Viewing such activities as “serious threats aimed at destabilizing the security, integrity and economy of India,” the Committee has argued that such activities should not be merely construed as “acts merely of ordinary crime or law and order nature,”

Admitting that as per the Constitution, “Police” and “Public Order” are subjects in the State List of the Seventh Schedule, the Sorabjee panel has made a strong case for handing over investigation of such crimes by the central agency saying, “Such perilous activities cannot be obviously be left to be routinely dealt with the as ordinary crime or law and order problems, by the concerned State police forces.”

Citing key “handicaps” faced by state police forces, including inadequate knowledge of the inter-state and international dimensions of the crime in question, the committee has called for a specialized national-level agency, other than the CBI, to be constituted by a Statute of Parliament, which shall tackle these “federal crimes.”

“With the blurring of the line of distinction between external aggression and internal disturbances engineered by terrorist groups etc — often instigated, abetted, aided and supported by inimical foreign forces — and the organized criminal groups supporting them, with arms, ammunition, and funding through hawala transactions etc, any measures taken to combat their activities can be regarded as measures taken for defence of India in terms of entry number I of the Union List.”

A consequence of which would be that “the

Union would have the competence to take both legislative and administrative measures to combat all such crime, specified as federal crimes,” the Committee stated in its affidavit.

The committee made it clear that “while creating such agency, the aim cannot be usurp the powers of the States but on the other hand, it should be an agency meant to

assist them in the nation’s fight against terrorism and inter-state or transitional organized crime which jeopardize national security.”

It suggested that such an agency might have concurrent jurisdiction with the state police and in case of dispute, a proposed statutory committee with representatives of Home Ministry, state Governments concerned and the Solicitor General, may decide the issue.

It also clarified that the proposed agency not be confused with the existing CBI which is seen as “essentially, an investigative agency.” The reason: prevention and control of national-security crime, collection, collation, analysis or criminal intelligence does not fall within the CBI’s charter of duties.