New Delhi: Government will soon draw up plans for pre-verification of consignments made through ports in view of potential use of these consignment route by the terrorist outfits for their activities in India.

"We are considering pre-verification of consignments at the originating destination itself and if necessary a person could even be sent from here to foreign ports for inspection of containers," Cabinet Secretary T R Prasad told reporters in New Delhi on the sidelines of a (CII) Confederation of Indian Industry seminar.

This proposed move was to ensure that security barriers did not become barriers for trade, he said, adding the US had also been experiencing similar problems after September 11 attacks.

"We will have to see what technology they (US) are using in checking the terrorist activities and draw some lessons from that so as to make it applicable in India," Prasad said.

Addressing the seminar on 'Supply Chain and Logistics Management for Globat Trade', he said, "security is very important issue and security barriers could become trade barriers".

Once the economy is opened up, there would be increased trade and therefore to that extent the security aspects also needed attention, he said, adding there could be instances of terrorists using the containers for safe passage.

"We have to see what can we do for bringing about ground level improvements," Prasad said.

Everyday 15 million containers move and security could not be overlooked and these are the threats the country was going to face, he added.

PTI