Hyderabad, Dec 6 (IANS): Union Home Minister P. Chidambaram Monday inaugurated a regional hub of the elite anti-terror National Security Guard (NSG) here.
The hub has come up at a cost of Rs.37.96 crore on 22 acres of land at Tirmulghery in Secunderabad, Hyderabad's twin city.
Speaking on the occasion, Chidambaram said the NSG were being provided modern weapons and the world-class training to thwart terrorist attacks and hijacking of airplanes.
He said NSG commandoes would be sent to visit their counterparts in Russia and France to update themselves on training methods and equipment.
Recalling that the decision to set up the regional NSG hub was taken after the terror attack in Mumbai Nov 26-28, 2008, with the aim to reduce response time and reach the area of operation as quickly as possible, Chidmabaram said that following the measures taken by the government and security agencies, the number of terror attacks has come down.
"There were only three blasts in three years, but that is one achievement. Busting of 57 or 58 terror modules is another achievement, but the biggest achievement is the capacity we have created throughout the country (to tackle terrorism)," he said.
The home minister said the capacity was created in the NSG, the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF), the Border Security Force (BSF) and the Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) and new courses were introduced at the National Police Academy in Hyderabad.
"New training modules were created, new equipment provided and a huge amount of money was spent on this," he said.
It was in July 2009 that Chidambaram had formally inaugurated the regional hub at a ceremony held at the old airport but the infrastructure has only come up now.
Though three regional NSG hubs were already functional at Mumbai, Chennai and Kolkata, the hub at Secunderabad is the first to have permanent infrastructure.
Stressing on quick response time to counter terrorist attacks, Chidambaram said the minimum time for an NSG unit of Hyderabad to assemble and be airborne would be 60 minutes.
The idea of setting up regional hubs was born out of the fact that it took several hours to deploy NSG commandos from Manesar, near Gurgaon in Haryana, which was hometo the NSG then, to Mumbai on 26/11.
The regional hub here will have 241 commandos, ready for deployment round the clock at the shortest possible notice.
Chidambaram said a state-of-the art facility exclusively for the NSG training in southern states would soon come up at Ibrahimpatnam near Hyderabad.
Andhra Pradesh Home Minister P. Sabita Indra Reddy and NSG Director General R. Medhekar were also present.