Opinion Arrested,but still wanted

For too long,the compilation of these lists has been a lazy bureaucratic exercise handled on a daily basis by relatively junior officials in the police hierarchy. So,when it comes to preparing a list of India’s most wanted in Pakistan,not much hair-splitting actually happens. The usual known faces,a Saeed or a Dawood,are immediately put on the list. The errors start to creep in while framing the other part of the list; many of those names and faces are not on instant recall,because of their reduced relevance.

To begin with,there is an urgent need to get rid of the sanctity attached to red corner notices. But before that,it is important to know the latest procedures for how a terrorist/criminal gets into that list. The Interpol now requires that an accused should be named in a formal chargesheet,based on which an open-ended non-bailable warrant should be obtained from the court. Once this prerequisite is met,the concerned investigative agency can approach the CBI — designated the nodal agency to liaise with the Interpol — to have a red corner notice issued against the accused.

At the CBI headquarters,all that is done is a routine check by junior officials of whether the documentation required by the Interpol is in order. Thereafter,the CBI puts the name up on its list and intimates the Interpol. This list is a mother document from where other lists,particularly those passed on to other countries like the Pakistan one,are usually prepared. This is a “blind” preparation,because it is assumed that if a red corner notice is active against an accused,then the person is still wanted.

Here lies the problem: While there is a system in place to get a red corner notice issued,there are no standard operating procedures to withdraw a name from this list if the status changes.  It would stand to reason that in most cases the change would have to be authorised by the court,which had in the first place issued the non-bailable warrant. For this to happen,the agency that pursued for a red corner notice needs to formally inform the court if there is a change in status of the accused — due to arrest,say,or death. Mere intimation to the Intelligence Bureau cannot provide legal basis to withdraw the name from the CBI list. At the same time,IB’s (Multi-Agency Centre) MAC needs to ensure that such information is not left to lie but is passed on. The simple point is a clear-cut procedure has to be put in place to withdraw names from the list else they just keep piling up without updates.

Now to the larger issue. Should this be the only basis for preparing a list of the 20 or 50 most wanted Indians from Pakistan? This has to be a far more serious exercise,because it involves the credibility of the Indian argument. The Interpol’s red corner notices hardly seem to work on the ground,and that’s why there are different kinds of international terror designations. The United States has many of its own lists,over and above something like the UNSC resolution 1267 on sanctioning al-Qaeda and Taliban members and affiliates.

These designations are far more detailed,containing the latest information on aliases,addresses,photographs and physical features besides other relevant details. The Interpol only requires a name,not even aliases or physical features. So,for instance,someone like Manipur militant leader Rajkumar Meghen,who was arrested recently by the National Investigative Agency,had a red corner notice against him since 1998 — but,as it now turns out,he travelled undetected for a decade under a new name,Surjit Waikhom. Incidentally,the NIA has informed the Manipur government,which is yet to get the legal documentation in place to have his name removed from the CBI list.

So while preparing a serious document that goes into the terror dossier to be presented to Pakistan,the red corner list can,at best,be an input which must be doubly authenticated. That’s where the MAC needs to step in and ensure proper scrutiny of names by all agencies concerned. And this is not just to screen wrong names,but also to provide as much credible information as possible to strengthen the Indian claim.

To sum it up,there is a case for spelling out objective criteria for a name to make it to a terror list. Maybe even to create a national most wanted list of terrorists and absconders,based on a set of minimum information benchmarks,which law enforcement and intelligence agencies have to follow — rather than just doing a cut-and-paste job from the red corner list. There are many international terror designation lists which can serve as models here,but what is unequivocal from this episode is a need to quickly modernise and reform.

pranab.samanta@expressindia.com