ipcs.org
http://www.ipcs.org/books-review/india/first-draft-witness-to-the-making-of-modern-india-264.html

Book review
India Over the Years

First Draft: Witness to the Making of Modern India
BG Verghese
New Delhi: Tranquebar Press, 2010
Pages: 573
Price: Rs 695


BG Verghese has lived a life coextensive with the growth of India as a fledgling democratic republic when he joined the Times of India in 1949 to a potential great power today. In his book he bears ‘witness to the making of modern India’ from the vantage points that his career as a journalist and writer offered him. Multiple areas of expertise acquired along the way, in particular developmental journalism and security; help make his perspective a unique one. Not only has he been an observer taking care to record his views, but has also been a participant in engaging with some of the monumental questions that India has faced along the way. The book is a testimony of his inspiring energy even in the evening of his life.

The book is appropriately named First Draft, set to serve as the ‘first draft’ of history for historians to do a more deliberate job. Two such histories of the period find mention in his Preface, historians Bipan Chandra, Aditya and Mridula Mukherjee’s India After Independence and Ramchandra Guha’s India After Gandhi. Given India’s well known lack of a sense of history and government’s penchant for keeping information classified, such efforts serve to refresh readers of all ages of the antecedents and context of the times, past and present. Indeed, Verghese’s ring side view of history on the make over the years makes for a compelling reading. This owes to several advantages for readers that Verghese subsumes in his person such as being a journalist he is able to convey the tone and texture of events and issues through light prose. But more usefully for readers, his integrity, liberal perspective and the sympathy of his treatment of various topics adds to the value of the book.

The book begins with a self-introduction, tracing his roots to Kerala. The catholicity of his upbringing in a military family and appreciation for India’s diversity acquired in the Doon School shape his prism for viewing the world. His subsequent education in St Stephens College and Cambridge University serve to place him in the best position to take on life in a newly independent nation. His marriage to Jamila, the daughter of Reverand Barkatullah, a convert from Islam, can only have added to the breadth of his humanism. That his sons are named Vijay Khurram and Rahul Salim is telling in itself.

His early experience when posted in Delhi with The Times helped him gain acquaintance with several areas of interest, such as the development schemes beginning with the first five year plans. His insight into security affairs can be attributed to his covering the 1962 War, the end of which saw him as one of two Indian reporters left in a forlorn Tezpur evacuated by the administration and inhabitants. His abiding interest in issues of increased topicality such as environment and climate change dates to his covering of the subcontinent’s river water issues for over half a century. His political sense owes to his service in Indira Gandhi’s secretariat as information adviser (1966-68). This could only have been honed further in his subsequent stints as editor with the Hindustan Times (1969-75) and Indian Express (1982-86). His copious knowledge of the development sector has been enhanced by hands on experience with grass roots NGOs and Gandhian institutions in the sabbatical from journalism he had between his two editorships.

It would appear that ‘retirement’ has only made him busier. Tying down a fellowship with the reputed Center for Policy Research, he was able to pursue the several issues that interested him to the benefit of the policy makers and the wider reading public. It is befitting that the government has attempted to benefit from his experience through bodies like the Kargil Review Committee (1999-2000), Prasar Bharti (1997-2003) and the National Security Advisory Board (1998-2000). It is a different matter that not all his input has seen the light of day. But the book helps keep the spotlight on the work yet remaining.

Among the issues close to his heart that he reflects on with authority and at length are politics, the long neglected North East, developmental concerns, press freedom and regulation and the manner to address problems in tribal areas. The landmark political events ranging from the Nehruvian apogee to the Gujarat pogrom, are all there, covered with an insider’s finesse and a editorialist’s critical eye. His insight into security matters is refreshing in that it is not one of a practitioner, but from non-core areas such as development of tribal areas and the North East while being sensitive to the aspect of cultural preservation and respect. His heading of the Press Council’s enquiry at the behest of the Army into the allegations of rape in Konan Poshpora in J&K helped India ward of pressures in the 1990s. His membership of Kargil Review Committee is recounted, giving an understanding of how even a government appointed committee can deliver. His abiding reservation is on the manner information is horded by the government despite its potential to strengthen democracy, the nation and contrary to the government’s belief, also the state.

Since his association with all these issues has been over the years, the issues resurface in the chronologically set book. This serves to update the reader even while keeping his attention. His last chapter dwells optimistically on current day headlines such as terrorism, including majoritarian terror, Naxalism, economic change and land alienation etc. Embedded alongside are his answers, impelled by a liberal vision. The text is complemented by value adding sepia-tinted photos covering a lifespan and five appendices on structural and information reforms. Of interest also is that a full life at the periphery of the vortex need not be at the cost of family and friends. Clearly, by that standard of a life lived well, Verghese passes with distinction. This adds to his credibility as the interpreter of our today.

indiatogether.org
http://www.indiatogether.org/2010/oct/fah-churchill.htm

BOOK REVIEW

Madhusree Mukerjee, Churchill’s Secret War: The British Empire and the Ravaging of India during World War II, Chennai: Tranquebar Press, 2010, pp. 352, Rs 495/-, ISBN 978-93-80658-47-6

India’s most widely read historian, Ramchandra Guha rightly praises Mukerjee’s book as ‘a major contribution to Indian history and to history of the Second World War.’ The author has convincingly laid the blame for the Bengal famine and the resulting three million deaths at Churchill’s door. Her thesis is that ‘Churchill and his advisers chose to use the resources of India to wage war against Germany and Japan, causing scarcity and inflation in the colony’ that led to 1.5 million deaths by the official account. The ‘deprivation and anarchy of the fractious era had torn the fabric of its society’, enabling the ‘divide and rule’ policy that eventuated over time in the mutually antagonistic nations, India, Pakistan and Bangladesh.

The author begins the work with the establishment of the British in Bengal with Robert Clive’s take over in 1757. The first famine among a series that reduced India’s prosperity to dependence on British rule was in 1770. Clive, who was once a clerk, returned to become the richest man in Britain. Though member of the House of Commons, he was tried for corruption but absolved of charges of retaining gifts that were the property of the company. His life befittingly ended in suicide. Over forty rebellions rocked India over the next hundred years till the anniversary of the hundredth battle of Plassey when central and northern India erupted. The Bengal Army being at the center of the ‘Sepoy Mutiny, policies were put in place by the Crown that took over India to keep the Bengali ‘babus’ in check. Later the province was divided along linguistic and religious lines and the capital shifted out of Calcutta to Delhi. The Viceroy’s taking of the colony into World War II without consulting the Congress governments in power set the stage for the famine.

Fearing the war coming to India’s doorstep on losing Burma, a ‘scorched earth’ policy was embarked on. Provisions such as rice, transport facilities were removed from coastal Bengal, lest they be acquired by the Japanese who were expected to arrive by sea. The Quit India movement, diversion of resources to the Indian Army fighting in far away theatres around the Mediterranean Sea, printing of money to pay for the purchases and an untimely cyclone conspired to bring on the famine. With the Subhash Bose led INA at the gates, insurgents in Bengal preparing to welcome him and patriots responding to Gandhi’s call of ‘Quit India’, Churchill was called upon to ‘make a choice that would tilt the balance between life and death for millions: whether or not to expend valuable wheat and shipping space on providing famine relief to Bengalis.’

The book’s contribution lies in establishing the link between Churchill’s decisions on this score and his world view. The author shows that Leopold Amery, secretary of state for India, and the Viceroy, Wavell, attempted to respond to the famine, but were stymied by a combination of Churchill and his adviser, Lindemann, who achieved peerage as Lord Cherwell. Mukerjee writes, ‘If the United Kingdom had an Achilles’ heel, it was the stomach.’ Having experienced temporary shortages due to German U Boat action in the First World War, the British created stocks to last three months. Churchill appointed Lindemann to watch over the feeding of Britons. Lindemann, as head of S (Statistics) branch, also prioritized the logistical machinery of warfare. Thus, he was to advise on the utilization of shipping resources available and lent by the United States, between the equally compelling civil and military demands. Mukerjee makes that case that the ideas of eugenics that Lord Cherwell propounded and the racism these spelt influenced his judgment. While shipping resources were available, these were not diverted to save Bengalis by being deployed to import rice from Australia and elsewhere. This was in consonance with Churchill’s own perverse thinking, expressed in typical Churchillian prose as recorded by Amery in his diaries. An example of Churchill’s thinking on colonies and their inhabitants, is recorded by Amery thus, ‘(Churchill) came very near to suggesting that we really could not let Indian starvation or multiplying too fast interfere with operations.’ The author competently goes into tonnages of shipping, the alternative demands such as the supposed need for creating stockpiles in case the Balkans were liberated, and the rice and wheat that could have been brought in to mitigate the food crisis of 1943 to demolish the view that the famine was yet another work of nature. It was essentially man made, brought on by decisions taken by figures imbued with a racist mentality. Interestingly, Churchill was in the midst of a fight with Hitler, an extremist on this score.

The author’s description of the famine is blood curdling. It is a heartening that the democracy has ensured that such a predicament has not recurred in India, even if malnutrition persists as reminder of India’s underdevelopment despite its aspiration for double digit growth rate figures. The author taps the experiences of survivors of the famine, now in the twilight of their lives. Their stories of rural strife and urban horrors of the period make a riveting reading in the two chapters ‘In the village’ and ‘On the street’ respectively. The author weaves into the narrative the fallout of the Quit India movement at the local level in the form of a micro nationalist revolt under the local leader Dhara in Tamluk. She leaves the question unanswered as to why the people did not rebel, did not fight for taking over horded stocks. In his review of the book in Outlook, to these Swapan Dasgupta adds another: why the famine never became a pan Indian issue. His suggestive parting line is that ‘Mukherjee’s (sic) nationalist narrative dosen’t provide the answers but they suggest awkward possibilities.’

IPCS Article #3246, 28 September 2010
AfPak: Beginning of the End?

In an attack on Pakistan from Khost province in Afghanistan, International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) forces killed 50 Taliban insurgents. The NATO spokesman rationalised the attack as “ISAF forces must and will retain the authority, within their mandate, to defend themselves in carrying out their mission.” This action has been taken as a violation of its sovereignty by Pakistan. Pakistan has indicated that it “will be constrained to consider response options” since there exists no agreement on such ‘hot pursuit’ with the NATO force in Afghanistan, the ISAF.

After a lull resulting from the devastating floods in Pakistan, AfPak is back in the news with a bang. Two possible interpretations exist. One is that the attack manifests the energy of the ‘surge’ that has by now been finally completed, and Petraeus’ determination to prevail in the asymmetric conflict. The second more negative one is that it could be indicative of frustration within the ISAF against a wily foe having sanctuary across the Durand line.

In either case they potentially herald the beginning of the end. The end state could once have been visualised along the line of engagement and cooption of Taliban. Such attacks make this remote and instead are pointers that the strategy of herding the Taliban to the table through the surge has not worked. The possible end state now staring in the face is destabilization of Pakistan with expansion of the war into FATA in hope of ending the sanctuary. While the attack by itself does not presage follow-up attacks, it does indicate a strategy of reliance on military force.

In the pre-flood scheme of things, indicators pointed to increased readiness of the Pakistan Army in ending the sanctuary in North Waziristan through military action. However, with the Army deployed in flood relief, this was not to be. The attack can be seen as a substitute for the military operations that were to be otherwise conducted by the Pakistan Army. The drone attacks, continuing since the Bush presidency and intensified in the Obama period, may now be supplemented by both ‘boots on ground’, if only temporarily, and Apache helicopters. This has precedence in isolated cases earlier, with in one instance, over ten Pakistani Rangers being killed for providing cover to the retreating Taliban. It bears watching if there would now be a switch to a more aggressive military posture.

Earlier the logic put forth was that such areas constituted ‘ungoverned spaces’. Since the writ of the government in Islamabad did not run in these areas, interdiction of Taliban presence required being done. Pakistan was not in a position to do anything about it, it had tacitly agreed to the drone attacks even while putting up a token protest. Thereafter, Pakistan had taken on the onus of constraining the Taliban presence through Operation Rah-e-Nijat etc. However, it would have been obvious to the NATO that these were directed more against the Tehreek-e-Taliban (TTP) Pakistan that was anti-state rather than the Afghan Taliban contesting the ISAF. For the ISAF strategy to work denial of bases in FATA was necessary; therefore these attacks.

What do they portend? Over the immediate term, it could be indicative of retribution through bombings etc in Afghanistan to include Kabul. Of greater consequence is what could happen on the Pakistani side.

Apprehending this, Pakistan was quick to challenge the attacks, so as to send the message to the Taliban that it was not culpable. This reveals the apprehensions Pakistan has in the possibility of the Taliban turning against it. Given that the Taliban has proven a formidable foe even for the NATO, Pakistan has so far preferred to have it on its side. In case the Taliban were to lose the secure sanctuary, it would not need Pakistani state support and thus could turn against the Pakistani state.

A deepening of the already convergent interests with the Pakistani Taliban would make the combined Taliban implacable. The TTP through bombings even during the calamity of floods has demonstrated its reach. The Pakistani state has proven inept in its response to the floods and lost credibility. Its Army is unwilling to go the distance in taking on the different groups of Islamists together. Given its ideological inclinations and institutional interest in cohesion, it is doubtful it can be pushed to do so either. Clearly, Pakistan cannot be relied on to clean up the fallout of policy options adopted by the NATO.

Since all this is clearly discernible, it begs the question as to why the continued reliance on the military template. The optimistic answer is that once the hand of the Pakistani military is forced, it would go after the Taliban of all hues. This can be made possible by the Taliban being provoked into challenging its hosts. The Army’s willingness has been worked on considerably through incentives such as the IMF bailout, a three year extension to Kayani etc. This is the time to call collect.

Obama’s exit strategy relies overly on Petraeus’ military reputation. Time will tell if the risk was a calculated one.

US-INDIA-CHINA
The tangled triangle
indiatogether.org
31 August 2010 - The Pentagon report, Military and Security Developments Involving the People's Republic of China, 2010, has opened a fresh chapter of India-China friction. The report had let on that China had moved CSS 5 Medium Range Ballistic Missiles to Tibet. Following on its heels, the latest headline is that India has cancelled a few military confidence-building engagements with China in wake of China not granting a visa for the visit of the head of India's Northern Army.

SEE indiatogether.org for full article....

China for its part is miffed at the unpublicised meeting of the Dalai Lama with the Prime Minister last fortnight. It had raised objections to the visit of the Dalai Lama to Tawang last year and also to that of the PM. It is also rankling perhaps from India taking objection to China's work on infrastructure in Gilgit in Pakistan Occupied Kashmir. India is lobbying with the NSG to block two Chinese nuclear reactors bound for Pakistan. But more significantly, China is wary of India's drawing closer to the US signified by the nuclear deal with the US in 2007. The deal has since culminated in the Parliament passing the Nuclear Liability Bill, paving the way for closer ties in the run up to the Obama visit in November.

China sees itself as hemmed in by the US' presence as an 'Asian' power. Hillary Clinton upset China when she raised the issue of territorial claims at the ASEAN regional forum in July, referring to China's claim of 'indisputable sovereignty' over the South China Sea. The US Pacific Command chief has claimed that the US is mindful of Chinese 'assertiveness'. The report to Congress mentions that Chinese military modernisation that attempts to deny US access to Asia through acquiring a ballistic missile capability to hit US' giant air craft carriers. This is the latest twist to the long standing trans-Pacific disagreement along several dimensions such as North Korea's nuclear ambitions and US interests in Taiwan.

India risks being sucked into the incipient global rivalry between a hegemon and a rising challenger. Thus far it has attempted to maintain relations with both states without reference to the proximity or otherwise of the second. In this, for example, India not only exercised its military regularly with the US, but also has had two rounds of exercises with China. However, a view is emerging that while not alienating China there is a case for India to lean towards the US.

India's strategy has been to engage China ever since the visit of Rajiv Gandhi to Beijing in 1988. Vajpayee upgraded the joint working group on the border talks to a higher level with the National Security Adviser to serve as India's special interlocutor. These initiatives have since resulted in China becoming India's largest trading partner, with trade likely to hit $60 billion this year.

Alongside, India has been upgrading its military capability in the east. It has moved from what it terms 'dissuasive defence' to 'active deterrence'. This means a move away from conventional 'deterrence by denial' to an ability to punish, based on two additional mountain divisions. These are under raising presently as part of four to be raised to eventually form part of an offensive 'strike' corps for mountains. This is coupled with infrastructure development, specifically 72 strategic roads along the border. The idea is to bring home to China that India too is a rising power.

The current low ebb may owe to China warning India tacitly against explicitly weighing in on the side of the US. It has created a two-front problem for India in arming Pakistan in both nuclear and missile delivery fields. It may now be keeping India's focus eastwards so as to bail out its friend Pakistan, passing through a period of uncertainty. It is constantly balancing India in its own backyard in its relations with Bangladesh, Myanmar and Sri Lanka. The message is that India has its vulnerabilities, and these could be aggravated at will.

India needs to borrow a page out of the Chinese success story. Ever since 1978, China has attempted to maintain a stable environment to continue on the growth path. It has resolved its border problems with all states and placed others, such as with India, on the back burner. It has simultaneously raised its military capabilities to eventually be able to break into the superpower league.

India is in a similar position. It requires stability so as to remain on the growth trajectory. In case it is displaced or distracted, then it would not be able to cope with its monumental problems, leave alone match China or be a useful partner for the US. It therefore needs to stay out of the China-US equation.

The argument to the contrary doing the rounds is that India needs to get closer to the US since it needs technology, both civilian and military, and capital. The US would tacitly oblige since it would help balance China, but would extract a price in terms of strategic autonomy from India. Some believe that this is a price worth paying, while others believe that such proximity would make the US dependent on India and therefore would strengthen autonomy. More importantly, it would ensure that the magic 10 per cent growth figure is met. Given such growth, India would be able to arm itself, reorder itself internally and get its periphery to bandwagon. This is a seductive visualisation of the future.

The choice not offered by those making these arguments is whether India can stay non-aligned. India has inclined towards the US as a hedge against China. But China looms as a threat to India to the extent India seems to incline towards the US. Therefore, if India was to stay non-aligned or equidistant, then it gains time to protect its national interest of stability for economic growth. China then would not need to prop up Pakistan as their proxy either. This would give India the space of about a decade or a generation it needs to set its house in order. Greater distance from the US may entail a slower rate of growth, but it would be growth that would be certain.

Even while India tells China when to lay off, it needs to revisit why the relationship is as it is. Non-alignment may serve our interests once again.
⊕

INDIA’S GRAND STRATEGY: ON TRACK

India’s Grand Strategy is not given out in a written policy document. However, its contours can be pieced together from the Prime Minister’s statements such as the yearly one from the ramparts of the Red Fort and from the actions being taken by the government on various fronts. This article attempts to make sense of India’s grand strategy. In doing so, it arrives at a conclusion markedly different from the spate of somber commentaries that greeted India’s Independence Day.

The refrain is that UPA II is a dysfunctional dispensation, much prone to infighting. Its coalition partners, tying down hefty ministerships in agriculture and railways, are a liability. Critics have it that the aging Prime Minister is waiting for handing over the reins to the next generation of the Gandhis. The party is in disarray in its critical home base, Andhra Pradesh. Kashmir burns. The CBI is barking up the wrong tree in Gujarat. The CRPF is lost in the jungles of Central India. The multiple blockades in the North East cast a shadow over the future. The CWG have driven the corruption index through the roof. Inflation is also through the roof. The Bollywood commentary on the times, Peepli Live, is entirely plausible.

The main line of critique is that India requires to grow at ten per cent in case it is to accommodate the demographic trends staring India in the face. India’s rise is to be economy driven and the economy is to be private sector led. This would place it favourably in the eventual face-off with China later. This requires infrastructure needs and governance and security issues to be addressed by the government. Since the government’s approach appears slovenly, India is said to lack variously national will, grand strategy, leadership etc. India is adrift.

However, a review of the initiatives of the UPA II seems to suggest that it is embarked on the right direction. Whether it gets anywhere, time will tell. It has major initiatives, in the tradition of UPA I’s coup de grace of MGNREGA and RTI, in the offing. There is the Right to Education Bill that seeks a demographic dividend. The Food Security Bill is to cast current reports of godowns overflowing with rotting grain a part of history. A revised Nuclear Liability Bill is to enable future energy needs for the growing economy. The trade with China, our largest trading partner, is set to top $ 60 billion. This would help avert conflict and moderate crisis someday. India has offered aid to Pakistan in its hour of need with the PM talking to his Pakistani counterpart on phone in an act of ‘disaster diplomacy’ of potentially long term consequence.

But two particular advances on the internal security front dispel the notion of a non-performing government. The two foremost threats have over the past decade been the rise of Maoism and of terrorism.

Though the casualty figures of the CRPF rightly suggest that action against Naxalism leaves much to be desired, the story has more to it. The latest is that the final clearance for South Korean steelmaker Posco’s project at Jagatsinghpur, in Orissa, will have to wait till settlements rights under Forest Rights Act, 2006, is complete.
Jairam Ramesh’s MoEF plans to send a team to undertake, ‘with due diligence’ in the words of the news report, the settlement of forest dwellers’ rights. Apparently there is cause to suspect the Jagatsinghpur collector’s report which said, “no claim for settlement of rights from tribals and traditional forest dwellers has been received.”

But more significantly, the mining giant, Vedanta, has been found to be afoul of the Forest Rights Act and the Forest Conservation Act in collusion with state officials implementing a fast tracked policy of mineral exploitation with political blessings. The NC Saxena committee report in preserving the Nyamgiri Hills, sacred to the Dongaria Kondh and the Kutia Kondh tribes, prevented a real life adaptation of the theme of the Hollywood megahit, Avatar.

This implies the state is serious, to the extent it can, of taking the ‘root causes’ approach to counter insurgency. In not deploying the military to chase down Naxals and persisting with CRPF, at some political cost, it has sensibly not militarized its response. Instead, it appears resolved that the experience in Bellary, the stronghold of BJP leader Sushma Swaraj and the Reddy brothers propping up the BJP ministry in Bangalruru, is not to be repeated. A commission under the Commission of Enquiries Act of 1952 is on the cards. A National Mining Regulatory Authority Act is in the pipeline.

Clearly, the Sonia headed NAC appears to be back in action. NC Saxena is one of its members. To it is credited the backing of the common man for the Congress in the last elections. It has appropriated to itself the need to ensure that growth is an inclusive process, as promised by the Prime Minister from the Red Fort: ‘When our Government came to power in 2004, we resolved to build a new India under a progressive social agenda. We wanted the fruits of development to reach the common man.’

There is a consensus that India needs to come to grips with the Arjun Sengupta report pegging the poverty figures at 836 million people living on less than Rs 20 a day. The divergence is on the means to this end. Those enamoured of the growth rate opine that trickle down from the ten per cent figure is necessary to reduce these. Headlines, such as farmers protesting land alienation to the Noida-Agra expressway, indicate that this may not be enough.

The second major initiative is that of the Supreme Court. The Court appointed CBI team has zeroed in on the junior home minister in Gujarat for an ‘encounter’ killing, one passed off as one Jihadi terrorist less. Alongside another minister, Kodnani, has been displaced from the ministry for her role in the Gujarat pogrom by the working of the Raghavan team, yet again one appointed by the Court. This constraining of the forces of majoritarian nationalism is what has led in part to the absence of terror attacks, perpetrated by extremists of any camp, over the recent past.

From a security point of view those dispossessed by India’s infrastructure needs would be vulnerable to revolutionary propaganda. The Maoist threat, reportedly already in urban alleyways, would grow. Response incapacity would make the right wing stake claim to steward the state. The majority-minority cleavage would reopen for exploitation, reinforcing plausibility of the right wing’s claims to having answers.

India is not out of the woods yet. A ten per cent growth rate, as seen, may not be the right route out. The Center appears to be on the right track. The hope is that it does not get waylaid.

articles of firdaus at indiatogether.org

INDO-PAK DIALOGUE
Talk another day
Both India and Pakistan have independently concluded that they would be able to extract better concessions from the other at a later date.
National Security
July 2010


MILITARY RECRUITMENT
Soldiers in our own images
The multi-ethnic reality of India must find expression in its institutions, especially those charged with security. Plus, there are other reasons to broadbase recruitment further.
National Security
June 2010


TACKLING NAXALISM
Pause the mineral economy
Let the mineral wealth of Central India remain untapped until the people there acquire the capacity to negotiate the terms for its use and benefit directly from doing so.
National Security | Mining
May 2010


INTERNAL CONFLICTS
AFSPA: Between battle lines
Two recommendations to repeal the Armed Forces Special Powers Act have been ignored. The Army is right to insist on its view, but there are things that can be done to improve matters.
National Security
April 2010


DEFENCE PURCHASES
The government versus the military
The armed services have given a long wishlist of material to be procured, but the Defence Minister is in no hurry to accommodate them.
National Security
March 2010


PREPAREDNESS FOR WAR
Surgical strikes: Missing the mark
Some months after advocating limited and focused attacks on Pakistan-based terror camps, FICCI has a rethink. Corporate concerns and the armed forces' unpreparedness are finding common ground.
National security
January 2010


MILITARY DOCTRINE
Much hullaballoo, little cause
Of course the military should be prepared for conflict. However, whether to engage in such conflict, and how, is a decision for the civilian leadership.
National security
December 2009



NEW FOCUS ON KASHMIR
Our view, their view, the world-view
President Obama will raise the Kashmir issue during the PM's visit to the White House. The many views of the problem and its consequences will have to be balanced.
National security | Jammu and Kashmir
November 2009

ANTI-NAXAL OPERATIONS
A job for an infantryman
At best the central police and paramilitary can hold an area once it is taken back, but clearing it and handing it over to them can only be done by the Army.
National security
October 2009

ARSENALS
The nuclear numbers game
India claims that Pakistan is stockpiling more nuclear weapons than it needs for minimum deterrence. But this could just turn out to be an excuse for it to do likewise.
National security
September 2009

PRE-EMPTING WAR
Wanted: A peace movement
Arguing against the nuclear enclave and its retainers is a kind of national service, and we must press on, no matter how futile it may appear at times.
National Security | Peace
August 2009

10 YEARS LATER
Making Kargil serve a purpose
India has not managed to bring the troubles in Kashmir to a close. And Pakistan has not dismantled the infrastructure of terror. In effect, little has changed since Kargil.
National Security
July 2009

MILITARY STRATEGY
Looking at China, missing Pakistan
New developments in India's nuclear posture vis-a-vis China inevitably impact the Pakistani nuclear program as well. We must recognise this implicit risk.
National Security
June 2009

SECURITY AGENDA
Inward lens for incoming government
The buzz on the global front should not distract us from pressing matters at home. This would also make our security agenda more human and less state-centric.
May 2009

ENDLESS STRIFE
Awakening the somnolent state
The common thread between our external and internal security predicaments is our approach to time. Most security issues are long-standing and seemingly interminable.
April 2009

OPINION
The coming fateful decisions
The two protagonist South Asian states got their independence in the middle of the last century, and it is about time that they seize control of their mutual and intertwined destiny.
March 2009

OPINION
2009: A preview of security issues
India begins 2009 from a position of strength. But how it approaches security issues in the internaland external security planes will determine how it ends the year.
January 2009

AFTER THE ATTACKS
An indirect response to terror
What India does or does not do is critical to the two power centers in Pakistan. The triumph of democratic forces there cannot be done without such Indian help.
December 2008

OPINION
How deep is the rot?
If Purohit's activities are only one instance of something wider, then the Army faces a real problem over the penetration of majoritarian religious ideology.
Peace and Security
November 2008

GEO-POLITICS
Military cooperation with the US: A mixed bag
A future government that is without the check of a strong opposition could strike out on a course that is markedly divergent from India's past record of abstinence from geo-political conflicts.
Peace and Security
October 2008

SECURITY
In Muslim India, an internal battle
The struggle to wrest back interpretations of Islam from the extremists could boost security, and halt the marginalisation and ghettoisation of Muslims in India.
Peace
September 2008

OPINION: SECURITY
Mid-year chakravyuh
With the government firmly in ostrich mode on issues of internal security, and the external situation appearing complex, India awaits its Abhimanyu.
Peace and security
August 2008

THE SECURITY ESTABLISHMENT
Making nuclear sense
As the strategic enclave has grown, the agenda of political discourse has been usurped by 'high politics'. This has wide implications for democracy.
Peace and Security
July 2008

POLITICAL HISTORY
Is Vox Populi good enough?
In Advani's worldview, populist sorrow and re-election after the Gujarat riots amount to democratic endorsement of whatever happened, and is sufficient political accountability.
Peace and security
April 2008

NUCLEAR WEAPONS
Successful deterrence? Hardly.
The absence of open conflict between India and Pakistan is cited as proof that nuclear deterrence works. But there have been unacknowledged conflicts.
Peace
February 2008

OPINION: BHUTTO ASSASINATION
Internal security agenda for the new year
The happenings in Pakistan, which have culminated in the unfortunate assassination of Benazir Bhutto, are equally portentuous for India.
Security
January 2008

SECURITY
Expansion in Indian nuclear theology
Retired Army Chief General Shankar Roychowdhury, writing in a popular security magazine, says India's nuclear doctrine must be revised to cover the additional threat of sponsored nuclear terrorism that could, as part of Pakistan's proxy war, prove to be the 'Future Shock'. Firdaus Ahmed analyses the General's views.
Security
November 2007

OPINION
The Nagaland model for Kashmir
Pakistan, under pressure in the Global War on Terror (GWOT), has restrained its hand in the proxy war. By most accounts, Kashmir appears headed towards peace. This is the right juncture to approach the issue politically, both in its external and internal plane.
Peace and Security
September 2007

WAR IN THE SUBCONTINENT
This summer, at a border near you
The United Stated-led Global War on Terror is all set to come up to India's doorstep this summer, with Pakistan's move from being a 'frontline state' to becoming a theatre of war. For India, a reflexive anti-Pakistani stance or a fashionable pro-American one are not the only choices. writes
Security
March 2007

OPINION / SECURITY
The Indian Army: crisis within
The army has apparently delivered on its mandate of ensuring the return of an environment more conducive to law and order since more than a decade, in Kashmir. But the recent spate of suicides and fratricides within are showing that the army is under stress, a slide that the political side can and must prevent.
Security
January 2007

OPINION: PRE-EMPTIVE WAR
Lessons from recent wars
The impact of 9/11 has brought in a greater permissibility in the use of force by states. With terrorist attacks taking their toll of innocents by design, a move away from the earlier restrictions on use of force appears defensible. Like its strategic partners, India too might act on this higher latitude for war.
Peace and Security
September 2006

OPINION: SECURITY/PEACE
Grand manoeuvre, yes, but to what end?
That Ex Sanghe Shakti concluded in the plains of Punjab without much ado indicates the determination of both India and Pakistan to keep temperatures below the now usual levels of the summer campaign in Kashmir. However, this positive should not cloud the questionable premises of Ex Sanghe Shakti.
Security | Opinions
July 2006

NATIONAL SECURITY
Politicisation and the Indian military
While agreeing with General S Padmanabhan who says in his recent book that "politicisation of the military is a self defeating exercise in a democracy," it is difficult to concede that "greed for fish and loaves of office" is how the politician would corrupt the military establishment and wrench it from its apolitical moorings.
Security | Books
April 2006

SECULARISM AND THE STATE
Muslim headcount: A useful controversy
The furore over the counting of minorities in the armed forces has taken attention away from what such a survey might reveal. Are the minorities adequately represented in the security services? This question too should concern secular-minded citizens.
Peace and Security
March 2006

DEMILITARISATION
Security agenda: 2006 and beyond
Now that political alienation has been redressed to some extent by democratic changeovers, the presence of the Army in Kashmir can be more boldly reduced. The coming year is one of many possibilities, but it will be followed by an even more important year, and the opportunities at hand now must not be lost.
Peace and Security
December 2005

WAR GAMES
Of nukes and counter-nukes
What is the threshold for Pakistan to use its nuclear weapons? Public statements by knowledgeable insiders addressing this question may only be a decoy, and at any rate the pressures of war might trigger unforeseen lower thresholds for the use of nukes. Alertness and public scrutiny are both warranted.
Peace and Security
October 2005

OPINION / BOOK REVIEW
Second Strike and false security
In Second Strike: Arguments about Nuclear War in South Asia, Rajesh Rajagopalan articulates that ‘the probability of nuclear weapons use is less in the India-Pakistan feud'. This is comforting, and perhaps on that account, dangerous, because of the false sense of security its conclusions give rise to, says Firdaus Ahmed.
Book reviews | Security
August 2005
INDO-PAK PEACE
Political courage, and the next step
Permitting Musharraf to sell the notion that what could not be wrested from India in a decade and half long jihad has been obtained through diplomacy can help with this. Doing so would deflate the legitimacy that jihadi forces seek from their presence in Kashmir.
Peace and Security
May 2005

WAR GAMES
An illusory battleground
Among military planners, it is common to devise war games to counter any nuclear attack by enemy states. The theories put forward in such games, however, are not always grounded in reality. The peace community should alertly challenge such thinking.
Peace and Security
March 2005

EARLIER ARTICLES
- Hail to the new chief
- Preparing for the wrong war
- Special powers, mixed results
- A new security agenda
- The calculus of 'Cold start'
- Chief of Defense : Implications
- Not yet history
- A national confidence syndrome
- Missing the security target
- Lies in the name of 'security'
- Must remain 'unfinished'
- Questions in search of answers
- PM peace initiative: Much ado?
- Lessons from Baghdad
- Kashmir after Nadimarg
- Limited nuclear war, limitless anxiety
- A debt we can do without
- Arms control and disarmament
- Time for policy re-orientation
- Kashmir - the way forward
- The Indian bid for Great Powerdom
- Muslim India - A liberal perspective

ARTICLE BY AUTHOR at ipcs.org
• Jammu and Kashmir: Need for a Political Solution
• Countering the Naxal Threat-IV: Military as an Option?
• Revisiting ‘1971’
• The Bright Side of ‘Asymmetric Escalation’
• Questioning Defence Spending
• India at 60: Acquiring Escape Velocity?
• Making Obama's War Also India's
• An Issue in Civil-Military Relations
• Disarmament in South Asia
• Emulating the US
• The 'Vision Thing'
• Kargil: Ten Years On
• From ‘No First Use’ to ‘No Nuclear Use’
• Agenda for the Next Government
• Rethinking Civilian Control
• A Strategy for ‘Af-Pak’
• Not Quite an Empty Threat
• The Counter Narrative on Terror
• National Security Adviser: Reviewing the Institution
• A Roadmap for Kashmir
• Afghanistan: Appraising the Future
• The Lesson from Sam Bahadur's Triumph
• The Myth of 'Weapons of Peace'
• Getting it Right: Rereading India's Nuclear Doctrine
• Reconceptualizing Internal Security
• Musharraf and the 'TINA' Factor
• Understanding Minority-Perpetrated Terrorism
• For a Return to Lahore
• The Day After 'Cold Start'
• Haldighati II: Implications for Internal Security
• Tackling Intervention in South Asia
• Querying India's Grand Strategy
• Kargil: Back in the News
• In the Line of Fire: Pakistan Army
• Pakistan's Possible Nuclear Game Plan
• Menu for the New Chief
• For a Paradigm Shift
• Addressing the 'Central' Issue
• 'No' To 'Cold Start'
• The Price of Malgovernance
• The Price of Misgovernance
• The Police and the Example of the Armed Forces
• Missiles and Crisis Stability
• Widening the Discourse on Terror
• The Post-Parakram Peace Agenda
• Indian Peacekeeping in Iraq?
• The ‘Peace Initiative’: A Tactical Gambit
• The Sole ‘Lesson’ of the Iraq War
• Muslim India as ‘Threat’
• For a Return to Clausewitz
• Preparing for ‘Limited Nuclear War’
• The General Did Not Bite!
• Lessons from India’s Kashmir Engagement
• The Logic of Nuclear Redlines
• A Smoke Screen Called Limited War
• ‘Terrorism’ and Intellectual Responsibility
• The Need to Revisit Conventional Doctrine
• Moving Beyond Realism
• Lessons from the Present Crisis
• The Impetus behind Limited War

ipcs.org
INDIA’S COIN POLICY: ‘PEACE PRECEDING TALKS’?


It is no secret that India does not have a written national strategy document. While well known in respect of its external security situation, this is true for the internal security context as well. For instance, it is nearing ten years now since the CRPF was designated as the lead internal security agency by the GOM report. Yet there is no counter insurgency pamphlet with MHA imprimatur. The effects are visible in the CRPF’s showing in both Kashmir and in Central India.

Absence of an official document makes divining of India’s COIN (Counter-Insurgency) policy difficult. The policy needs to be traced instead from statements and actions, making the exercise resemble the ‘Blind men of Hindustan’. Nevertheless, it can be taken, contrary to expectations, that India’s attitude to return of normalcy in disturbed areas is not dependent on talks. For instance, the action of killing of a Maoist, Azad, apparently interrupted a ‘talks initiative’ of Swami Agnivesh. From statements, such as the PM’s recent two speeches on Kashmir, it is quite clear that India’s policy is one of ‘peace preceding talks’. This article questions this policy.

Delhi’s past record on the political approach to insurgency is not heartening. In Kashmir, George Fernandes, KC Pant and NN Vohra failed as interlocutors. Talks with separatists, initiatives of Advani, the PM in UPA-I and the Home Minister in UPA-II have made no headway. The autonomy report and reports of the five working groups to the three round tables lie neglected. The dialogue with Pakistan got nowhere and is not getting anywhere soon.

Elsewhere too, Delhi has not been able to reach political solutions to insurgencies. Though the offer of talks has been made, the Naxals are required to first cease violence. The Nagaland ceasefire is in its second decade for want of a political solution. Other insurgencies have simply been outlasted. In the Mizoram case, it took two decades for the conversion of a District Council into a UT and thereafter into a state to end the insurgency.

This record along with the PM’s recent statements spells that no political moves are in the offing. The PM has indicated as much in his meeting with the All Party delegation. He said: “…But this (talks) process can gather momentum and yield results only if there is a prolonged peace.” He repeated this formulation, of ‘peace preceding talks’, in the same speech and it should be noted unmistakably: “Let us recognize that repeated agitations whether violent or otherwise only obstruct this process. The cycle of violence must now come to an end.”

Problems in advancing political solutions no doubt exist. For instance, in the Naga case, the demand for Nagalim holds up the solution. In Kashmir, the insistence of separatists for tripartite talks involving Pakistan can hardly be conceded by the government. But can these problems not be taken as a way to legitimize procrastination by the government, in the hope that the militancy would exhaust itself eventually?

The attitude of placing peace as a prerequisite to talks betrays a lack of understanding of peace dynamics. Peace elides any military template, as the military continually warns. Talks are the vehicle for peace. Solutions need to be advanced through talks. With respect to Kashmir, though the PM says that the intent exists, there are no talks ongoing, either on its internal or external planes.

The agitations in Kashmir, over the past three years failed. The earlier militarization of their movement also failed. They will be more innovative in future. What has not happened so far may yet occur, a radicalization of the movement. Praveen Swami, a Kashmir watcher, warns that younger Islamists have taken over the movement in Sopore, displacing separatists who were known quantities. While earlier Kashmir was sought to be linked with the wider Islamist project at the global level, this had amounted to no more than point scoring against Pakistan. Even while some terrorists were inspired by the jihadist ideology, the people were not. The danger lies is in this occurring, should the Indian democracy fail them.

Avoiding this eventuality requires the Center to be politically innovative. If today it is not in a position to deliver, tomorrow it may be less so and it might get too late. For instance, in case the situation in AfPak shapes up negatively, India would have lost time and opportunity. The PM’s words require to be seriously followed up: “I believe that India's democracy has the generosity and flexibility to be able to address the concerns of any area or group in the country...” The reality is that this has not been in evidence in India’s COIN engagements.

The wider point is that the expectation of ‘talks preceding peace’ is insensitive to the plight of the people in disturbed areas. The government, having greater power and sense of responsibility, needs to exhibit it by engaging insurgents through the medium of talks, rather than being reactive militarily. Its COIN policy should instead be ‘peace through talks’. A written document to that effect emanating from the MHA may be a useful first step.

#3195, 20 July 2010
Jammu and Kashmir: Need for a Political Solution

Even as India was moving into a self-congratulatory mode in gaining the upper hand in Kashmir, the recent youth agitations reminded it that placing a military lid on the situation does not make it go away. This has been acknowledged by both the Kashmir Chief Minister and the Army Chief, calling for ‘political’ steps. The Army Chief has gone further seemingly to suggest that earlier opportunities having been frittered away; it is time for a political solution. Removing deep levels of disaffection can only be done by a political approach.

Promises have been aplenty and so have overtures. The last initiative of ‘secret diplomacy’ by the home minister has also been discontinued. Nevertheless, these actions indicate that intent exists. It begs the question as to why the state has held back. There are two sets of reasons: the first set comprising understandable reasons and the second those less so. Eliminating these reasons would help with the solution.

The first set gives the state the benefit of the doubt comprising fairly obvious reasons that the problem is complex, has a historical legacy and involves a territorial problem as well. But a significant reason is that India’s nation-building project is a work-in-progress. It is wary of the demands of its constituent sub-nationalities. It fears that setting a precedent may encourage the others through working of the ‘demonstration effect’. The domino theory in this case conjures up an unraveling of India.

The second is more critical to the state, dealing with the vexed question of militarization. The ‘insurgency economy’ in terms of vested interests of all players including security forces having grown roots, now requires considerable convincing that it is time to draw down. A political approach necessitates reconsidering the AFSPA. The Army Chief has already indicated his aversion to removal of AFSPA; implying that in case it is removed, so should the Army. Counter intuitively, removal of a division would do more for peace than a division deployed.

The political risk in proving this paradox could have been mitigated by getting Pakistan on board. With talks having collapsed last week at Islamabad, little progress can be expected on the Kashmir front. Absent any effort at selling the necessity of a political agenda to shape public opinion, a political approach is apparently not on the cards.

Who gains from another wasted summer in Kashmir, for both Kashmiris and India, provides the answer. Pakistan has kept the issue alive over the last three summers, deflating Indian complacency resulting from military dominance of the internal security situation. The low ebb militarily in Kashmir can be explained by the fact that Pakistan is keeping its powder dry for a post-AfPak situation.

Waiting for the situation to get worse in Pakistan, so that it falls out of the radar screen on the Kashmir question, has not worked for India. Indeed, it is questionable if India should have such a preference in first place. Getting Pakistan on board is the key. This means not missing opportunities at the mid-month meeting in Islamabad. The only gain of the meeting of setting the date for the next one needs to be capitalized on. India has six months to implement a fresh strategy.

The proposal here is to mesh the external and internal dimension of the Kashmir issue. Progressive demilitarization of J&K is necessary. Doing so would have a salutary effect in entrusting citizens and incentivizing them to preserve gains made. A sense of ownership, of return of peace can be brought about. Perhaps later, a Nagaland model ceasefire can be worked out, even as constitutional modalities of devolution of powers are worked through for a political approach.

Clearly, this internal dimension would require Pakistan ceasing support to terrorists. Negotiations involve a ‘give and take’. Pakistan would get a return to normalcy in Kashmir through autonomy of sorts. It would be willing to settle for this, given that it has not been able over the last twenty years to make India budge. Stable Kashmir may not be enough for Pakistan in case it wants to keep India off balance for reasons of perceived insecurity. A ‘grand bargain’ may perhaps help. India could permit political space for a return of a Taliban willing to reform itself. A stable backyard would end Pakistani insecurities that among other reasons, prompted interference in Kashmir in the first place.

Selling this agenda internally against skepticism of the strategic community, intelligence fraternity and the military is what politics is about. The domino theory is correct, but only in reverse. The more accommodative India is internally, the less it will be challenged. Even if the AFSPA is deemed necessary, meaningful self-regulation can be imposed under threat of liberal grant of central permission for prosecutions under its Article 7. As for vested interests, budgets can compensate.

This is a tough political call. Nothing can kill an idea better than the levels of political will and risk necessary for its implementation. But, in case of India’s twin Kashmir and Pakistan problems, there is no escaping the status quo without a political approach.

INDO-PAK DIALOGUE
Talk another day

India and Pakistan - in the failed meeting of their two foreign ministers in Islamabad in mid-July - have agreed to meet once again in December. This can be seen as a 'gain' only if no terrorist intervention rocks the interim. In case of a terrorist strike originating in Pakistan, the just-concluded meeting would be viewed as a lost opportunity. Instead of bridging the 'trust deficit', as intended by the prime ministers as suggested by the Prime Ministers of both countries during their meeting at the sidelines of the SAARC summit at Thimpu, it only reflected the distrust.

The failure indicates that the two sides are not prepared to take the minimum steps necessary to get the other side to move likewise. They now have six months to prepare the ground to do so. Is it possible?

Pakistan's foreign minister is seen in the Indian media as the one to have wrecked the talks. This is being taken as part of a script written in the GHQ, Rawalpindi. The Pakistani military perhaps feels that country is not in a strong position, constrained as it is by the pressures on its internal polity and on the Af-Pak front. Therefore, it is playing for time. It expects it can ride out the risks, given that the US military effort moves towards a climax over the coming autumn. When the position gets clearer and hopefully better by end of the year, it would be better placed to weigh its cards.



In any case its grand strategy is to ride out the US intervention in the region without having to sacrifice its crown jewels in terms of the India, Kashmir, Afghan and nuclear policies. It also would not like the civil government to take credit for any useful movement on the India front, lest it upset the internal balance in its favour.

India for its part had nothing to offer at the talks. The talks process is ongoing through repeated meetings of leaders, even if consequential talks in the form of the composite dialogue are on hold. The latter, though an Indian idea, perhaps no longer serves India's purpose since it believes that the growing power asymmetry with Pakistan is making its position stronger. While it is pledged to talk, it is not pledged to take the talks process to an outcome acceptable to both. Since a composite dialogue implies timelines, concessions, and outcomes, India is quite happy to postpone this reckoning.

India therefore continued to insist on visible proof of Pakistani sincerity in acting against the handlers of the 26/11 terror attack. The UPA government, already on the defensive due to 26/11, inflation, Maoism etc. is in any case susceptible to right wing critique. Within itself too there appears to be a lack of consensus, given Home Secretary Pillai's statement on the eve of talks that held ISI directly responsible for the Mumbai terror attack. The Foreign Minister has since accepted that it could have been better timed.

Secondly, Pakistan did stir the pot in Kashmir by bringing disaffected youth out into the streets over the summer in an intifida-like confrontation with authorities. Therefore, there is no urgency to talk to either the internal dissidents or with their sponsors in Pakistan, lest the pressure be viewed as successful to get India to talk.

The talks have been seen as being influenced by the Americans - brought on by the US's need to ease its Af-Pak circumstance. Therefore, even if talks proceeded, meaningful outcomes from them were ruled out, lest Indian interests be sacrificed for US interests. Also, with 26/11, the Indian tolerance threshold has been stretched. Its procedures and organisations for response are considerably better placed. Therefore, seeing itself as capable of handling another crisis, India does not see any necessity for engaging Pakistan.

Lastly, in case Pakistan does succumb to Indian demands, then going after its home grown terrorists would result in an introspective Pakistan. A weaker Pakistan with an internally embroiled Army is one India can then manipulate with greater ease.

Both states have thus independently concluded that they would be able to extract better concessions from the other at a later date.

FOR FULL ARTICLE SEE indiatogether.org

Both states are therefore acting in accordance with their respective strategic logic. Progress in December would be predicated on how the situation develops in Af-Pak. This impasse in South Asia has an underside. Firstly, are the two states underestimating prospects of another terror attack and possible escalation into an inter-state war thereafter? The linkage of terror directly with the ISI, seconded by the NSA Shiv Shankar Menon at a seminar in New Delhi, could yet come back to haunt the government in case of another provocative action by terrorists. It would then not be able to make a distinction between the Pakistani state and the non-state actors that could help buffer its response. The government, already proven weak in its ability to take talks ahead meaningfully, would not be able to resist calls for extreme steps.

Secondly, the newly framed Multidimensional Poverty Index has half the world's poor living in South Asia. The recent survey by the Oxford University and the UNDP indicates that just eight Indian states have more poor people than 26 poorest African countries combined. This yardstick calls for a revision of strategic priorities and gameplan. The Sonia Gandhi-led NAC needs to provide right-headed direction to a grand strategy for UPA II, as it had done in UPA I.

Lastly, while Pakistan's position can certainly get weaker, it does not imply that India is necessarily the gainer. The talk of Pukhtoonistan, emanating lately in hardline US circles and finding echo in the conservative sections of Indian strategic community, can only be a pressure point at best. As a self-regarding regional power, India needs to be in charge. Assisting a neighbour going downhill is an indicator of power alright, as was the case in 1971. But are there better indicators and is this in India's self interest? There is much more to do before December than merely avoiding war

Kashmir: No end in sight

The alternative media has it that over the last year over 70 youth are reported to have died in stone pelting related violence in Kashmir. They were agitating against the alleged rape and killings of two women in Shupiyan. The year prior, Kashmir had taken to the streets over the Amarnath land transfer issue. This year the toll is close to a score. Complacency of the state is breathtaking in that the lessons in crowd control of the previous two years were completely ignored. Given the past pattern and the coming talks with Pakistan at foreign minister level, the eruption in the Valley was entirely predictable.

Speculation is that this owes to a governance deficit. With development and a corruption free delivery system, the problem would go away. Realists have it that the agitation is manipulated by separatists, themselves orchestrated from Pakistan. The government has released taped conversations to prove the linkages. Given the ‘foreign hand’, a law and order approach is necessary lest the word get out that the state can be held to ransom.

The fact escapes attention that even the tapes suggest that the agitation has gone out of hand of those manipulating them. Consequently, attuned and empathetic observers have discerned that brutalization over the past two decades has resulted in the intifida-like expression of angst by youth. There is little doubt that this is a generation lost to militancy. There is little India can do to eliminate their alienation. There is little India is not already doing. The writing on the wall is that alienation persists. With a whole life ahead, India has little choice but to get along in one unaddressed direction – the political approach.

The methods of expression of disaffection can only get more innovative. That militarization of the present movement has not occurred indicates the capacity for learning from the past mistake of early nineties. Then the militants had hijacked the agitation for ‘azadi’, thereby legitimising the military ‘crackdowns’. Borrowing a leaf out of the Indian legacy of the freedom struggle would be strategically portentous. Already the central government is considerably embarrassed in having to deploy the army in a ‘standby’ role for the first time since the mid nineties when the Army ceased operations inside Srinagar.

Even as India was moving into a self-congratulatory mode in gaining the upper hand in Kashmir, it has been reminded that placing a military lid on the situation does not make it go away. This has been acknowledged by both the Kashmir Chief Minister and the Army Chief calling for ‘political’ steps.

There have been promises aplenty going back to Narasimha Rao’s formulation that the ‘sky is the limit’. The parameters since have included ‘the four corners of the constitution’ and ‘insaniyat’ (the principles of humanity). The state autonomy report was laid by the National Conference government when in power last in 2000. The UPA government initiated the five working groups during the second round table conference on Kashmir in 2005. Four groups tendered their reports in the third conference in 2007 and action on them is underway. The last, that of Justice Sagheer Ahmed, on center-state relations did so only in December last year. The report did not command credibility. KC Pant earlier and NN Vohra later were to progress talks. Reports have it that the latest initiative, that of ‘secret diplomacy’ by the home minister, was also discontinued recently. All these political initiatives testify that the intent exists and that there are promises to be kept. These require to be made good.

Why the state has held back is a valid question. The first set of reasons give the state the benefit of the doubt. Firstly, India’s nation building project is a work in progress. It is wary of demands of its constituent subnationalities. While it can accommodate demands made by ethnic groups through creating autonomous councils etc, it is less constitutionally venturesome when it comes to the major cases, such as, among others, those of the Nagas and Kashmiris. It fears that setting a precedent may encourage the others through working of the ‘demonstration effect’. The domino theory in this case would conjure up an eventual unraveling of India. Secondly, the complexity of Kashmir’s case is daunting. There are two other regions to contend with. Thirdly, Kashmir cannot be seen in isolation of India’s problems with Pakistan. The proxy war Pakistan has waged cannot be allowed to be seen to succeed through Indian concessions, even if these are solely internal.

The second set comprises reasons more critical of the state. Firstly, the right wing in India’s polity is stronger than its electoral showing may indicate. Even during the Nehruvian period the presence of Sardar Patel and stalwarts such as GB Pant indicated the strength of conservatives in the Congress party. Nehru’s early Kashmir initiatives faced a strong riposte by Shyama Prasad Mukherjee and the Praja Parishad. This led to Sheikh Abdullah’s reservations on credibility of Indian secularism. The pattern of conservatism holding India’s Kashmir policy hostage persists till today. While the NDA government expectedly ignored its alliance partner in 2000 on the autonomy question, the Congress does not have the political strength or will to make any political overtures. The fear is that even if reasonable these would be criticized as ‘competitive communalism’. This fear of its own shadow explains India’s lack of follow through in reaching out to Pakistan; Sharm es Sheikh being the most visible example. Absence of any preparation of ground in terms of selling the necessity and contours of a political agenda to shape public opinion indicates that the political approach is ruled out as an option.

Secondly, the ‘insurgency economy’ in terms of vested interests of all players – be it separatists or security forces - has grown roots. For instance, a political approach would inevitably imply reconsidering the AFSPA and the militarization of the state. Anticipating this, the input of security forces in any such consideration would be that it is inadvisable since it would play into Pakistani hands that are behind the agitation. A government with deficit in political will would in such a circumstance take prudence as the better part of valour. Such a play can be discerned from the recent utterance of the Army Chief that demands for dilution of the AFSPA originate in hope for ‘narrow political gains’. That the Army Chief was allowed to get away by the Army making a subsequent clarification that the remarks were directed at ‘local’, ‘separatist’ politics indicates the underside of India’s civil-military relations.

A clear eyed assessment indicates that the problem thrown up for India is unlikely to nudge India down the political road, though this is its sole option. India’s reluctance would be especially attenuated at a juncture when it contemplates reengaging Pakistan. Therefore, this can only be yet another wasted summer of wasted lives. Regrettably, the inescapable conclusion is that a state fearful of its own shadow may prove an unbearable burden on a future with a nuclear backdrop.

IPCS article
#3152, 21 June 2010
Countering the Naxal Threat-IV: Military as an Option?

The Times of India headlines has it that the ‘Army is bracing to take on the Naxals’ (17 June 2010). The report informs that up to five divisions of the Army are being readied for deployment. A training center is planned to be opened that would put through other ranks of the supporting arms such as armour and artillery. In the traditional way the Army does counter insurgency, a grid is apparently to be deployed and the Maoists isolated from the populace. Brigadier level advisers have been earmarked. Earlier last month, the cabinet committee on security had debated Army deployment and at that time, the Army deployment had been ruled against, to prevent it from being over-stretched.

Preparations as reported may be contingency planning on part of the Army. The training center reported could even be one being opened by the Army for training the paramilitary troops. However, it’s possible that in light of the inadequacies of the police leadership and paramilitary sub-units revealed by the EN Rammohan enquiry in the Chintalnar episode, the government may have decided otherwise. The government has been persuaded of the need to use the right tool for the job of gaining control over the massive area comprising difficult terrain. The preparations would in any case be useful in buttressing any political reaching out that may be underway, behind the scenes to Maoists, to bring them to the table under threat of unleashing the Army.

On the issue of whether the Army ‘should’ be deployed at all, it is quite apparent from the recurring losses sustained by the paramilitary that there are shortfalls in its organization, leadership, ethos and training. The argument, usually heard on air waves, that the Army should not be used against its own people implies that where it has been so employed such as in J&K and the North East, the people are somehow ‘different’. Even in Kashmir, the operations were in a human terrain comprising Indians, if alienated Indians. If the Army is to be deployed, it is best to rehearse counter-insurgency lessons in a timely manner. By this yardstick, the mental and training preparedness as reported being undertaken by the Army is a commendable start.

The foremost concern, however, remains human rights. The killing of three ‘infiltrators’ who later turned out to be men lured by the TA (H&H) in Kashmir recently is not a one-off incident. Note that the crime occurred in the present environment of human rights watchfulness in Kashmir. There were also earlier reports of the fake action in Siachen and of the ‘ketchup’ Colonel in Assam. The lesson is that the state would require being wary from the outset. The understanding that operations are an independent military domain is in light of the past experience, unpersuasive.

It follows from this that political over-watch would be required. This cannot be expected at the provincial level. The very fact that the situation has been ‘handed over’ to the Army would lead the weak political class at this level to abdicate responsibility. Delhi is indeed too far and the indefatigable Minister for Home Affairs over-burdened; his latest additional responsibility being to head the GoM on the Bhopal tragedy! Given that the required levels of supervision would be absent; can the military be expected to exercise suitable self-regulation?

This is not impossible to conceive. The opposition expected is unlikely to be of the order the military has experienced elsewhere. The dimension of external interference is missing. The military has an ‘iron fist in velvet glove’ doctrine, dating to 2006, as a guide. The military values the difference in approach to insurgency with that of other armies in the close vicinity, such as the US and in particular the Pakistani Army. Beginning the new mission on a clean slate, it is in a position to build in best practices from the outset itself. Knowledgeable sources have it that the in-service reputation of the commanding general, head of its Central Command, inspires confidence on this score.

Nevertheless, pathologies need pointing out. One is that quantification of the officer promotion system - reportedly under re-examination on priority on order of the new Chief - could lead to a ‘numbers game’. Second, the need to show ‘results’, particularly to distinguish its deployment as an improvement over the paramilitary, needs being guarded against. Third, military recruitment practices favour officers and troops from a particular strata and region. The impact of this on their perception of the tribal people needs factoring in. Fourth, the ‘grid’ system contemplated indicates a lasting deployment. Instead, the grid could be furnished by the paramilitary. Staying on as the grid suggests, implies avoidable militarization in which the military would over time gain a vested interest. Lastly, theory on primary group cohesion, reinforced by the earlier experience of the Rashtriya Rifles, warns against using subunits of amalgamated troops.

Even if the Army is seemingly the best instrument, a far better approach would still be political first, negotiations based, development led and precluding violence.

MILITARY RECRUITMENT
Soldiers in our own images

'Pipping' ceremonies at the Indian Military Academy were solemn occasions. With the media revolution and the need to attract officer material, the Academy has over the past decade resorted to ceremonial innovation, such as singing a patriotic song during the oath taking ceremony. TV grabs and photos accompanying the twice-yearly news reports on officer commissions usually feature jubilant newly commissioned officers throwing their regimental caps in the air, in an imitation of the scene in the cult film, An Officer and a Gentleman.

FOR FULL ARTICLE SEE http://www.indiatogether.org/2010/jun/fah-recruit.htm

While 23 were from friendly foreign countries, 132 were from UP, 56 from Haryana and 51 from Uttarkhand. Thus, more than one third of the Indian's newly commissioned officers were from this belt. It can be assumed that other areas from which cadets have always come - such as Delhi, Punjab and nearby areas - were not very far behind. In other words, it can be hazarded that about 50 per cent of newly commissioned officers are from a narrow region in North India. The breakdown of the officer cadre of the paramilitary and central police forces is not known. It is very likely that their intake patterns are similar. Is this good for India's security?

And as for the soliders, what is their representation pattern? The figures are not known. The Ministry of Home Affairs sets ratios of desirable recruitment for its forces. In case of the Ministry of Defence, the recruitable male population serves as the index. Unfilled vacancies are to be carried over. However, this only accentuates over-representation.


While there are stipulations on vacancies for intake below officer ranks in the military and paramilitary, the officer cadres of both have all-India recruitment.

It can be conjectured that the general lack of transparency in recruitment is a defensive move, since the figures if known could prove embarrassing. The recruitable male population is supposed to serve as the index for recruitment. However, for instance in the Army, this can be expected to be weighted in favour of ethnic groups traditionally contributing to respective infantry regiments. Besides, some ethnic groups have representation in other arms such as in Engineers groups, artillery regiments etc.

The example of the Air Force is instructive. It has jettisoned the recruitable male population index in favour of an 'All-India' recruitment pattern. As a result, those self-selecting are mainly from UP and Bihar. The reason for departure was lack of response from non-traditional areas of recruitment. In the interest of efficiency, the Air Force opted to sacrifice broad representation. Even if this was acceptable from a point of view of military effectiveness, is this in the overall interest of the service and the nation?

While there are stipulations on vacancies for intake below officer ranks in the military and paramilitary, the officer cadres of both have all-India recruitment. This implies that a selection is made from those volunteering. Given the information available and anecdotal evidence, it can be reasonably inferred that the intake for the security forces is biased towards a narrow region in North India. Those volunteering from other regions are apparently fewer or found to be less qualified. This means the nation is getting the best on offer.

It should be pointed out that the officer cadre is still as good as it has ever been, and has not been found lacking in any way as a result of skewed intake. The military remains a respected and independent institution, focused on professional training and goals, and with no participation in the political affairs of the country. Coups have been ruled out by every expert on civil-military relations in India. If the officer corps is less alluring to some, it could be partially due to the draw of other occupations. For instance in South India, other avenues in Bangalore and Hyderabad and abroad such as in the US and the Gulf perhaps lead to fewer officer candidates.

We could conclude, therefore, that there is no reason to be concerned if the intake of officers or soldiers is particularly high from one region, and less so from elsewhere. Nevertheless, the case of Pakistan is illustrative. Up to two thirds of the officer cadre is filled by Punjabis, and many of the ills of that country can be attributed to this, including the primacy of Punjab over other states. Though Indian socio-political reality is much more complex, the implications of having majority of officers and lower ranks originating from one region still bears consideration. Some concerns are highlighted below for the attention of policy makers and their political overseers.

Firstly, in principle, the multi-ethnic reality of India must find expression in its institutions, especially those charged with security. While 'recruitable male population' may be the basis of filling in the rank and file, the practice in case of under-representation of states is not known. The Army's reluctance to share figures regarding Muslim presence, in response to the query from the Sachar Committee, is well known. It indicates that shortfalls exist. Parliament should examine how the military compensates.

FOR FULL ARTICLE SEE http://www.indiatogether.org/2010/jun/fah-recruit.htm

Secondly, although the military has been spared the operation of caste-based reservations, it still has anachronistic recruitment practices. These may not have any self-evident negative connotations for military effectiveness. However, recall that the Punjab problem did lead to changes in recruiting policy. Broad-basing recruitment is the best manner of preempting problems. For instance, modernisation may require a different type of officer candidate and recruit, more technology-inclined. This may prove beyond the capacity of the unwittingly favoured recruiting area. Additionally, over representation also owes to coaching centers in these areas offering intensive coaching on how to crack the exam. This results in poor standards at intake. This original debility cannot easily be corrected through training.

Thirdly, given the unexceptionable largesse of the latest Pay Commission, it would be unfair if the same is channeled into only one region, as seems to be the case. Higher order gains - such as regional equity, and a stake in the system for all including the social and geographical periphery - need to guide decisions over recruitment.

Fourthly, fighting insurgency can be expected to continue as a preoccupation. A narrow recruiting base, particularly of the officer corps, would lead to problems with perception. A Mainstream vs Other perception tends to emerge, clouding judgments on the applicability of force. This only accentuates in case the social origin of the officers in the lower middle class is added to the consideration. For instance, dilution in the intake of percentages from the North East in Assam Rifles has been done in favour of Gorkhas and other hill people from North India. This affects the culture of the Assam Rifles defined by its motto Friends of Hill People, changing it towards a more militarized paramilitary resembling the Army from which it draws its officer cadre

Likewise, imbalanced representation would lead to institutional bias or neglect of some or other feature in security concerns. Such imbalances in perceptions can creep into institutional inputs, for instance, on India's Pakistan or Kashmir policy. It is well said that the manner the equanimity with which these problems are viewed increases with distance from Delhi. Keeping relations with Pakistan adversarial would keep the hardline policy option underwritten by military power in play. Such a policy input could result from ethnic imbalances since parochial considerations could override the rational alternative or national interest.

Happy with the status quo, institutional leadership is likely to advise: "Leave well enough, alone." Political sagacity, however, calls for initiating the change.
⊕

The doyen of India's strategists, K Subrahmanyam, has got it wrong before. He advocated Indian vivisection of Pakistan in 1971, not only in the East, but also in the West advising for a drive up to the Indus to bisect West Pakistan between Sindh and Punjab. In the event, India settled only for the former. But even this smaller intervention has had long consequences for India. Pakistan determined that it would go nuclear to overcome its disadvantage in conventional forces, and has since waged an endless proxy war against India under nuclear cover.

Back then, he had argued that India should go nuclear to ensure deterrence, making war prohibitive and resulting in settling of issues as Kashmir. We now know otherwise, with Kashmir figuring in a war and a near war since 1998. This reality, quite different from what was predicted back in the 1970s, should be borne in mind as we read Subrahmanyam's latest (below) on the internal conflict strategy for Central India:

"India cannot industrialise without displacing populations. While the displaced population should be compensated generously, swiftly and made stakeholders in industrialisation, it is unrealistic to talk of eliminating poverty without industrialisation and fast growth. If this proposition is considered valid, India is going to face the challenge of left-wing and secessionist insurgencies to fast growth through efficient and just governance and delivery of services to the common man. To ensure that a three-pronged approach is imperative - an effective civil armed force free from the parochial political influence, a just governance and a fast growing industrialisation cum urbanisation and poverty elimination programme" (from his article, "Wake Up Call" in Dainik Jagran (Hindi), dated 11 April 2010).

Advancing years have not made a dent on his combative prose. However, Subrahmanyam's argument is predicated on a very big 'IF'. India could go down the route of fast growth 'if' it can 'compensate generously', provide 'just governance', ensure 'delivery of services' and undertake 'poverty elimination'. Since the country's past record does not instil confidence that it can do any of this adequately well, it bears questioning whether it should venture down the route of 'displacing populations' at all. In that case, would the country's war in the central provinces - referred to as Operation Green Hunt and avidly denied by authorities - be the wrong war to fight?

It is certain now that an internal war is on. A Home Ministry's statement has it that "some Maoist leaders have been directly contacting certain NGOs and intellectuals to propagate their ideology and persuade them to take steps which would provide support to the CPI (Maoist) ideology." The warning perhaps owes to Arundhati Roy's and Gautam Navlakha's take on the Maoists in Outlook and Economic and Political Weekly respectively, based on some days spent with them in Central India.

As a prescient letter to the editor in the EPW informs, the Karnataka police have served a 'notice' to a journalist on publication of his interview with a Maoist. The subtext is threat of action under Section 43 (F) UAPA (Unlawful Activities Prevention Act, 'Obligation to furnish information'. The article states: 'The failure to furnish the information called for under sub-section (1), or deliberately furnishing false information shall be punishable with imprisonment for a term which may extend to three years or with fine or with both.' Such an embargo on freedom of thought and expression indicates a war is on.


Taking the development prong of strategy first, K Subrahmanyam seems to suggest displacement is justifiable, if resettlement is done alongside. The argument is that the outcome in larger good of higher growth rates will help reduce poverty. The government's record on this can best be seen in the case of the Narmada dam. Despite this being under judicial scrutiny and civil society focus, the record has been dismal. On the Maheshwar Hydel project, Chittaroopa Palit, an activist of the Narmada Bachao Andolan (NBA), says, "The dam construction is about 80 per cent complete, but the R&R (resettlement and rehabilitation) is only about five per cent complete (The Hindu, 23 Apr 2010)."

This reality cannot but be even worse in case of remote areas where there is little scrutiny of the government's actions. Displacement figures are taken as 30-60 million since Independence; most of the advantages having been cornered by the 'haves' at the expense of the 'have nots'.

Next, is the military prong. The gag order on the two service chiefs speaking in the wake of the Chintalnar incident shows how sensitive the Home Ministry is to criticism of its military strategy. The E N Rammohan report on the Chintalnar ambush, not released in the open domain, is also apparently critical. In a knee-jerk reaction to another ambush soon thereafter, Dantewada District Collector, Reena Kangale told the Hindustan Times, "We are working on issuing an order that the security personnel should not travel by public transport." This is war by standard operating procedures - SOPs, in military parlance - at its best!

SEE indiatogether.org for full article -


K Subrahmanyam recalls suggesting in the Kargil Committee Report that he headed, "They (the paramilitary) need to be trained to much higher standards of performance and better equipped to deal with terrorist threats. The possibility of adopting an integrated manpower policy for the armed forces, paramilitary forces and the central police forces merit examination." Yet another questionable suggestion, flying as it does in the face of insights from military sociology. Fighting capability at the lower level is dependent on cohesion. 'Integrated' forces from disparate backgrounds cannot hope to develop this. The Army learned this at its cost, and that of worsening the human plight in Kashmir, by deploying the Rashtriya Rifles that suffered similarly.

The Home Minister seeks to expand his mandate, spelling further militarisation at the expense of the non-existent development prong. The argument for this advanced by Swapan Dasgupta in his weekly Sunday Times column is for development to take place, "the state must uproot an illegal military presence first". With the media and civil rights activists intimidated and the higher echelon leadership of IPS officers absent from the frontline, there would be no oversight of operations or resettlement. Continuing military action by Maoists, and all untoward incidents such as that of the tragedy of the train accident at West Midnapore being placed at their door, has placed them at odds with public opinion, making the military option - even one less than effective and very definitely, inefficient - a virtual certainty.

The third suggestion of the Bhisma Pitamah of the strategic community is on improving governance. This is unexceptionable. However, the question is, can it be done given the political reality in Jharkhand and Chattisgarh? Even relatively advanced states with Naxal presence, such as Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka - one ruled by the Congress and the other by the BJP - are rocked by political dissidence based on mining-related money power.

The Centre cannot step in easily, as some would suggest, in light of the federal structure. In case stepping in is compelled by the war, the federal pillar of polity will be easily eclipsed. Mineral wealth and development are issues not only in adivasi lands, but in the corridors of organised state power too. A politically hobbled administrative structure whose inadequacy has caused the tribal backlash in first place, is being expected to further development on a war footing. Even if assuming the Infantry was available to roll back the Maoists, the governance prong would lag behind.

Since the strategy is wishful, what is the answer? Since Subrahmanyam's strategy cannot be operationalised on all three counts, the aim he suggests also needs jettisoning. The mineral wealth of Central India can remain untapped till the people there acquire the capacity to negotiate the terms for its use. This may take a generation, but it will protect the people from the known consequences of the ongoing war. Equally importantly, this may also shield India from the unforeseen consequences of triumph - by either left wing extremists, or the right-wingers who would seek to demolish them.

The cost of a couple of percentile points of the growth rate is a price worth paying to avoid India's Red Indian moment.

IPCS, ipcs.org
#3134, 21 May 2010
Revisiting ‘1971’



The latest, if muted, storm in the military’s tea cup has been the destruction of documents relating to India’s 1971 victory. Apparently, Eastern Command made a search for the documents in order to interact with erstwhile Mukti Bahini fighters as part of a forthcoming observance of the event. It turned out that the documents in question had been destroyed on orders. This was confirmed by Lt Gen Jacob, architect of the famous victory, recalling that this was done before he took over as the Eastern Army commander soon after the war. Promptly, it surfaced that the records of the great naval action – the sinking of the Pakistani naval submarine, PNS Ghazi – were also missing.

The controversy provides an opportunity to revisit 1971. The landmark events have since had considerable resonance, particularly because the Pakistani Army has been engaged in ‘paying back’ India over the past three decades. However, this article dwells on the problems with strategic thinking in India, using the 1971 War as an entry point.

It is now widely known that the decision to go to war was taken sometime in mid April of that year, after the extreme brutality of the crack down on Bengalis in East Pakistan the previous month. Late Field Marshal Manekshaw recounted how he had stood up to his political masters insisting on postponing the date to a more opportune time later in the year for which his army would be better prepared. (It is perhaps his retelling of this ‘legend’ that led to India’s political elite inexplicably keeping away from his last rites.) The interim gave India ample scope for interfering in East Pakistan, by supporting the Mukti Bahini.

While state terrorism that occurred in East Pakistan is inexcusable, it bears mention that in the Third World context of state weaknesses, dealing with foreign interference is usually done through greater violence than is otherwise the case. Therefore, India’s earlier role in sponsoring irregulars and later in conducting operations alongside them prior to the outbreak of war contributed in some measure to the brutality of the Pakistani state and its army. There is also a question mark in history on the hijacking of and blowing up of the ‘Ganga’ Air India flight in Lahore. This enabled India to terminate over-flights between the eastern and western wings of Pakistan as early as February 1971, accentuating its problems of access and heightening its security dilemma. Therefore, to an extent the final figures of three million dead and ten million refugees can also be attributed to India’s strategy. It is no wonder that the records held with the Army are missing.

The costs of India’s strategy are easy to discern. It could have been anticipated that Pakistan’s paranoia would heighten due to the Indian angle to the crisis. Was it perhaps that Pakistan’s despicable behaviour provided India the casus belli? Was the strategy to provoke just such a response? At the UN, India initially alluded to the humanitarian consequences of Pakistani action as the casus belli, swiftly its UN officials retracted and attributed India’s action to self-defence instead; brought on, incidentally, by Pakistani attacks after a fortnight of Indian ground force presence in East Pakistan.

K Subrahmanyam, doyen of India’s strategic community, won his spurs then by making a case for dividing Pakistan. He records insisting with YB Chavan that India also take the war to West Pakistan to dictate the agenda of peace. In the event that India’s aims were limited to taking some territory in the East and being defensive in the West would Subrahmanyam’s case have led to a better outcome? The USS Enterprise was enroute to the Bay of Bengal leaving India with enough time to revert troops from the West to East. Operational level ingenuity resulted in the stunning victory. However, factoring in the entirely predictable human cost preceding it and that continues to rack the subcontinent today, makes it much less so.

The criticism today is that the gains to the east were not exploited adequately at Shimla to force Bhutto’s weak hand. The usual argument is that holding onto prisoners would have been a useful pressure point. This is ignorance of the Third Geneva Convention which requires the return of prisoners at the earliest. In the event India chose to return even the 150 prisoners pointed out by Bangladesh as war criminals. Perhaps returning them, after getting Bangladesh to acquiesce, would have closed the chapter. War crime trials would no doubt have brought out the Indian angle to the internal crisis.

Lastly, the telling lesson of 1971 is that continuing political control over the military is required, even over action seemingly in the military domain. War aims formulated in Calcutta by Eastern Command’s Chief of Staff keeping Dhaka as the center of gravity were not those of Delhi, as elaborated by the General Jacob himself in his surrender at Dhaka. In today’s nuclear environment –a consequence of political inattention then– such a situation cannot be allowed to replicate.

AFSPA: Between battlelines


The new Army Chief has given out his mind on the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA). He has said that, "Any dilution of the Act will impinge adversely on the manner in which the armed forces operate.'' To him ‘in constrained and trying circumstances, the armed forces need requisite legal protection' and on that account the Act ‘cannot be disputed’. Having come in from Kolkata after command of the Field Army deployed in countering insurgency in the North East and being an infantry officer with counter insurgency experience at the grassroots and at the operational level, his is a considered opinion.


This explains the Army’s reservations on the draft of an amended version of the AFSPA that the Ministry of Home Affairs had sent for concurrence.

See indiatogether.org for full article.


Specifically, an amended AFSPA was to have had the Do’s and Don’ts incorporated. The Supreme Court judgment had stated that the Army, ‘shall strictly follow the instructions contained in the list of ‘Do’s and Don’ts” issued by the army authorities which are binding and any disregard to the said instructions would entail suitable action under the Army Act, 1950.’ It had required that ‘the instructions contained in the list of ‘Do’s and Don’ts” shall be suitably amended so as to bring them in conformity with the guidelines contained in the decisions of this Court and to incorporate the safeguards…’


Second, but more importantly, was in respect of Section 4 (a): ‘if he is of opinion that it is necessary so to do for the maintenance of public order, after giving such due warning as he may consider necessary, fire upon or otherwise use force, even to the causing of death, against any person who is acting in contravention of any law or order for the time being in force in the disturbed area…’ This clause has been considered ‘draconian’. The draft under preparation for tabling an amended law in parliament this session had perhaps watered this down. But the Army has not proved agreeable to results of half a decade long exertions in the MHA and Law ministry.


Why this is so is because the Army prefers to see itself as the force of last resort in internal security situation. The role is itself seen as a secondary one to its primary role of fighting and winning the nation’s wars. Therefore, if the situation is bad enough, it feels it requires the powers necessary to cope with it including legal cover for its soldiery. This is especially so given the information war that surrounds insurgency, in which allegations of human rights violations are a weapon.


This perspective is not problematic. Extraordinary situations require extraordinary powers to cope, lest the republic unravel. What is problematic instead is the Army’s insistence that it would deploy only under the legal cover of the Act in areas declared ‘disturbed’ under Section 3 of the Act. Thus even where the situation is not bad enough to warrant Army deployment with such powers, the Act is invoked to enable the Army’s deployment. This position of the Army is not without logic in that by insisting that the law be invoked protects it from being used as a default option in internal security, as yet another paramilitary.


The issue is therefore on how to identify situations that warrant Army deployment under the Act and how to cope with those that are less critical. Understanding, if not agreeing with the Army’s position has led to the government’s position on a consensus, with the Army on board, before any further move is made. In the interim however much can be done.


Firstly, in areas where the Army’s efforts, among other reasons, have brought down the insurgency to manageable levels, a review of whether Army deployment is necessary needs be done. The J&K government has been asking for this for better part of last decade. The political dividend of this would be more useful in making balance of the insurgency recede than anything the Army is currently doing by remaining deployed. Even if this may not be readily possible in the Valley, an experiment can be done with withdrawing both the AFSPA and Army deployment in districts south of Pirpanjal. Such areas primed for vacation include Assam also, in particular lower Assam and the autonomous councils. The state has been amiss in extending Army deployment even where not required. Therefore a proportion of the blame must go to elected representatives in state legislatures, rather than the Army.


Secondly, the Center need not be as protective as it has been over granting permissions for the Army to be investigated where it is remiss. The Army in any case follows up on allegations and takes pride in delivering justice where warranted. However, as the Manorama case indicates institutional interest may at times over ride higher considerations. The Supreme Court has required the government to be strict, stating, ‘A complaint containing an allegation about misuse or abuse of the powers conferred under the Central Act shall be thoroughly inquired into and, if on enquiry it is found that the allegations are correct, the victim should be suitably compensated and the necessary sanction for institution of prosecution and/or suit or other proceeding should be granted under Section 6 of the Central Act.’ For instance, the J&K state government made 38 requests to prosecute soldiers but no permission was granted by the Centre. Defence Minister A K Antony told Rajya Sabha that 133 complaints were made against army between 2004 and 2009. In case the Ministry is less reticent, the Army can be expected to be doubly conscious of observing its obligations.


The AFSPA is perhaps necessary to deal with extreme situations. Such situations are a rarity. Therefore, the Act needs to be withdrawn where not necessary. However, in case the Army is still needed in such cases, then it can be deployed under cover of the relevant Code of Criminal Procedure sections. This may deprive of its extensive powers, but since these would not be necessary in less critical situations, it can afford to forego them. Army deployment in any case must be made judiciously. For instance the Chintalnar incident indicates that it may be required in select areas of Dantewada for a specific purpose of dislodging the PLGA and for that limited duration only, rather than across the board in Central India indefinitely.


It would appear that the truth lies somewhere between the battle-lines of the Army and the NGOs against the AFSPA.