Author: G.D. Bakshi
Publication: Outlook
Date: October 3, 2011
URL: http://www.outlookindia.com/article.aspx?278421
The MoD would do better to assess military
threat from China than spend its energies on discrediting the army chief over
the non-issue of his year of birth
Civil-military relations in India today have
touched a nadir that is strongly reminiscent of the state of affairs in the
run-up to our disastrous war with China in 1962. In that year, the circumstances
were perhaps extenuating for a civil-military spat. There are none today.
A military coup in Pakistan had then made the civil establishment in India
paranoid. Unfortunately, this took the form of a McCarthyist inquisition to
humiliate and sideline all professional military officers with combat experience
and promote in their place officers from cushy peace station environments
who were deemed pliable.
Matters reached a head when the civil establishment
tried to foist a lieutenant general from the army supply corps (who was related
to the then PM) as the army chief. Gen Thimmaya, a combat-experienced general,
was aghast. He had been warning the government on the need to speed up military
preparations against the Chinese. He was callously ignored and told that the
Chinese would be handled by personal charm and diplomacy. Thimmaya resigned
in disgust but Pandit Nehru persuaded him to withdraw his resignation. The
moment he did so, he was ridiculed and humiliated in the national media. Timmy
went home a heartbroken man. Three years down the line, the nation was faced
with the traumatic military humiliation by the Chinese.
Today, there is a new civil-military gridlock
which has been triggered off by a manufactured controversy around the age
of the current army chief, General V.K. Singh. This at a time when equipment
deals worth crores have been pending for two decades. The army has not been
able to procure a medium artillery gun since the 1987 Bofors deal. The procurement
needs to be expedited on a war footing in response to Chinese military modernisation
and infrastructure capacity development in Tibet. If in the 1980s, the Chinese
could build 22 divisions over two seasons, today they can field up to 34 divisions
within just a month. Instead of speeding up things to meet this increased
threat, the defence ministry is stonewalling every proposal being sent up
by the current army chief. To ensure deterrence and counter the steep rise
in Chinese capabilities, the army had put up a case for raising a strike corps
for the mountains. The finance and environment ministries have shot this down,
along with another proposal to build a road to north Sikkim. Are we heading
for another military disaster?
The age of the army chief is at the heart
of this increasingly unseemly controversy. The issues at stake have now been
well-framed by the MoD accusations (leaked through a weekly). These virtually
charge the chief with lying about his age. Gen Singh, a well-respected combat
soldier, had begun his tenure with a concerted effort to improve the moral
and ethical health of the army. Stringent action had been initiated against
very senior officers on corruption issues. And since the current defence minister
had a reputation for probity, it was expected that the two would gel well
as a team. To everyone's surprise, the army and the MoD are now energetically
engaged in trying to reduce the tenure of the chief. They are doing their
best to provoke him into resigning by calling him a "liar". This
is a very serious accusation that impinges most adversely on the honour and
reputation of any military officer and the institution of the army.
Did the chief actually lie about his age?
Despite a barrage of disinformation, the facts are now transparent and clear.
There is only one document that lists the chief's date of birth (DoB) as May
10, 1950. This was the application form to the National Defence Academy that
his schoolteacher B.S. Bhatnagar had filled for him at the age of 14. It is
hardly legal tender. As against this, there are a host of legal documents
that give his correct DoB as May 10, 1951. These include the matriculation
certificate-mandated by the Supreme Court of India as the key document for
determination of age. There are also the iafz 2040-the record sent by the
Indian Military Academy on the commissioning of an officer-as well as the
iafz-2041, the record of service sent by the officer's unit to the adjutant-general's
(AG) branch. This is in addition to the birth certificate of the military
hospital where he was born as also the Part II Orders of his father's military
unit that record his DoB as May 10, 1951. Besides, there are the officer's
ID card and the officer's passport. In the light of this overwhelming weight
of evidence, three former chief justices of the Supreme Court have upheld
the contention of the army chief and the AG branch, which is the real custodian
of officers' records, that his DoB was May 10, 1951.
But Goebbels-style "spin-doctoring"
has been used to spread the canard that the chief has sought a revision of
his age to get an extended tenure. This is blatantly untrue. Gen Singh has
consistently maintained from the stage of entry into the army that his correct
DoB is May 10, 1951. Each and every annual confidential report (ACR) since
he was commissioned bears this date. His crucial promotion boards till the
rank of Lt Gen were done based on 1951 as his year of birth. If the MoD seriously
believes its own strident accusation, then it must try the army chief for
lying. However, the ministry is well aware of the weak legal ground it is
on. Hence it is apparently trying to force Gen Singh into resigning through
an orchestrated PR campaign of slander and unsubstantiated accusations in
the media.
It is obdurately trying to defend an obvious
goof-up, by making it out to be a classic case of the military defying the
supremacy of civilian authority. That is far from the case. The chief has
taken the extraordinary step of putting up a statutory complaint seeking redress
from the raksha mantri. This is a formal and legal route for seeking redress.
The chief has been called a liar. He is seriously aggrieved and would like
to clear his fair name. The ministry is expected to apply its mind and act
impartially while dispensing justice and ensure fair play. Instead of doing
so, its minions have sought to damn the chief without even the pretence of
a hearing. In trying to damn Gen Singh, it is destroying the very august institution
of the army chief.
How did this whole unseemly controversy begin?
It dates back to 2006 when the then army chief, Gen J.J. Singh, decided to
set his line of succession two or three chiefs down as per his personal predilections.
It was during this exercise that the disparity in records of Gen V.K. Singh's
DoB held with the military secretary's (MS) branch and the AG's branch came
to light. A look at the charter of duty of the two branches clearly indicates
that it is the latter which is the designated custodian of officers' records.
The AG branch had correctly recorded the general's date of birth as May 10,
1951. The MS Branch (despite receiving a copy of the officer's matriculation
certificate in 1971) failed to correct its records. In 1974, it published
the army list showing Gen V.K. Singh's DoB as May 10, 1950, and has since
obdurately and incorrectly stuck to its flawed stance. It is also responsible
for misguiding and misinforming the MoD. Of course, it was equally incumbent
upon the ministry to seek legal advice at that stage itself to resolve the
controversy well before Gen V.K. Singh became an army commander and then the
army chief. Instead, Gen J.J. Singh tried his best to exploit Gen V.K. Singh's
vulnerable position and virtually ordered him to accept 1950 as his year of
birth or face the consequences of disobedience! A pained and baffled Lt Gen
V.K. Singh complied, but with express reservations in writing. The same exercise
was repeated in 2008 when he was elevated to the army chief's office. The
MoD ordered an inquiry that was never held. It's a brand new concept of justice
based not on facts and competence but the personal likes and dislikes and
manipulative chains of succession worked out by the ministry.
This murky episode, however, serves to throw
light on the opaque and manipulative nature of the MS branch. The ministry
seeks to retain control by having its representative in the MS branch (MS-X)
and tightly controlling all promotions to brigadier and above. In the pre-1962
era, this was used to sideline competent and combat-proven officers and promote
sycophants and peace area specialists.
Some five decades down the line from the sordid
saga of throttling the army in the run-up to the 1962 war, military historians
can see that spectre looming all over again. There truly is a need to restore
the ethical and moral tone of our army, precisely what the present chief was
doing. Sacking him would send a very wrong signal to the rank and file.
