The Union Ministry of Dwelling Affairs (MHA) on Monday (February 23, 2026) launched the nation’s first-ever anti-terror coverage, emphasising that aside from terror sponsored from throughout the border, “felony hackers and nation states proceed to focus on India by cyber-attacks.”
The coverage stated that India faces terrorist threats on all three fronts — water, land and air — and capacities have been developed to guard the crucial sectors of the Indian financial system, together with energy, railways, aviation, ports, defence, area and atomic power, from State/non-State actors.
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The Hindu first reported on December 23, 2025 that the Nationwide Counter Terrorism Coverage and Technique has been finalised and will probably be launched quickly.
The coverage named “PRAHAAR, uploaded on MHA’s web site, acknowledged that “India doesn’t hyperlink terrorism to any particular faith, ethnicity, nationality or civilisation.”
It added that India has lengthy been affected by “sponsored terrorism” from throughout the border, with “Jihadi terror outfits in addition to their frontal organisations” persevering with to plan, coordinate, facilitate and execute terror assaults in India.
“India has been on the goal of world terrorist teams resembling Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), which have been attempting to incite violence within the nation by sleeper cells,” including that violent extremists working from international nations have hatched conspiracies to advertise terrorism.
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“Their handlers from throughout the border continuously use the newest applied sciences, together with the usage of drones, for facilitating terror-related actions and assaults in Punjab and Jammu and Kashmir. More and more, terrorist teams are partaking organised felony networks for logistics and recruitment to execute and facilitate terror strikes in India,” the coverage stated.
It additional stated that for propaganda, communication, funding and guiding terror assaults, these terror teams use social media platforms in addition to ‘prompt messaging functions’ and technological developments resembling encryption, the darkish net, crypto wallets, and so on. Have allowed these teams to function anonymously.
“Disrupting/Intercepting terrorist efforts to entry and use CBRNED (Chemical, Organic, Radiological, Nuclear, Explosive, Digital) materials stays a problem for Counter Terrorism (CT) companies. The specter of state and non-state actors misusing drones and robotics for deadly functions stays one other space of concern.”
As a means ahead, the coverage advised that to make applicable circumstances towards the perpetrators of acts of terrorism, there’s a have to affiliate authorized specialists at each stage of investigation, proper from the registration of FIR to its end result in prosecution.
“Terrorist teams based mostly exterior these days use the infrastructure, logistics and terrain information of native outfits for launching assaults. Nationwide actions, coupled with worldwide and regional cooperation, are key parts in addressing the transnational terrorism problem,” it stated.
MHA stated that terrorist teams are repeatedly making efforts to recruit Indian youth and to thwart these efforts, Indian intelligence and regulation enforcement companies have been repeatedly disrupting the designs of terrorist teams.
“As soon as recognized, these youths bear a graded police response, geared toward comprehensively addressing the issue of radicalisation and violent extremism in a multi-stakeholder setting. Authorized motion is initiated towards the person based mostly on their degree of radicalisation,” the Ministry’s new coverage stated.
Underscoring the function of group and spiritual leaders, the coverage acknowledged that average preachers and NGOs are engaged to unfold consciousness concerning the hostile penalties and impacts of radicalisation and extremist violence.
“Moreover, youth are constructively engaged in making certain that points which will threaten peace and communal concord are checked. With the intention to stop radicalisation in prisons, jail workers are cautioned on occasion to forestall acts of radicalisation of weak inmates by hardcore inmates. De-radicalisation programmes are additionally undertaken,” MHA stated.
Revealed – February 23, 2026 02:46 pm IST
