How not to do Defence forces a great disservice

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How not to do Defence forces a great disservice

Sunday, 17 March 2019 | Pamarty Venkataramana

How not to do Defence forces a great disservice

The root cause of all problems with our ‘fauj eclipse’ has been that a former Prime Minister allowed the Ministry of Defence to be infested with non-military Government servants

The department of Defence has been in the news throughout the history of India’s democracy more than the department of Agriculture or the department of Health, thanks to all the controversial occurrences often orchestrated by politicians and their sidekicks.

Even as there can be no two opinions about the courage, valour and dedication of our men and women in uniform, the cause for all those acrimonious debates and sad tales of supposedly rampant cobwebs in the corridors of power can, on a dispassionate analysis, be pinpointed to the colossal damage caused by a deliberate machination of a dictatorial lady Prime Minister through tinkering of administrative structures.

The fallout is the fallen morale of upright, honest rank & file in the defence forces.

Let me begin with an episode which drew my attention — as a practising lawyer — to this wing of Government.

To cut a long story short, I accepted the brief of the then topmost tank-expert of our county, a Brigadier and his boss, then Director of a defence research establishment, who were both thrust with orders of “compulsory retirement”.

Why?

Apparently because they were not participating in a huge continuing act of misdemeanour: about Rs 115 crore was spent to develop the prototype of a main battle tank over 15 long years. The honest duo protested and they were unceremoniously removed.

I can place on record as a matter of pride that with high malarial fever running, I was able to argue for a record number of hours in then AP High Court and have them both reinstated (with structures passed against then defence secretary).

If the MBT Arjun prototype scam is not as much publicised as the Bofors Gun scam or later day controversies of AgustaWestland Helicopters purchase and the ongoing storm over the Rafale aircraft purchase order, there is but a common thread which weaves beyond the tenure of a certain elected Government or any particular acquisition from a certain jurisdiction.

That there are ghosts hidden in the corridors of power leading to the seeming “self-destruction” of outdated ships, fighter jets and other such most-expensive assets inducted into our armed forces is a foregone conclusion.

A moment of pride for Indian soldiers has in recent centuries been their incomparable valour during the First World War with all of them fighting shoulder-to-shoulder, regardless of religious faith they subscribed to!

Wickedness had its say and colonial rulers began to play the cartridge-trick (beef & pork bullets) to eliminate Brahmin castes from Army and divide the rank and file along the religious and caste lines.

This “divide-and-rule” game was the one that was later on aped by a desperate head of State who wished to cling on to seat of power. As a much-praised ‘empress of India’!

Here began the murky twist.

As an incisive study reveals, even though the Ministry of Defence is into long-term planning, a former lady PM dismantled the organisational structure of Ministry of Defence by flooding civilian staff under control of IAS officers.

The root cause of all problems with our “fauj eclipse” has been that the Ministry of Defence has been infested with Government servants (the IAS category) who are the root-cause of all acts of corruption springing out of defence deals — ranging from kickbacks in imports to running of dedicated public sector units.

From the embezzlement of PSU-assets to deliberately ensuring that former military officers are not involved in matters of the military, and policy-making to the exercise of financial powers, the nexus is not a simple wedlock of babudom and netalog but a more deadly, vicious and deeply-entrenched witchcraft stretching over four plus decades of foul play by a “IAS cartel and the dynasty-owned political party”.

The unholy nexus has caused the downslide in spirit and image of the most pristine department of the country’s Government.

Pentagon of the USA does long-term military planning and is staffed by more than 95 per cent military uniformed staff (and not by civil-servants as in India). Similar is the case with Russia, Israel, France, China and the UK.

This is a most noteworthy point that any contender for being a “Global Economic superpower” has to firstly command (emphasis placed on word “command”) respect as a “military-superpower” in today’s age and time.

To make matters worse, salaries of the military personnel, housing facilities, pensions have been reduced under supervision of the IAS — masters by dynasty. Thereby the IAS retains about 99 per cent of the financial powers in arms production, procurement to MES, infra-development or the maintenance of military-areas with complete “loot”.

All soldiers in the military are retired at age of 35-38 years so as to keep the forces young. These experienced, trained soldiers should be placed in the respective State Police forces (of their native, home State), on higher standards with basic police re-training being imparted. Such a move would help ensure prevalence of an honest police force, countrywide!

Such a pragmatic move would ensure that they get pension from age-60 years, thereby also saving taxpayers’ hard-earned money on early pensions. For instance, appoint or depute the IAS-IPS-IFS officers only if and after they put in a mandatory seven-years’ military service.

Moreover, five years of field posting in such a prescribed seven-year period of military-service would endow a qualitatively refined bureaucratic structure.

And so, the urgent dismantling of UPSC conducted recruitment measures as a springboard to elite military services is an equally vital element in the creation of a strong and robust military services cadre. National security cannot be allowed to be compromised at any cost.

Yet another startling question India must ponder over is  “Where are all those bullets being manufactured by the lakhs everyday at our ammunition factories going?”

Why are we importing arms and ammunition when we possess the best of facilities created by the British colonialists and many of which possess idle capacities?

Also, when India rules and drives the software-cum-hardware technological capabilities of the western world in several frontiers and applications, what is the need for continued imports of such “advanced” weaponry systems at huge costs to the exchequer that otherwise may be better utilised ?

The imports often are generations old, outdated ones by the time they are inducted in the Indian territory.

Not to miss the trump-card in favour of the case to oust devilry of “scams in defence sector”. It is an universal truth that when a certain product is manufactured in one corner of the globe and is imported into another country for use, the purchase is made through a middleman or a marketing representative (who taps the most powerful contacts of buyer-land to close the transaction).

Under such a trading situation, those who cry “wolf” seated in Opposition-ranks or are wild with rage for not receiving a “share-in-the-pie” would be doing greater disservice to their homeland than the recipients of the “bribes” or “commissions”.

So long as we let the media ecosystem to bypass the niceties of a set constitutional system to govern the democracy, the largely illiterate society would continue to dishonour its heroic ones while prostrating before the evil flock.

I hope this cry of the unsung patriotic defence forces would reach the ears of the Government of the day who certainly can bring in these evolutionary changes to restore the pride and strength of Defence Realm of India!

Jai Hind!

(The writer is an eminent jurist, based in New Delhi)

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