Crisis Management procedures overlooked: Ram Pradhan committee

“There was absence of overt leadership on the part of Hasan Gafoor,the CP,and lack of visible Command and Control at the CP’s office,” said the report prepared by former Governor and Union Home Secretary R D Pradhan.

The report tabled by Maharashtra Home Minister R R Patil in the Assembly today said the Committee found several lacunae in working,both within Mantralaya,the state secretariat,and the police establishment.

“Well set out procedures for handling intelligence and ‘Crisis Management’ were overlooked. These require urgent attention,” Pradhan said in his note to Chief Minister Ashok Chavan presenting the report of the committee which also had as member V Balachandran,former Special Secretary in the Cabinet Secretariat.

The report tabled by Maharashtra Home Minister R R Patil in the Assembly today said the attack was beyond the capacity of Mumbai Police and had to be tackled by specialised forces like National Security Guards.

“However,we find that the CP Mumbai did not exhibit adequate initiative in handling the multi-pronged attack. He remained at one spot near Trident Hotel throughout the operations.

“For lack of visible Command and Control at the CP’s office,an impression that the police handled the operation ineffectively,was created by the public.

“Moreover several senior officers told us that those three days,the CP did not give any directions nor enquired of ongoing operations. We found that although the CP kept in touch on wireless and mobile on selective basis,several officers felt that they did not get a feeling that they were part of a team,” the report said.

The committee said Gafoor did not follow the Standard Operating Practice (SOP) evolved for bomb blasts and terror strikes.

He ignored the SOP and decided to direct Joint CP (Crime) to be in-charge of the control room instead of Joint CP (L&O),who as in-charge of all police stations was better suited to decide on marshaling of forces at various sites.

Nevertheless,the committee noted with appreciation the role played by Rakesh Maria,Joint CP (Crime) in the control room in handling a very serious situation extending over three days. It was also appreciative of the dedicated work performed by control room staff including officers,wireless operators and men in maintaining records.

“Well set out procedures for handling intelligence and ‘Crisis Management’ were overlooked. These require urgent attention,” Pradhan said in his note to Chief Minister Ashok Chavan presenting the report of the committee which also had as member V Balachandran,former Special Secretary in the Cabinet Secretariat.

The committee was greatly impressed with the speed and urgency with which the Mumbai Police machinery,as a whole,reacted to unfolding of events at five different venues in a short space of time.

“Also,we note with appreciation initiative exhibited by younger police officers who led their men in facing the terrorists who showed exemplary courage and enterprise.

It had a word of praise for the then Director General of Police A N Roy,who it found that throughout the operations,he made himself available to provide information and offered help while taking care not to intrude into the functioning of Mumbai Police officers.

The committee did not find any failure to act on inputs provided by the central intelligence agencies.

Referring to six alerts beginning August 7 last year indicating LeT was making preparations to infiltrate commando terrorists into India by sea route,it said,there was no specific intelligence that sea-borne terrorists would hit hotel Taj or Oberoi.

The committee was of the view that though attacks on three mentioned dates in alerts did not take place,“an overall assessment and proper analysis of these report would have revealed a strong indication that some major terrorist actions were being planned against Mumbai. The existing mechanism to make such an overall assessment was inadequate.

The committee found that at present all intelligence alerts were mechanically forwarded to operational units either by DGP’s office or Anti-Terrorism Squad or by Home Department.

It found total confusion in the processing of intelligence alerts at the level of state government.

The committee observed that tragically the Taj and Oberoi did not implement certain important security advise given by police because of their own policy perspective as hospitality industry.

The committee recommended that the Quick Response Teams formed in 2003 should be urgently upgraded and strengthened to promptly and effectively counter such attacks,till more specialised forces come on the scene.

It also furnished a blue print for their reorganisation,training,equipment and service conditions.

The committee said the state of preparedness of police administration in other major cities of Maharashtra to face Mumbai-like attacks required to be reviewed by a team of experts and necessary steps taken.

“In particular,we cannot overlook that the police of Mumbai,Thane and Navi Mumbai must have an integrated action plan. This region should not be dealt on the basis of administrative boundaries of the three Commissionerates.

Further,administrative limits to DGP Maharahstra’s powers to operate in Mumbai city should not inhibit action,” it said.

Likewise,the committee said,working of several crisis management mechanism set up to deal with situations need to be reviewed in the light of experience of 26/11 in Mumbai. This will require looking into setups within the Mantralaya,Municipal Corporations,hospitals,fire brigades etc.

The committee said it was impressed with the promptness with which the control room of the CP’s office handled communications on 26/11.

Their meticulous recordings and transcriptions in the absence of CCTVs helped the committee get the correct picture of unfolding of events at five different places and reactions of individual officers to act and react.

The committee recommended that the Principal Secretary Home (L&O) should be designated as the nodal officer to receive an act of intelligence report. The Additional Chief Secretary (Home) must be kept fully informed of serious or actionable intelligence who must ultimately take responsibility.

It said on the occasion of a crisis such as the one Mumbai faced,the Commissioner of Mumbai should have been in command centre in the control room which might have helped in better utilisation of forces and prevent a duplication of efforts by different police units.

“In fact,one of the important lessons of 26/11 is not to temper on the spur of the moment with the system as such by taking instinctive decisions,but to do crisis management as a team,” it said.

“The police can inspire confidence in public if they — in particular senior most officers — in times of emergency,present themselves as a united team doing their best under situation of stress and strain that they had to face,” the report said.

The committee said it was constrained to observe that as a rule SOPs should not be overlooked in crisis management. “If each top officer,such as the CP or the DGP treats SOPs in cavalier manner,why have the SOPs at all”.

The report noted that despite receiving as many as six alerts,no significant steps were taken by the state administration to beef up coastal security.

On modernisation of police,the committee suggested substantially increasing the limit of purchases and giving responsibility to senior police officers.

“There is obvious need to simplify the purchase procedures and delegation of powers. We recommend that an empowered committee may be constituted to clear all pending proposals rather than following the tortuous paper trail”.