India's Intelligence and Internal Security

Geographically, India is placed in between hostile Pakistan to its West and not too friendly Bangladesh, Myanmar and China to its East. Regular terrorist activities targetted by Pakistan against India have made it necessary for India to be always on guard and develop fool-proof intelligence and internal security system. India’s new government has prioritized intelligence in its agenda and conceptualised policy formation and implementation diversities for the country’s safety and security.

The ever-increasing security concerns and the greater reliance on intelligence are the offshoots of a host of causative factors. New and complex manifestations in the nature of security threats, states resorting to low-cost option of covert actions to achieve their objectives, abundance and accessibility of lethal weapons, availability and accessibility of lethal technology, quick and easy trans-national mobility, low efficacy of conventional security measures, etc. have come to play a significant part of this gamut of contributory factors.

No wonder, intelligence has come to play a significant role in all modes of conflicts. Intelligence may be operative in the twin modes of being offensive and defensive. In the offensive mode, it can provide vital inputs for strategy formulation and assessment of enemy strengths and weaknesses on one hand and a capability-degrader on the other. In the defensive mode, intelligence plays the vital role of predicting and preventing security threats. In internal security it operates in an area- specific and problem-specific manner.

India is externally prone to multiple vulnerability owing to a myriad of factors, geopolitical positioning hostile neighbourhood, long and treacherous borders, long maritime belt, etc internally, its communal, caste, linguistic and ethnic economic disparities, political conflicts and turmoil, etc. contribute to its vulnerability. But the genesis of India’s internal security has undergone a radical change, of