Toying with intelligence

Toying with intelligence
By R Venkatesh,DH News Service, Bangalore:
An elaborate plan to subvert peace appears to be at work in the State, going by the seizure of a trunkful of ammonium nitrate, which was the main ingredient in the bombs that went off in Bangalore on Friday, near Channapatna night.

With the haul being a tip of the iceberg, massive quantities of incendiary material appear to be in circulation across the State, raising the spectre of the possibility of recurrence of serial blasts at places other than Bangalore.

In fact, there have been several instances of explosive material being tested on the outskirts of the City and other towns of the State. But jurisdictional police have never found them grave enough to warrant their attention.

Failed intelligence
The Bangalore blasts and the Channapatna haul drive home the point of intelligence failure in pre-empting the acts of subversion. Even a cursory glance at the happenings in the intelligence set-up of the State is enough to realise the dismal state of affairs.

Officers of IG rank have been helming the State intelligence apparatus for sometime now, while the post was always held by those of ADGP rank.

Hierarcy
This is no trifling hierarchical matter though as an ADG rank officer would usually be an IPS officer who can communicate with his counterparts in neighbouring states and top Central super sleuths who are always senior IPS officials.

An IG rank officer helming the State intelligence apparatus also means that it is generally a KPS promotee being rewarded for loyalties which include running errands to political bosses.
Even within the State, servile officers heading the intelligence apparatus may just fail to command the attention other top police brass.

Criteria
As former IPS officer chuckled, nowadays the caste and proximity to the rulers matter while promoting an officer to the State intelligence chief’s post. The downgrading of the post to by political bosses to accommodate their loyal men, means that the post has lost its sanctity as well.

The trend of nominating servile officials for the intelligence chief’s post began during the H D Kumaraswamy regime.

True posts!
An intelligence chief of those days was believed to be neckdeep in the chief minister’s personal affairs. He was jokingly referred to as a core member of the kitchen cabinet.

You can't blame the officer personally as that was what was expected out him. In fact, the officer himself used to personally keep an eye on the internecine internal feuds of a ruling party in those days.

Friday’s blasts might hopefully jolt the ruling class into stopping the trivialisation of the intelligence chief’s post.
Else, the State will have to pay a heavy price in the days to come.