector. The modernization plans of Karakoram highway, the development of Gwadar as a n aval port by the Chinese Navy and covert assistance to Pakistan’s nuclear and missile program are on the anvil; these two countries should be watched very carefully in our defense planning. Rapid implementation of the mooted Cold-Start Strategy should be pursued by the forces to neutralize Pakistani threat quickly in a two-front war scenario and deny the bigger neighbor to our North an advantage from the Western sector. 2.4 IMMEDIATE NEIGHBORHOOD
Unfortunately our other neighbors with the exception of Bhutan also don’t provide any succor to military planners and political leaders and are equally as challenging as China and Pakistan. While Nepal is in the grip of political turmoil since the ouster of unpopular King Gyanendra, India has to play its cards carefully lest it be seen with a big brother agenda. India and Nepal share an open boundary with free exchange of people and currency across the borders. Although few contentious points remain in the Indo-Nepalese relations; they should not be allowed to obstruct our efforts in ensuring political stability in this strategically important neighbor of hours. Perhaps Indian leftist parties can be utilized by the Central government to persuade Maoist leadership in Nepal to desist from mollycoddling too much with the Chinese to our and Nepal’s detriment. Bangladesh on the other hand is showing signs of delivering on the stated policy of the Government of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina of not letting her country’s soil for anti-India activities. Bangladesh has recently handed over many high profile terrorist leaders hiding in their country. India has also reciprocated with huge USD 1 billion economic assistance in the form of line of credit to Bangladesh . But India should actively continue to manage her somewhat uneasy relationship with the Opposition leader in Bangladesh former PM Mrs. Begum Khalida Zia. Seeking active Bangladeshi cooperation in destroying the terrorist infrastructure of Harkat-ul-Jihad-al Islami (HuJI) remains a challenge for Indian security agencies. Although India at first neglected their relationship with Burmese military rulers, there have been improvements in the past few years in our bilateral relations. China has been investing in Kyaukryu and Sittwe as commercial ports on the west coast close to our NE states. Both of these ports can be used as a naval base and should be a cause of concern. India also needs to co-opt Myanmar for curbing the North Eastern rebel groups e.g. NSCN, ULFA and Manipur rebels which find shelter in dense forests along the international border. For that increased economic and military cooperation without inviting international limelight is a challenge as recently the US has started objecting to our strengthening relationship with the junta. India also faces competition from China in keeping Sri Lanka attuned to our interests. The recently finished Civil War in the North-East Sri Lanka has incurred huge emotional and economic costs for the Indian Tamils. Thus encouraging cordial linguistic relations in Sri Lanka through persuading Lankan government towards equitable distribution of resources and fair treatment of ethnic minorities is a priority for Indian foreign policy mandarins. Bhutan has demonstrated sensibilities to our concerns by wiping off ULFA rebels in their territory in 2003 and India rightly assists in their economic, social and defense developments. Similarly India should also manage our closest ally during the Cold War era – Russia – to counterbalance China and procuring critical defense supplies. 3.INTERNAL SECURITY THREATS TO INDIA India’s internal security challenges can be categorized under two heads – insurgency and extremism. We will explore the internal security threats to India in these lines. 3.1 INSURGENCY India faces huge challenges in dousing the insurgency fires in many parts of the country – from the dense forests of Central India covering Chattisgarh, Jharkhand, few districts in Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, few parts of Andhra Pradesh (so called Red Corridor) to North-East India. We all know the
Pakistani sponsored and mooted terrorist activities in the state of J&K since 1989. Besides there are dozens of militant groups in ethnically diverse North Eastern part of the country. Indian strategy so far has been to first let a state handle its law and order situation and intervene only in cases of extreme urgency. This strategy needs a rethink because of signs of consolidation among many of the freedom-seekers e.g. there are indications that Maoists have tried to forge ties with Kashmiri separatists and ULFA to synergize their activities. Furthermore as Left-Wing Extremism (LWE) in India stretches has their proximity to important cities and both north-south and east west lines of communication - termed as “potentially dangerous” by the Indian Army . Therefore for successfully tackling the menace of LWE, two pronged strategy needs to be adopted – focus on socio-economic uplift of the affected areas as it is unfulfilled promise of the Indian state to her citizens (aka Directive Principles of the State) and secondly this is one of the root-causes of the rise of Naxal movement in the Indian hinterland. Sincere efforts must be taken to implement inclusive growth as an objective of public policy. On fighting the insurgency, inter-state cooperation is a must and jurisdictional issues should not be allowed to tackle a nation-wide insurgency. Failing which, it must be emphasized India will face sever governance crisis internally and might even descend into chaos. Insurgency in NE part of the country goes till 1950s and has its genesis in the way those states were integrated into the Indian Union. Much water has since flown down the river Brahmaputra to reverse the flow of time. Inter-ethnic and inter-religious harmony should be maintained in the highly sensitive region through grass-root level participation of people. Besides illegal migration from Bangladesh rightly fuels resentment among the rightful Indian citizens and there should be no votebank politics with this critical development in Assam and other states. Otherwise changed demographics of these states can wreck havoc on the internal security of the country in the coming decades. For tackling the issue of Jammu and Kashmir, numerous tomes have been written. But in a nutshell, the issue requires firm handling from the Centre. It is widely documented that Pakistani state fuels the seeds of alienation among the Kashmiri youth. Even within the state of J&K, Jammu and Ladakh have not shown secessionist movements and are well-integrated into the mainstream. It is only the Kashmir Valley which has seen such activities and adequate focus should be given towards job creation in this region. 3.2 EXTREMISM Religious extremism is other main internal security threat to the country. Without establishing cause-and-effect for this phenomenon as do most of the Right and Left wing intellectuals, there is urgency to tackle this issue. Fair and transparent law enforcement and quick, efficient judicial apparatus are required to stem the tide of religious extremism in the country – both minority as well as majority. Recent rhetorical statements from the politicians of certain political spectrum to milk this challenge for their advantage are indeed unfortunate. Other challenges to internal security are astoundingly high level of corruption, political factionalism and caste wars – all of which require seasoned and firm political vision. 4. WHICH IS GREATER THREAT - INTERNAL OR EXTERNAL? It is indeed a complex task to determine which of the two threats will be greater for India. In fact, in
highly dynamic external security situation and rapidly evolving internal socio-economic developments, the relative strengths of these challenges cannot be determined with certainty. But one can say that an internally weak nation cannot fight an external adversary successfully. So tackling internal insurgency successfully is a greater and immediate challenge than fighting wars abroad. Continued insurgency can provide a fillip to external aggression from our adversaries sensing internal weakness. For example, left wing ultras can cripple rail and road infrastructure in the event of war and our enemies can very well factor this into their calculations. Similarly insurgencies in India are abetted and supported by our adversaries and the impact of the two challenges cannot be isolated per se. CONCLUSION As has been argued throughout this article, in area as humongous as national security it is difficult to ascertain which of the two threats – external or internal – will pose greater security threat to the country going forward. But if we take nation as an organism, to fight an external adversary internal strength is prerequisite. Internal cohesion and external defense preparedness is what gives a nation lethal power to deter a potential aggressor and preserve freedom. Indian history has shown throughout millennia, we have lost our freedom and riches by neglecting our frontiers or through internal factionalism. Any nation which is getting rich without paying adequate focus on defense invites aggression. Are our policymakers ready for the challenge to steward safely an ascendant India of the 21st Century?
The essay posted here represents the views of the author only and not of INDIA Future of Change. This is one of the winning essays from the INDIA Future of Change Essay-Writing Contest 2010-11 as evaluated by Financial Times, the knowledge partner for the contest.
National Cyber Security Policy Of India Has Failed To Protect Privacy Rights In India
The National Cyber Security Policy (NSCP), 2013 has listed many Objectives that Indian Government wishes to pursue to protect the Cyber Security Interests of India. However, from the very beginning the NCSP is facing Implementation Hurdles. The NCSP is also not holistically drafted as it is in active conflict with other Projects and Initiatives of Indian Government. For instance, consider the example of the Central Monitoring System (CMS) Project of India. The CMS Project has been launched without any Parliamentary Oversight and Legal Framework. The problem has been further aggravated due to absence of Lawful Interception Law and Privacy Laws in India. The net effect of this situation is that Indian Government and its Agencies can do willful esurveillance and phone tapping without any Parliamentary Oversight and Judicial Scrutiny. Similarly, the Unconstitutional Aadhaar Project has already been Challenged before various High Courts in India. Aadhaar Project has serious Cyber Security and Data Security Issuesthat are still
unresolved. The truth is that Biometric Collection in India is done in an Illegal and Unconstitutional Manner as on date. So we have all sorts of private and sensitive personal and biometric information lying openly with Indian Government and its Agencies without any sort of Check and Balances. In these circumstances the claims of Privacy Protection by the NCSP of India have to be judged. The NCSP claims that it aims at enabling protection of information while in process, handling, storage and transit so as to safeguard privacy of citizen’s data and for reducing economic losses due to cyber crime or data theft. The Policy is silent as to how it would be able to do so. The Policy is also silent as to how it would Balance the Civil Liberty and National Security Requirements while enforcing Indian Cyber Security. The present Mental Framework of Indian Government as well as the Regulatory Regime of India is “Anti Privacy” and “Anti Civil Liberty” in nature. Despite contrary media claims, the NSCP has maintained this position and Status Quo. In nutshell, the NCSP of India has failed to protect Privacy Right of Indian Citizens. Rather, accompanied with Projects like CMS, Aadhaar, etc it would be actually violating the same. Let us wait for its actual implementation to see its true effect upon Civil Liberties Protection in Cyberspace.
