New Delhi, Dec. 2: The Centre may not wait till Parliament’s session from December 10 to set up the planned federal investigative agency, which will be like America’s FBI.

Sources said since Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had promised to create the agency with sweeping powers to tackle terror, the urgency was greater.

The sources said an ordinance might be issued announcing the agency, the need for which was highlighted by the second administrative reforms commission under Veerappa Moily.

States have long opposed the move over fears the agency will limit their authority but, after the bloody Mumbai rampage, their objections may not hold.

The agency is one of the many strategies the Centre intends to adopt to fight terror, the others being upgrade of the coast guard and modernisation of the police force.

Like the FBI, the Indian agency will have offices in all states under state chiefs. But unlike the CBI, the agency will have offices the world over.

Most overseas offices may be in neighbouring countries, but the aim is to have its centres in countries that share intelligence, the sources said.

The agency may have a hierarchy similar to that of the FBI, headed by a director and backed by assistant directors.

While probing terror incidents and preventing them will be among its foremost tasks, the agency will also be expected to check related crimes such as money laundering.

National security adviser M.K. Narayanan had earlier this year highlighted this concern, saying he couldn’t rule out terror money making its way into the stock market.

The agency could, therefore, be tasked with choking off funds to terror outfits and sympathisers. Specific incidents of smuggling of arms and narcotics, with evidence of links to terror, could also come under its purview.