NEW DELHI: The Union Home ministry on Monday decided to strengthen the security cover of Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the wake of reports that the Maoists were conspiring to assassinate him. The decision was taken at a high-level meeting chaired by Home Minister Rajnath Singh.
National Security Advisor Ajit Doval, Union Home Secretary Rajiv Gauba and Intelligence Bureau director Rajiv Jain were present at the meeting. A statement issued by the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) said the Home Minister directed that all necessary measures be taken in consultation with other agencies to suitably strengthen the security arrangements for the Prime Minister.
“The MHA is in receipt of a report from the Maharashtra Police regarding certain communications among individuals having links to Maoists organisations containing references to targeting the Prime Minister,” the statement read. On June 7, the Pune Police had told a court that they had seized a “letter” from the residence of one of the five people arrested for having “links” with the banned CPI (Maoist). The purported letter allegedly mentioned of a plan to “assassinate” Modi in “another Rajiv Gandhi-type incident”, the police told the court. Another high-level meeting was held for discussing measures to be taken against malicious online content.
Gauba held the meeting to discuss steps law enforcement agencies could take to tackle the security challenges being posed by terrorists, militants and also individuals propagating child pornography using the social media platforms. In the meeting, senior officials also emphasised on taking steps to enhance coordination among the law enforcement agencies, the Department of Telecom, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MEITY) to block and remove malicious content under Section 69 and 79 of the IT Act.
“It was decided that law enforcement agencies will closely coordinate with MEITY to ensure that the action to block the content on social media platforms is taken in a timely manner. This will be followed by a meeting with the representatives of social media platforms for compliance,” a statement issued by the Ministry read. Senior officials said the idea behind the crackdown on malicious content is to ensure that security agencies could concentrate more on nabbing or eliminating criminals/terrorists with real guns rather than those who wage war against the state machinery using keypads.