The government on Thursday gave its approval to set up the National Counter-Terrorism Centre which will act as the nodal agency for all anti-terror activities in the country.
The Cabinet Committee on Security, headed by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, after an hour-long meeting gave its nod to set up the NCTC which will streamline all terror-related intelligence, analyse and provide them for action to concerned agencies, official sources said.
A pet project of Home Minister P Chidambaram, the NCTC will be the nodal agency for all counter-terrorism activities and coordinate with intelligence agencies such as Intelligence Bureau, Research and Analysis Wing, Joint Intelligence Committee and state intelligence agencies.
The NCTC will connect Multi Agency Centre, which would be subsumed into NCTC, and all agencies reporting to it in Delhi and state capitals.
Between the Centre, where almost two dozen agencies coordinate with MAC, and states almost 500 stakeholders are involved in counter-terror activities.
The NCTC will not have any foot-soldier to collect information, but will depend on other agencies. It will come up through an executive order which will be issued soon. The government will not bring a legislation for setting up of this anti-terror body, unlike the NIA that was created through an Act.
The head of the body, an additional Director General level police officer, will report to the Union Home Secretary.