Young boys and girls, from highly educated backgrounds such as MBAs, advocates, IT specialists having qualifications of BE, BTech and MTech, accountants, science graduates and PGs, doctors and even pharma engineers are joining IB to become "spies". Many of them have already resigned from their better paying careers as they see being an IB officer is more exciting and challenging. "A young boy even left his job where he was earning Rs 1.5 lakh per month to become an intelligence officer," said a top official.
Many of these youngsters are in the age-group of 18 to 27 years and are from across the country from the states including Nagaland, Manipur, Telangana, Maharashtra, Delhi, Karnataka, J&K and others are excited in the tough job and have shown interest in gathering intelligence for national security.
"These are the boys and girls who are go-getters for the IB," said an official. "All they need is a telephone, a tele-printer and a computer and they send their daily reports to their local SIBs and headquarters. They are the eyes and ears of the government," said the officer.
"Intelligence Bureau's men on the ground don't get the kind of facilities Pakistan's ISI operatives have access to. What was happening for a long time was that IB officers on the ground filed their 'daily reports' like a routine with whatever limited information and knowledge they had from their area / sources. Sometimes, the alerts sent to the states were recycled and sufficient verification wasn't done or there was no coordination at the local SIB (Subsidiary Intelligence Bureau) level," the officer said.
Intelligence gathering is one of the toughest jobs, especially in "hard zones" (disturbed / conflict areas), an officer said, "Being a field intelligence officer, ACIO, requires a lot of motivation and skills. At a time when militants are upgrading and new threats are emanating from the cyber world, the IB using age-old methods and people is not working."
A senior home ministry official confirmed that "the Narendra Modi government has put more focus on better intelligence officers on the ground and providing everything they need so that country has a safe environment".
By Premji
