State's first under cover intelligence unit begins ground work

The Organised Crime Intelligence Unit (OCIU), Tamil Nadu's first undercover agency for intelligence-gathering, has already begun its groundwork. With its present skeletal strength, it has helped the local police crack a few sensational cases, including the daring daylight T Nagar robbery where the law-enforcers had no clues to work with.



In view of the importance accorded to this specialised unit, the state home department has cleared the appointement of 460 new recruits who will join the OCIU soon. The OCIU, which presently works out of the stinking forensic department building on the DGP's office premises. will soon move to swanky premises in the same building,
The OCIU has started compiling a list of the state's most notorious rowdies, drug-runners, criminal gangs and hawala racketeers. Once the list is prepared, it will begin monitoring each and every move of these criminals and tip the investigation agencies concerned regarding their plans. The unit, part of the state police, will do nothing but engage in gathering intelligence regarding organised crime syndicates. It is also the first such unit constituted in the state to bring more focus on prevention of organised crime.
"The unit will have a presence in all the districts and we are in the process of appointing deputy superintendents of police to head each district unit. The force is now headed by a superintendent of police, who would be stationed in Chennai," a senior police official said.
The government, while constituting the OCIU, rectified a flaw committed during the formation of the Q Branch. Conceptualised as an intelligence agency, the Q Branch was later on asked to take up investigation of cases related to left-wing extremism and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). The Q Branch members, supposed to be undercover, were forced to appear in court during the hearing of cases. This, according to senior officials, affected their ability to carry out decoy operations and secret intelligence gathering.
"The members of the OCIU will not face this problem as they will never be made part of investigation. They will only concentrate on the core intelligence work related to organised crime syndicates and pass on the information to the respective investigation agencies, be it the local police or the CB CID. So the OCIU can carry out decoy operations and secret surveillance more effectively," the official added.
Regarding data collation, the OCIU has started from where former Chennai police commissioner K Vijaykumar left off. Its members have begun making out a list of rowdies, classified in to A+, A, B and C categories, and started profiling each of them.
"They will be doing many operations in the future that could really bring down organised crime cases in the state," the official added.