Vehicle-ramming, lone wolf terror attacks 'serious challenge': Rajnath

Ibrahimpatnam (Telangana): The newly-devised terror techniques of using large vehicles to mow down civilians and lone wolf attacks pose a “serious challenge” to the country, Home Minister Rajnath Singh said here today and asked special forces such as the NSG to prepare themselves to deal with these threats.

Singh arrived in Telangana on a day-long tour to inaugurate a 200-acre complex of the 28 special composite group (SCG) of the elite counter-terror force National Security Guard (NSG) in the Ranga Reddy district of the state. The campus is about 33-km from the Rajiv Gandhi international airport of Hyderabad.

Addressing the officers of the commando force and those from the state police, the minister said the terrorist minds keep on devising and adopting “new tactics” to unleash death and mayhem. “We have seen across the globe that a big vehicle is being used by such elements to mow down people as also lone wolf attacks being carried out by them to wreak death and destruction,” he said.

“The terrorists are adopting cruel and barbaric techniques like I mentioned. This is a serious challenge and special forces like the NSG should prepare themselves to tackle these emerging threats,” Singh said. He said the central government is also thinking as to how the NSG’s role could be “enlarged” vis-a-vis security challenges faced by the country.

Singh said instances of civilians being taken as shields by terror elements has also been noticed and the elite counter-terror force should enhance its technical capabilities and capacities in this context. “Post the 26/11 (2008 Mumbai terror attacks), every agency needs to work round-the-clock and be vigilant to ensure that peace is not breached,” he said.

Singh lauded the forces for ensuring that no big terror incident has taken place in the hinterland, except in parts of Jammu and Kashmir. “The morale of the terrorists is down but they are always looking for chances. Hence, you should continuously keep evolving and enhancing your tactics,” he said. Terrorism, Singh said, is a threat to the entire mankind and it is posing new challenges globally.

The minister said it was being thought, post the Mumbai attacks and establishment of NSGs regional hubs, that the elite forces core competence will go down, but that has not been the case. The NSG hub inaugurated today by the minister is tasked with tackling any terror threat in the four states of Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Odisha and Chhattisgarh.

The hub had been shifted from Begumpet to this town in the Ranga Reddy district few years back and the facility has infrastructure to house about 300 commandos and also to train them regularly. The force has also stationed a small counter-terror and counter-hijack task force of commands at the Hyderabad airport. During the event, NSG director General (DG) Sudeep Lakhtakia said the force is continuously enhancing its techniques, tactics and strategies to render its special task. The National Security Guard was raised in 1984 as a special federal force against terror incidents and attacks.