Senior Indian Police Service (IPS) officer Ashok Patnaik, who is also the son-in-law of former prime minister Manmohan Singh, was appointed as the CEO of National Intelligence Grid (NATGRID), an ambitious intelligence gathering mechanism conceived in the wake of the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks.
He will be effective from the date of assumption of charge of the post upto December 31, 2018 — the date of his retirement on superannuation or until further orders, whichever is earlier. He will succeed Raghu Raman, the first CEO of NATGIRD ended in June 2015. The post was under the additional charge of former special secretary Ashok Prasad till January 2016.
Ashok Patnaik
Patnaik is a 1983-batch Gujarat cadre officer, who is currently serving as additional director in the Intelligence Bureau. Patnaik married former prime minister Manmohan Singh’s daughter, Daman Singh, in 1991.
According to a report in October of 2007, Patnaik was decorated with the President’s Police medal. He received the medal from his father-in-law and then prime minister, Manmohan Singh.
NATGRID – National Intelligence Grid
- NATGRID is an ambitious counter terrorism programme, which will utilise technologies like Big Data and analytics to study and analyse the huge amounts of data from various intelligence and enforcement agencies to help track suspected terrorists and prevent terrorist attacks.
- NATGRID aims to mitigate a vital deficiency — lack of real time information, which was considered to be one of the major hurdles in detecting US terror suspect David Headley’s movement across the country during his multiple visits between 2006 and 2009.
- According to the Union Home Ministry proposal, the NATGRID, which is still in a nascent stage, will connect, in different phases, data providing organisations and users besides developing a legal structure through which information can be accessed by the law enforcement agencies.
- In the first phase, 10 user agencies and 21 service providers will be connected, while in later phases about 950 additional organisations will be connected.
- Currently, there are around 70 personnel, drawn from both the government and private sectors, in NATGRID.
