Give armed forces their rightful dues

Arun Kumar Singh
I must clarify that I am not a member of the ESM (Ex-Servicemen Movement) which has been holding marches and press conferences all over the country to press its demand for better pay and pension for military all personnel, serving and retired. Having interacted with military, civil and political leaders in dozens of countries, I firmly believe that in any democracy, the military must be subordinate to the civilian political government in power, but not the bureaucrats who are on the staff of ministers. Also, having served in the Navy for some four decades, and hailing from an "Army family", I believe Indians have full faith in the armed forces always remaining apolitical.

Unfortunately, I have been driven to pen this article after reading a newspaper article by Shekhar Gupta on October 4, Chain of command, demand in the Indian Express, which appears to be based on incorrect inputs and lack of sufficient exposure to the Indian military ethos.

India is a liberal democracy, and people have the right to say and write whatever they want without censorship. But it is essential to set the record straight. People are aware of the downgradation of the military by successive pay commissions where the armed forces were not even represented. Most Indians are also aware of the price India has had to pay (and continues to pay) for the political leadership not permitting the then Major-General K.S. Thimayya the two weeks he sought to complete the liberation of Kashmir in 1948. This was followed by large scale demobilisation and downgradation of the combat capability of the armed forces in the wake of the short-sighted "Hindi-Chini Bhai Bhai" era. Unfortunately, since the service chiefs of that era could not muster enough courage to warn the government of the dangers of leaving our borders unguarded, the nation suffered a humiliating defeat in 1962 against China.

In 1971, the then Army Chief, General Sam Manekshaw, refused to comply with the government's order to commence hostilities in April because the Army needed time to prepare. General Manekshaw wanted to fight in December, after the fields had been harvested and snow had blocked the mountain passes, to prevent a Chinese intervention. The result was the victory in the 1971 war. Sadly, in 1987, the then Army Chief did not follow this precedent when ordered to go into Sri Lanka at short notice. The outcome of the IPKF operations is well known.

What the three current service chiefs have done with respect to the Sixth Pay Commission is not wrong. It is their duty to gauge the morale of the military and inform the political leadership of the need for corrective action before things get out of control (as had happened with a section of the Indian Air Force after the Fifth Pay Commission).

Even in the UK, the Army and Naval Chiefs have openly voiced their anguish over low pay structure of the UK armed forces. The result was a public promise by Prime Minister Gordon Brown to take corrective measures. The armed forces are aware that while they regularly bail the bureaucrats out of tight spots (be it insurgency, Naxalism, riots, natural disasters etc), the babus and police effectively raise their own status and career prospects. After countless failures of civil administration in recent times, the Army has been repeatedly called to restore order. Look at the past two months: After dealing with the crisis in Kashmir, the armed forces had to step in to help in Bihar and Assam during the floods.

The civil services, which continues to lose the war on terror and against Naxalism (in 2002, Naxals were active only in five states; today, 16 states have active Naxals due to poor administration), have got a Diwali pay-cum-status hike for their non-performance and non-accountability. In the meantime, the same babus have been busy in releasing "selective and incorrect" leaks to a section of the media, between September 2 and October 4, casting aspersions on the armed forces. There were also veiled threats of the need to "discipline the armed forces".

Fortunately this time, the political leadership became aware of the manipulations done to the Sixth Pay Commission by the bureaucracy. The print and electronic media has given details of the four anomalies which are expected to be resolved before Diwali by the group of three ministers. On October 6, a news magazine reported how the IAS babus had given themselves an additional pay hike of Rs 12 crores per annum (two extra increments and an increase in grade pay of joint secretaries by Rs 1,000) without the Cabinet's approval. Hopefully, the Cabinet will pursue this scam to its logical end.

India's sad history of lack of strategic vision and its inability to protect the wealth its entrepreneurs have traditionally generated resulted in about 1,300 years of foreign invasions, slaughter and subjugation. Progressively destroying the morale and respect of the military, in 61 years since Independence, will result in history repeating itself.

The three wise ministers reviewing the armed forces' pay, may like to remember this letter written in 320 BC by Kautilya (author of Arthasashtra) to Emperor Chandra Gupta Maurya: "… My Lord, the day the Mauryan soldier has to demand his dues, or worse, plead for them, would neither have arrived overnight nor in vain. It will also bode ill for Magadha. For then, on that day, you my Lord, will have lost all moral sanction to be king! It will also be the beginning of the end of the Mauryan Empire!!"

Vice Admiral Arun Kumar Singh
Retired as Flag Officer Commanding-in-Chief of the Eastern Naval Command, Visakhapatnam
Give Armed Forces its due

To,
The Editor
Indian Express.
Sir,
For some time it has been evident that the Indian Express' standards have been steadily deteriorating. This was confirmed by the insensitive, craven editorial a few weeks ago which drew a righteous response. If further confirmation was required it was provided by Shekhar Gupta's lead article, "Chain of command…" . He observes that "Soon enough, there will be a civilian riposte, and unfortunately it could take away from the armed forces and their future chiefs some of the autonomy in decision-making, even small purchasing powers, that they have won in tiny parcels in a six-decade war of attrition. This pay commission episode will now be invoked by stronger governments, and certainly better defence ministers — as almost anybody would be after Antony — to "cut the brass to size" with the argument, "remember how they behaved over that pay commission?" Was he being the spokesman for the babus by holding out this threat? (His well known dislike for South Indians is evident here!)
There has been a virtual tsunami of responses to this article and I am sure what is circulated on the net is only a fraction of the outpouring of indignation, which demonstrates the depth and extent of anguish of the citizenry of the country. Most of them must have been consigned to the trash can – like this one will. Unfortunately, Down Under I cannot read Indian newspapers and am totally dependent on the internet.

With a dwindling subscriber base due to aggressive marketing and slick production by the 'Times of India' and other papers, he has been masquerading as a crusader of 'journalism of courage' by being "free, frank and forthright". The inability to start a TV news channel forced him to host an inane talk show, "Walk the talk", courtesy NDTV. Building memorials to the dead soldiers, (to which he personally did not contribute a penny himself) that was funded by the generosity of patriotic readers does not give him the license to insult living soldiers/ veterans by publicly denigrating the three Chiefs, when he is ignorant of the functioning of the services.

This ignorance is further on show as he has rattled off a few names of some well known Chiefs. He has forgotten one who like Sam Manekshaw stood up to a formidable PM (and RM) Indira Gandhi without the support of the two fellow chiefs, and got away by winning the battle for 'free rations' for officers, even though he himself was not a beneficiary. Many would know that Indira Gandhi then sought to replace him in the same way that Vishnu Bhagwat was replaced by George Fernandez. Fortunately for the IN (and India), the dramatis personae involved were true gentlemen and made of sterner stuff. When the aircraft landed clandestinely at night to fetch the "reliever" to Delhi, he informed the PM over the telephone, "unless my Chief orders me to come to Delhi, I will stay where I am"– and thereby defused an explosive situation. The two officers I refer to are (both late) Admiral Ronnie Pereira and Vice Admiral Vivian Barboza– both of whom are remembered with fondness and pride by all naval personnel of that era. I am glad that my friend, Faggy Mehta together with Deepak Kapoor and Fali Major are cast in the same mould. They have closed ranks and stood shoulder to shoulder to get justice for the men and women they command, backed by an RM who seems to know where his true strengths lie. More power to all of them.

The two cornerstones of military ethos are honour and loyalty (i.e. to the country, to the Service, to the unit). Contrary to what the babu thinks, loyalty is not a one-way street. It goes upwards and downwards: junior to senior and senior to junior. In following the axiom, "yours not to reason why; but to do or die", it is implicit that the senior would always do the right thing. What the CNS and the other chiefs have demonstrated (reciprocated) is their loyalty to their subordinates, by taking up cudgels on their behalf. The Chetwodian motto encompasses this. I hope the UPA has the sense to reciprocate their loyalty in the same fashion.

As I was 'writing' this, the news came over the BBC of the brutal killing of a close friend who was on the staff course at the DSSC with me. General Janaka Pereira of the Sri Lankan Army and his wife died in Colombo in a bomb blast on Monday. No doubt it happened in our backyard and not at home. It could well have happened to one of my erstwhile Indian colleagues, still in service. Does Shekhar Gupta or any of his bureaucratic cohorts know that people like Janaka lay their lives on the line every day, regardless of their rank – and the loss of life is no less poignant. Right now, somewhere some wife, mother, sister or daughter is mourning the loss of a loved one while people like Shekhar Gupta sermonize on what constitutes proper behavior for soldiers.

In days gone by, the soldier was placed on a pedestal as the call to arms was the noblest profession. Prompted by jealousy, the wily babu has been steadily chipping away at this pedestal for the past 60 years and has virtually succeeded in toppling him from that lofty position. One has only to recall the matrimonial columns of those days and look at the same columns today to realize this. Justice Srikrishna and the Cabinet Secretary, aided by Shekhar Gupta and his ilk have done what the ISI and the Pakistani establishment could not do in all this time ; sow the seeds of indiscipline. Let there not be any doubt about the repercussions which have already manifested itself in the BSF, Coast Guard Commandants refusing to take orders from the Army and Navy officers, who until yesterday were senior to them. The IAS is even now trying to sow the seeds of discord in the rank and file, with the intent to make them rebel against their officers. All this is being orchestrated by a special "DIRTY TRICKS DEPARTMENT" called the Department of Personnel and Training, headed by a Machiavellian secretary. This is the department which has consistently frustrated efforts to have a separate pay commission for the armed forces or even have a representative on the central pay commissions. Why is this demand inconceivable when the armed forces are always expected to conduct themselves differently from the rest – they even have their own unique justice system comprising summary trials and courts martial, mandated by Acts of Parliament? It is because of this justice system that army personnel involved in various scams have been tried and punished while their civilian collaborators (and co– accused) like George Fernandez and the like, still roam free. He still has a chance to redeem himself by issuing a public apology through his paper.

Carl H Gomes