Home ministry asks schools to follow SOP in terror attack

In the wake of the terrorist attack at an army-run school in Pakistan, the union home ministry has asked schools in India to follow the Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) issued in 2010 for dealing with any terrorist attack, an official said Friday.

The SOP was issued to all the schools affiliated to the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE).

In the SOP, the ministry had suggested various measures like mock drill, concrete boundary wall, 3 or 4 gates each manned round-the-clock, said the official.

"Telephone numbers of the Police Control Room and local police station should be...updated regularly by the school authorities. These details should be displayed at prominent places so that in case of crisis, the staff or security guards or any one in the school can contact the police," the SOP prescribed.

"A visual anti-sabotage check of the entire school should be carried out by the security staff of the school before the children start arriving in the morning. They should also check the footpath in front of the school, all along the boundary wall including parking area to detect any suspicious objects lying unattended there," said the SOP.

The SOP also said barbed wire may be fixed on the iron grills above the boundary wall to deter any one from jumping over the wall.

More than 140 people mostly students were killed in the Dec 16 terrorist attack in Pakistan's Peshawar city.

The advisory said in case armed terrorists managed to enter the school the children should not be asked to gather in any open ground as they could become easy targets.

"Initially all the children and teachers should stay back in their respective rooms and those in veranda rush into the nearest room, and not to indulge in any rash act. They should close the doors from inside and lie low in the classroom to escape random firing," said the SOP.

"School authority should wait for the police to arrive, contain the situation, surround the situation, surround the terrorist and provide a secured passage for the children to move out from their respective places to outside the school," it added.