Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu has been aware of the chinks in the armour around him and the pressing need to fix them. Just two weeks before the assassination attempt, he had a meeting with Nirtal, a top Israeli company, about sprucing up security and police in his state. After an hour-long presentation in Tel Aviv, he asked the company representatives to come and study the police and the security situation in Andhra Pradesh and work out a strategy to upgrade them. ‘‘I want to modernise police in the state considering the threat perception in the state,’’ Naidu had told The Indian Express in Tel Aviv. This was the only meeting scheduled apart from water and agriculture solutions, the two reasons he had gone on a four-day visit to Israel. Nirtal was established in 1995 and is staffed by graduates of Israel’s elite military and police units. The company is one of the leading worldwide providers of total security and counter terrorism operational and training solutions and is authorised by Israel’s Ministry of Defence. The company is headed by General Assaf Hefetz who was chief of Israeli Police until 1996 and who established the Israeli Police Counter-Terrorist Unit. Nitral is being invited to Andhra Pradesh for providing custom-built tactical solutions. The company constructs ‘‘quality check-ups of police units around the world’’. One of the main areas of specialisation, incidentally, is VIP protection. It has worked with Nigeria’s National Guard for counter-terrorist training and executive protection unit training in 1995. Since then, Nirtal has worked with governments of US, Mexico and Greece. In 2003, it trained personal body guards in Latvia and Kazakhstan. ‘‘The Chief Minister asked some very pertinent questions and it was clear that he wanted to focus on creating special anti-terror units, maintain public order and wanted to know what he can do with the existing structure of the police,’’ said Nir Shaul, managing director, Nirtal and former commissioner of Israeli Police. Israel, a country fighting with terrorism on a daily basis, has only private security in civilian areas. While borders are manned by the Army, within the city, there are only plainclothesmen from companies such as Nirtal. Dressed in plain clothes, the only evidence of their presence is when people are frisked outside pubs, restaurants and hotels. Though it is state-of-the-art security, it is known for being non-invasive.
