The three-member task force chaired by former defence minister K C Pant, which presented its report to Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee, said the need for managing national security in an integrated and coherent manner reaching across compartmentalised functioning had become more pressing after the May 11 nuclear tests.

The organisation below the level of the apex body should include a national security adviser to the Prime Minister (with cabinet rank) and three divisions for concurrent functions, it said.

The three concurrent functions to be performed are long-term strategic planning and formulation of strategy of national security; coordination of current decision making and follow-up of policy implementation and coordinatedintelligence assessment for national security planning and management, a statement issued by office of the task force chairman said.

The national agenda for governance had promised to establish a national security council which could undertake the country's first-ever strategic defence review and the government had set up the task force on April 14.The other two members of the task force were Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Jaswant Singh and Institute of Defence Studies and Analysis (IDSA) air commodore (retd.) Jasjit Singh.