For the seventh consecutive year, beginning 2012, overall terrorism-linked fatalities across multiple theaters of conflict in India remained in three digits, with 2018 registering a total of 935 fatalities, including 216 civilians, 183 Security Force (SF) personnel, and 536 militants. Such fatalities remained in the four digits for 18 consecutive years between 1994 and 2011, with year 2001 registering a peak 5,839 fatalities (1,693 civilians, 721 SF personnel, and 3,425 militants).
However, annual fatalities declined for seven consecutive years, between 2006 and 2012, but have followed a cyclical trend thereafter. Terrorism-linked fatalities in 2018 (935 fatalities) increased in comparison to 2017, at 803 fatalities (206 civilians, 170 SF personnel, and 427 SF personnel). In 2016, there were 898 fatalities, as against 722 in 2015, 976 in 2014, 884 in 2013, and 803 fatalities in 2012.
Meanwhile, 84 Districts recorded terrorism/insurgency linked fatalities in 2018 (the same number as in 2017), down from 94 in 2016, 93 in 2015, 100 in 2014, 103 in 2013, and 122 in 2012. Fatalities have already been reported from 37 Districts in 2019 (data till April 21, 2019).
Moreover, the total number of Districts afflicted by chronic conflict variables was down to 170 in 2018, as against 184 in 2017. There were a total of 191 such Districts in 2016; and 205 in both 2014 and 2013.
India presently has a total of 719 Districts.
These numbers clearly indicate that there has been considerable overall improvement in the security situation, but an analysis across different theaters of conflict demonstrates that the gains are not similar.
Islamist terrorism outside Jammu & Kashmir (J&K) has been contained to a large extent. Pakistan-backed Islamist terror formations, as well as Islamic State (aka Daesh) and Al Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS), the last two of which have been attempting to make inroads since 2014, have failed comprehensively in their ambitions [al Qaeda has, in fact, trying to create a network in India at least since 1996, and established AQIS, dedicated to the South Asian region, in 2014). There was just one Islamist terrorist attack in India, outside J&K, through 2018. It is useful to recall that, in 2008, Islamist terror formations operating out of Pakistan had carried out 10 attacks in India, outside J&K, resulting in 352 fatalities, the largest number recorded in a single year since 2000, when the SATP database commenced tracking such incidents. There is, of course, little room for complacence, particularly in view of the intermittent 'lone wolf attacks' by Daesh-inspired individuals across the globe, and the continuous stream of IS-linked conspiracies and arrests over the past years. According to the SATP database, a total of 167 Daesh sympathizers/recruits have been arrested and another 73 persons have been detained, counselled and released, in India (data till April 21, 2019). Another 98 Indians were believed to have travelled to Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan to join IS – microscopic numbers in terms of the country's huge Muslim population. Of the 98 who travelled abroad to join Daesh, 33 are confirmed to have been killed. The increasing trend of fringe Islamist terror formations in several countries associating with Daesh is a source of concern for India as well.
Insurgent violence in the Northeast region has seen a continuous downward trajectory with 2018 recording the lowest insurgency-related fatalities since 1992. Incidentally, except for Arunachal Pradesh, all the other six insurgency affected states – Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland and Tripura – registered a declining trend in fatalities.
The region did, however, witness multiple and widespread agitations and a tendency to increasing ethnic and communal polarisation through 2018 and thereafter due to several factors, most prominently including the passage of the Citizenship Amendment Bill (CAB) in the Lok Sabha (Lower House of India’s Parliament) on January 8, 2019, and the preceding troubles over the National Register of Citizens. The agitations even jeopardised ongoing peace talks with the ULFA-Pro Talks Faction (ULFA-PTF), and also saw a number of other erstwhile militant organizations across the region strongly opposing CAB.
The Maoist insurgency is also on a decline, though fatalities increased from 333 (109 civilians, 74 SF personnel, 150 Naxalites) in 2017 to 413 (109 civilians, 73 SF personnel, 231 Naxalites) in 2018, essentially as a result of increasing fatalities in Maoist ranks. SFs secured an improved kill ratio in 2018, at 1:3.16, as against 1:2.02 in 2017. The 2018 ratio is the second best recorded since the SATP database commenced tracking the conflict, after 3.69, in 2016.
Nevertheless, the intermittent and audacious attacks of the recent past clearly indicate that the Maoists still possess the wherewithal, albeit diminishing, to strike at will. Cadres of the Communist Party of India–Maoist (CPI-Maoist) triggered an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) blast and subsequently opened fire, targeting the convoy of a Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Member of Legislative Assembly (MLA), Bhima Mandavi, in a forested patch near Nakulnar village under the Kuwakonda tehsil (revenue unit) of Dantewada District in Chhattisgarh’s ailing Bastar Division, on April 9, 2019. Those killed included MLA Mandavi and his three Personal Security Officers (PSOs), as well as the constable-driver.
There have also been some worries in Punjab in recent times. Between 2008 and 2015, Khalistani terrorists failed to inflict even a single fatality in the State, but three years in a row, between 2016 and 2018, lethal terrorist strikes have been mounted. The grenade attack at Nirankari Bhavan on November 18, 2018, which resulted in three fatalities, was the last incident in a chain of efforts to revive Khalistani terrorism in the Punjab.
It is, however, J&K that has recorded the most significant surge in violence, after an extended phase of declining violence between 2001 and 2012. Total fatalities recorded J&K in 2018, at 451, are the highest after 2008, at 541. Worryingly, fatalities among civilians, at 86 in 2018, are also the highest in this category since 2007, at 164. Indeed, with an intensifying polarization and intentional political destabilization, the State appears to be headed towards a heightened phase of terrorism.
Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh while addressing the Inaugural Session of the Conference of Directors and Inspectors General of Police in Gujarat on December 20, 2018, thus observed,
The Minister further stated, in the context of J&K,
The Government of India (GoI) as well as respective states affected by Insurgencies in the Northeast, the Maoist belt, terrorism in J&K and in Punjab, have adopted several measures through 2018, as in the past. The Central Government also, initiated several schemes to further strengthen India’s existing internal security apparatus. On December 12, 2018, GoI disclosed that it had sanctioned the raising of six additional battalions of the Borders Security Force (BSF) on January 1, 2018. All these battalions have since been raised for deployment. A proposal to raise additional battalions in ITBP is also under consideration. Though an April 30, 2018, report stated that four new CRPF battalions with 1,148 staffs in each battalion will be raised at Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) Group Centres at Neemuch, Avadi, Rangareddy and Amethi, there is no further information available in this regard. The Government, however, informed Parliament on February 12, 2019, that “at present there is no decision of the Government to raise additional battalions in Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF)”. Earlier, on April 4, 2018, the Union Government informed Parliament,
Nevertheless, wide deficiencies persist. There has been no decisive improvement since the 26/11 Mumbai attacks, after which the Government had declared its intention to bring about radical transformation. The first responders to any terrorist threat, the Police Force, remain enormously neglected. While the Police-Population ratio was 134.3 (policeman per 100000 population) as on January 2, 2009, it has crept up to an arguable 150.75 by 2017 (as on January 1, 2017, the latest data available), much lower than the a 'desirable' Police-population ratio of 220 per 100,000 for ‘peacetime policing’. The number of vacancies across the country in the apex Indian Police Service (IPS) has actually increased over time. On July 19, 2018, Union Minister of State for Personnel Jitendra Singh, in a written reply to the Rajya Sabha, disclosed that there were 970 vacancies in the IPS or 19.64 per cent of the total 4,940 posts. As on January 1, 2010, of 4,013 authorised posts, in the IPS, just 3,383 were in position, leaving a deficit of 16.7 per cent.
Moreover, huge vacancies persist in the entire Central Armed Police Forces (CAPFs), which have been increasingly used as lead counter-insurgency Forces in the country: 166,896 vacant posts as on January 1, 2017, against a sanctioned strength of 1,154,393 (actual strength: 987,497). In 2010, the total vacancies were 100,830 (sanctioned strength 874,483, actual strength 773,653).
More worryingly, the implementation lag on decisions related to security is getting longer, as underlined in a report submitted by the Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) to the Parliament on April 5, 2018, where referring to Coastal Security Scheme Phase II (CSS II) it sated,
While the SFs have been able to bring down the level of terrorism/insurgency across most of the afflicted regions over the past few years, political mischief both at State as well as the Central level has allowed threats to persist and, in some cases, escalate. The Governments lethargic approach towards capacity building remains a major impediment to sustaining and consolidating the gains secured at great cost and sacrifice.