The nonpolitical nature of the army is a support of India’s self-governing and representative institutions. It enables allegiance and faithfulness to the constitution. The political parties and leaders should ensure that it remains the same.

The Modi Government will be celebrating four years of Sabka Saath, Sabka Vikas this week. It might be useful to factor military lessons from the recent Karnataka election. Prime Minister Modi takes immense pride in his Government’s contribution in strengthening the morale and mettle of the Armed Forces, frequently quoting the surgical strikes, Doklam episode, One Rank One Pension (OROP) and its modernisation through Make in India.

Sadly, this is not the entire truth. If anything, defence is one area where Modi has personally shown minimum interest, which is borne out by the frequency with which he has switched Defence Ministers and ad hocism that has crept in defence management. While he is au fait with the political history of the country, he is comparatively ignorant of the country’s colonial and post-independence history.

My friend, Air Marshal Nanda Cariappa, son of Field Marshal KM Cariappa, India’s first CinC and Army Chief, is quite upset with the faux pas made by Modi about his father’s military record while trying to win over Coorg during the recent Karnataka election.

Even the grand master and wizard of electoral oratory, Prime Minister Modi, in his indefatigable campaign trail in Karnataka, tripped by events of two of Coorg’s military legends to woo the voters. The Kodava is steeped in martial tradition and has been a great warrior from the land from where the Cauvery originates. Modi recalled the gallantry of two military icons and Army Chiefs — Gens KM Cariappa (Kipper) and KS Thimayya (Timmy) from Coorg who set the stage for many of the present-day Indian Army traditions, customs, ethics and coveted values of the military being professional, secular and most of all, apolitical.

By portraying that the two Generals were treated indifferently, even insulted by the Congress Governments in the wars of 1948 and 1962, Modi’s script writers got their military history wrong. Neither was the Army Chief during the wars in Kashmir and China. Timmy was Divisional Commander in Kashmir in 1947 and Cariappa had retired well before the 1962 War.

Modi normally has total command of facts, mastery over the political context and a sharp strategy for shredding the Congress. But earlier this month, he was wide of the target. He said Army Chief Gen Thimayya won the war in Kashmir but was insulted by Jawaharlal Nehru and Defence Minister Krishna Menon. This forced him to resign. The facts are otherwise: Nehru and Timmy were good friends but it was Menon who had problems with him and the other way around.

Menon liked to micromanage the internal affairs of the Army, such as interfere in promotions and posting of officers — an activity which is sacrosanct for any Army Chief. What has not been mentioned in any report are the widespread whispered accounts of an alleged plot of a military take-over by Timmy. One story refers to an interview given by him to a foreign correspondent who asked the ‘C’ question. And he replied: “Search my cupboard for any folder on coup d’etat”. This take-over account was concocted by the Menon camp. Timmy was one of the most dynamic military leaders and one of three Indians who commanded a Brigade in World War II. Timmy was truly a soldier’s General.

Modi messed up the Cariappa episode as well. Cariappa was the first Army Chief, a pucca Brown Sahib and a gentleman’s gentleman. He retired much before the India-China War and rather than being chided and insulted by the Congress for losing the war, was made a Field Marshal 33 years after he had retired. Gen Sam Manekshaw, who was hounded by Menon, was made India’s first Field Marshal, the supreme honour conferred for winning the 1971 War.

It is amazing that nobody in the local media picked up Modi’s slip of the tongue, but I suspect that he did convince the crowds that injustice had been done to the military heroes of Karnataka. Coorg has produced per capita, the highest number of General Officers and their equivalents in India. When HD Deve Gowda was the Prime Minister, he advocated raising a Coorg Regiment in recognition of their service to the country.

The last episode in politicisation of the Army was during the term of Gen VK Singh, now a Minister for rescue and relief in Government, when as Army Chief, he took his own Government to court over his age row. That was unethical on his part. But the UPA Government allowed the affair to be politicised.

More recently, two events have politicised the forces: OROP and surgical strikes. You could add Doklam too. Surgical strikes became the political password to an election-winning spree for the BJP. Pictures of Lieutenant General Ranbir Singh, then Director General of Military Operations, who monitored the operation along with those of Modi, the then Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar and BJP president Amit Shah, appeared on banners and posters during the Uttar Pradesh election.

The actions of Army commandos across the Line of Control became associated with the courage and nationalism of the BJP. Parrikar, meanwhile, would tell stories to the media about how as an Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) pracharak, he had instilled the Hanuman spirit in the Army. In short, besides politicising the cross border operations, the BJP extracted maximum political capital from the surgical strikes.

Even to this day, every political leader in the Government invokes surgical strikes as the new political metaphor for courage, decisiveness and boldness.

The apolitical nature of the military is one of the pillars for India’s democratic institutions which enables loyalty and fidelity to the Constitution, regardless of the political party in power. Despite their political aloofness, the majority of military veterans associate nationalism and military power with the BJP to negate the impression and reputation that India is docile and has abundant strategic patience and tolerance.

After the Kargil war, the BJP and the Congress were on opposite ends in matters of defence and national security when a national political consensus was paramount. Unsavoury comments have been made about the Army by the political class for electoral gains. The lesson from Karnataka election is to keep the military outside the political discourse during elections, enabling it to remain firmly apolitical. The Election Commission of India should lay down red lines that will ensure this. Prime Minister Modi understands only too well, the strengths and sensitivity of the Army while frequently eulogising the surgical strikes. India is the only country in this region where the military has been firmly under civilian political control due to its apolitical disposition. The political class should ensure it remains the same.

(The writer is a retired Major General of the Indian Army and founder member of the Defence Planning Staff, currently the revamped Integrated Defence Staff)

Writer: Ashok K Mehta

Courtesy: The Pioneer

As Beijing strengthens the execution of military principle, mainly media manipulation, India must stand organized. Information will be significant for any battle of tomorrow.
In 2003, China’s Central Military Commission approved the concept of ‘Three Warfares’, namely: (1) the coordinated use of strategic psychological operations; (2) overt and covert media manipulation; and (3) legal warfare designed to manipulate perceptions of target audiences abroad.

In recent months, Beijing has been intensifying the implementation of this military/civilian doctrine, particularly ‘media manipulation’. Take the example of an article published last week in The South China Morning Post. It speaks of “large-scale mining operations on the Chinese side of the border with India where a huge trove of gold, silver and other precious minerals has been found.” It argues that it “may create a new military flashpoint with India.”

Though no large-scale mining has yet been spotted in Lhuntse County, north of Arunachal Pradesh, the writer connects it with the Chinese claims in the area: “People familiar with the project say the mines are part of an ambitious plan by Beijing to reclaim South Tibet [the Chinese name for Arunachal], a sizeable chunk of disputed territory currently under Indian control.”

The article mixes the Longju border incident in 1959, the 1962 war with India, the Chinese claims and the supposedly huge deposit of rare earths. The sad part of the story is that the article was immediately copied and pasted by PTI and the next morning, the entire Indian media reported about the issue and linked the happenings on the Tibetan plateau with the Chinese advances in the South China Sea.

Ironically, a day later, the ultra-nationalist Chinese tabloid, The Global Times, called the article “a dodgy report disturbing the Sino-Indian ties.” It said that the article had lit a firestorm but remarked that after Indian Prime Minister’s visit to Wuhan, the two countries have achieved major progress in strengthening mutual trust, further it said China “has no intention of provoking border disputes”.

The Global Times added that though: “the report severely lacked factual evidence and was coarse,” the Indian media “was extremely excited to see such a topic,” adding: “to many Chinese people, their first impression is that the report is not credible, given the vague facts, the geopolitical point quoted by a geologist and the denial by the expert.”

Whether it is an orchestrated move by Beijing to first plant a ‘dodgy’ piece, knowing fairly well that some Indian correspondents in Beijing are experts at copy-paste reporting, and later to throw water on the fire, is difficult to know.

It is not the first time that The South China Morning Post has done it. On October 29, 2017, Jack Ma’s newspaper reported that “Chinese engineers are testing techniques that could be used to build a 1,000km tunnel — the world’s longest — to carry water from Tibet to Xinjiang;” again the Indian media jumped to the bait. There is no doubt that India needs to be prepared for Information Warfare in the coming months.

Another favorite topic of the Chinese media propaganda has been the 1962 War with India. Beijing is keen to rewrite the narrative and sell it to lakhs of its citizens visiting South Tibet; its idea is to prove that India attacked China in October 1962.

At the end of October 2017, as an offshoot of the Doklam episode, Sina.com published an album of photos “to commemorate the 55th Anniversary of the Outbreak of the Self-Defense Counterattack.” Note that for Beijing, it is the ill-equipped and unprepared Indian troops who attacked the Chinese, giving China no option but to ‘counterattack’, killing hundreds of Indian jawans and officers in the process.

One of the photos, showing the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) parading in front of the Potala in January 1963, in Lhasa linked the 1962 War with the 2017 standoff in Bhutan: “The leader of the Chinese Communist Party, Mao Zedong, once estimated that India’s ‘embarrassment’ [of the 1962 War] could usher in 10 years of border security and peace. History has proved that the period of peacetime has been longer than estimated. Today, 55 years later, India once again provoked China.” The message was clear. At the time of the 1962 War, disinformation already existed.

In his Monthly Report for April 1963, the Political Officer in Sikkim informed New Delhi: “Early in the month it was announced by the Chinese authorities that the Chinese frontier guards in Tibet would be releasing 3,213 Indian prisoners which included amongst others one Brigadier [John Dalvi], 26 Field Grade Officers and 29 Company Grade Officers.”

The PO added: “The propaganda machine of the Chinese made out that the Indian prisoners were living in Tibet in a state of idyllic bliss. The detention camp was described as having been established in picturesque surroundings where the prisoners spent their time playing games or fishing and otherwise enjoying themselves. The food was supposed to have been so good that the prisoners had according to the Chinese statement on an average gained 1.35 Kgs per head. The nursing care received by the sick is supposed to have so overwhelmed the recipients as to have induced them to say that even their parents had not bestowed more loving care on them.”

The Indian PoWs reported the opposite; they ate only radish and immensely suffered during their months of captivity on the cold Tibetan plateau. Today, the Chinese propaganda is using the 1962 conflict to its benefit.

Che Dalha (alias Qizhala), the Governor of the Tibetan Autonomous Region (TAR) recently visited Zhayul, north of the McMahon line in the Lohit Valley. Some 50 km south in the same valley, the famous Battle of Walong took place in November 1962; here Indian troops and particularly the six Kumaon regiment of the Indian Army managed to stop the Chinese advances and paid a high price for it; the Chinese too suffered heavy casualties.

China has built a Hero Memorial Park to honour its deaths in Zhayul. During his visit, Che told the villagers that the masses should always cherish the memory of the revolutionary martyrs; he laid a wreath for 447 Revolutionary Martyrs at the War Memorial.

The story will now be told to thousands and thousands Chinese visitors, how ‘the Indians attacked our troops’. Incidentally, Che took the opportunity to urge the villagers to watch for strangers or suspicious persons (Indian?); he asked them to cross-examine them and send a report to the PLA manning the Indian border.

Another memorial stands north of the Thagla ridge in Tsona County. The Forward Command Post of General Zhang Guohua, who commanded the PLA operations in 1962, has been reconstituted and opened to tourists. It is located in Marmang village, the first hamlet north of the McMahon Line.

This gazetted national-level historical site also mentions the ‘Sino-India Self Defense Counter Attack Battles’, hotels are already mushrooming to receive the visitors.   ‘Information’ will certainly be an important part of any battle of tomorrow. Has India grasped this? Not sure. In the meantime, Indian journalists should scrupulously verify the facts when they write.

(The writer is an expert on India-China relations and an author)

Writer: Claude Arpi

Courtesy: The Pioneer

PM Narendra Modi and Russia’s Vladimir Putin summit is a big proof of New Delhi showing promptness in answering to global power play.

The fact that Prime Minister Narendra Modi, welcomed warmly by Russian President Vladimir Putin to Sochi for an informal bilateral summit on Monday, leads an Indian administration that is refreshingly responsive to the rapidly shifting sands of contemporary geopolitics is beyond doubt. Even the Prime Minister’s severest critics ought to concede that he is doing a spirited job of keeping India in play at a time when the US, Russia, China and the European Union are all re-calibrating their tactical plays and/or redefining their strategic objectives. It isn’t an easy job, especially because both multilateral and bilateral relationships of the above-mentioned are in state of, let’s say redevelopment. Additionally, for India, we happen to live, to paraphrase the late King Hussein of Jordan, in a tough neighborhood, which makes it incumbent upon New Delhi to pay close attention to what’s going down in South Asia as well as what’s happening in Indian Ocean rim-countries.

Some strategic experts trace the current state of flux in the context of which Modi and Putin have met to iterate the strategic level of the longstanding Indo-Russian partnership with an emphasis on defence ties to the moves made by the US under President Donald J. Trump. The argument goes that it is a result of Washington no longer being willing to go along tail tucked neatly between its legs with accepting the inevitability of China’s rise as a fait accompli or Russia’s attempts to reclaim the Soviet legacy in terms of heft on the world stage and is entirely unwilling to continue with one-sided economic ties — especially its trade deficit with other nations/groupings — as a price for being feted as a so-called leader of the free world. Indeed, it is true, that the US under Trump – who promises to make America Great Again — has resulted in others reacting to protect their own national interests in turn thereby strengthening an emerging multipolar world. But it would be facile to put it down this trend to merely a change in US administrations. No, what many have missed but India for once has not, is that these developments are a manifestation of deeper shift in world politics after the end of the Cold War and perhaps the most fundamental rejig of the premise on international relations have been conducted after the end of World war II than is commonly recognized. We are, not to put too fine a point on it, going back to the future in a sense, with the nation-state once again as the primary unit of interaction globally and multilateral alliances increasingly becoming tactical rather than strategic in nature. India, which was a subject nation in the era of empire, has, thankfully, got it right this time around.

New Delhi’s outreach to Moscow at a time when US sanctions are a real threat for the latter while simultaneously deepening its ties with Washington is a reflection of that understanding. Its balancing act in terms of engaging with Teheran, another object of Trump’s ire, and making clear its sympathies lie more with the Russia/EU position is another example. India has also been quick to respond to China’s accommodative overtures given the US pushback against Beijing’s growing global influence which has forced the latter to show some flexibility towards its lesser adversaries. In sum, while all political parties in India have long accepted the primacy of our national interest, it has taken a Government with an ideological commitment to the idea of the nation-state in general and the Indian civilizational nation on which a modern, democratic state is being crafted in particular to walk the talk.

Writer: Pioneer

Courtesy: The Pioneer

The fight for the future of India is against three major assemblies: those who enact political terrorism, those who permit it to continue persistently, and from self-satisfied rootless leaders.

One of the most heart wrenching, irony-soaked episodes during the Karnataka election campaign was the ludicrous spectacle of a few superannuated Congress leaders — led by Manmohan Singh — writing to the President of India directing him to ‘caution’ Prime Minister Modi on the kind of language he used during the campaign. The letter, a prattle of sorts, had three categories of signatories — the superannuated — cold storage leaders of the Congress — Motilal Vora, Karan Singh and the like; those who looked the other way when mega scams were rocking the UPA II boat — Manmohan Singh, AK Antony et al; and those who aided and actively abetted corruption — such as P Chidambaram and Kapil Sibal. One thing that unites all these signatories in one category is the fact that they are all rootless durbaris who, instead of trying to re-invent the Congress after its worst debacle in 2014, have kept paying obeisance to an increasingly erratic dynastic scion determined to wreck the pillars of our democracy and undermine the democratic spirit.

However, why do I bring notice to an irrelevant piece of rag that should have ideally found its way into the dustbin? It is because, right when these Congress ‘stalwarts’ were writing to the President of India to ‘caution’ Modi, their own partymen in West Bengal, led by their leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, were being bludgeoned, intimidated, abused and assaulted by goons and lumpens of Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress (TMC). They, like all other opposition parties, were in the fray for the panchayat elections in the State and their grassroots workers were eagerly looking forward to be part of the panchayat polls.

Thus, while Mamata Banerjee’s lumpens knifed and hammered Congress workers on the ground — though the most brutal assault was reserved for the BJP workers — their rootless leaders in Delhi — all leading durbaris of the party’s ‘first family’ themselves living in the vacuum of a Lyutens mindset, deluded by visions of grandeur and relevance, some of whom have spent a lifetime lecturing on humanism and democracy, were complaining to the President of India, not against the bloodletting that Mamata Banerjee’s TMC had been indulging in by preventing the legitimate exercise of democratic rights. They were, instead complaining against a false scenario of a Prime Minister not living up to the dignity of his office. The Congress leadership has never been particular about protecting and standing by its workers and those who struggle on the ground to keep the party functioning and relevant. For them, it is the ‘family’ which matters, the rest is incidental — the concept and design of the ‘parivaar party’ has been clearly delineated.

Similarly, while Mamata’s goons had unleashed a reign of terror in which Congress workers were also victims, Abhishek Manu Singhvi was appealing to the Supreme Court on the Karnataka issue, having being elected to the Rajya Sabha on ‘Didi’s’ munificence, he had become a slave, he dare not sympathise with his party’s workers who were being intimidated. It took a Narendra Modi to speak of the panchayat poll violence in West Bengal as the ‘death of democracy’ and to reiterate the point that workers and candidates from all parties, except the one ruling in Bengal, were afflicted and being prevented from exercising their democratic rights.

While the Congress’s philosophers and economists were busy in trying to interpret and examine Narendra Modi’s lexicon — they were hurt because Modi had actually taken head on the Congress dynast — their workers in West Bengal were being brutally done away with by one of their close allies — the TMC. Another irony-cased issue for the Congress in West Bengal is that Mamata Banerjee has, since the Assembly election in 2016, poached 11 Congress MLAs. While the party in West Bengal is gradually disintegrating, while the once formidable Dr BC Roy’s legacy is being wiped out with the decimation of the Congress in the State, its philosopher and economist leaders are playing fiddle and paying obeisance to the ‘dynasty’, they dare not protest Mamata’s poaching of their party in Bengal.

However, the issue here in the space of this column is West Bengal and the near 45-day trauma that the State and its democratic space had to undergo. One thing clear from the panchayat poll results is that the BJP has emerged as the principal opposition party in the State. BJP chief Amit Shah’s repeated exhortation, that the more the Lotus is sought to be crushed, the more will it bloom has actually been proved right. Despite severe repression, assault and intimidation, with the BJP’s workers being killed, its women workers assaulted and molested;  despite being victims of targeted bombing by TMC lumpens, the BJP workers resisted political terrorism and proved their mettle. Across a vast swathe, including the Jangalmahal areas, the BJP has registered its presence at the grassroots. The shocking footage of ballot papers being stamped on counting day by TMC lumpens has revealed the actual condition of democracy in the State. The fact that BJP ballot papers were being singled out for this exercise at invalidation is indicative of the heat that the ruling TMC has begun to feel at the BJP’s expansion at the grassroots.

Mamata Banerjee-led TMC had unleashed a cycle of violence against the BJP candidates as well as their family members. Pursuing typically fascist methods, once used by the Left front cadres to threaten and subdue Opposition candidates, the TMC lumpens too began threatening and dissuading Opposition candidates from filing their nominations. The main targets of their attacks and intimidation have been BJP workers who were forcefully prevented from contesting the panchayat elections.

So gruesome has been the TMC violence  that it has seen workers being killed, women being molested and manhandled — in fact, TMC goons had gone around villages, threatening BJP workers, telling them that if they dared to contest, they should first buy for their women at home bales of white cloth used to cover cadavers and then proceed for filing their nominations. This was the exact modus operandi adopted by the CPI(M) harmads — armed and hired lumpens — who would, at gunpoint, threaten Opposition workers and make a mockery of democracy. The TMC cadres and the party’s mercenaries, with express support of TMC supremo, unleashed exactly such a cycle of violence.

So intense and thorough has been TMC’s terrorisation of democracy in Bengal that in Mamata’s nephew Abhishek Banerjee’s Lok Sabha constituency, Diamond Harbour, the Opposition was unable to file nominations in over 93 per cent of the seats, while in Birbhum, overseen by Mamata’s favourite henchmen, the district president Anubrata Mondol, the picture is similar.

In fact, Anubrata coerced and threatened candidates from withdrawing their nominations or having filed them, to switch over to the TMC. Both Abhishek and Anubrata — Mamata’s favourites in her control for Bengal — have actually lived up to her hope of controlling Bengal through terrorising the people and by ensuring that the democratic space in the State keeps shrinking. In this, she has surpassed the communists, who adhered to the philosophy of limited terror and limited violence in order to keep the proletariat in line and disciplined.

By resorting to violence with the help of anti-social elements, Mamata Banerjee has, while she keeps lecturing us on the need to protect the Constitution, put together by Dr Ambedkar — has herself defiled the sanctity and purity of the Constitution by turning the election process into game of muscles, fear and blood. TMC goons and lumpens with country made arms, batons and iron rods have been knifing, bombing BJP workers, vandalising shops, manhandling women workers and terrorising localities. BJP party offices across the State, especially in rural areas, are being vandalised and torched. The case of Raiganj was for all to see, where TMC harmad groups went on a rampage, breaking shops, openly wielding arms, hurling bombs and expletives. CPI(M) cadres too have been at the receiving end of what they have themselves meted out people during their three decades in power. Strangely, their leaders in Delhi blame Modi for the violence and are very reluctant in naming the actual perpetrators on the ground!

BJP workers were beaten up inside the SDO offices while trying to file their nominations or were prevented from entering the SDO offices for filing their nomination. A case in point is that of Bilash Lakshman, BJP leader from Khanakul’s Gobindapur in Hooghly. Lakshman had come to collect his nomination paper for the No 49 Zilla Parishad seat of Khanakul. BJP Kisan Morcha leader of Khanakul Tapan Mondal accompanied him. They were abducted in front of the Deputy Magistrate, taken out of the office and badly beaten up and manhandled by TMC goons.

While Keshab Koyal of Sandeshkhali-1, of Basirhat Subdivision, in N 24 Parganas too faced a similar situation when armed TMC goons picked him up from the BDO’s office and prevented. BJP workers who were filing the nomination form sitting in the BJP office at Minakhan, Basirhat Subdivision, N 24 Parganas, were attacked and their forms torn, the party office vandalised and workers badly beaten up. The Minakhan BJP office is next to the police station. BJP worker in Purulia, Bhim Sen Nandi had to be hospitalised after being severely beaten by TMC goons.

Such incidents have occurred and are occurring in large numbers across the State. Incidents of knifing and bombing has become rampant, the police forces are unable to or are unwilling to bring the situation under control. With the rise in nominations on BJP symbol, the TMC got rattled and resorted to unleashing violence against BJP workers and their families. However, BJP workers have also resisted TMC lumpenism and have, in areas, recovered inch-by-inch lost ground, it is this that makes the TMC and its leadership nervous, they wish to control Bengal unchallenged but lack the capacity to do it in a democratic manner. Both the TMC and Mamata Banerjee have failed the Indian Constitution, and the struggle against them must be further strengthened for democracy in West Bengal to be able to survive. While she poses as the foremost protector of the Constitution, Mamata Banerjee has consistently displayed that she is an inveterate fascist when it comes to controlling the politics of West Bengal.

But the most deafening silence on the ruling party sponsored IS-like violence in Bengal is from those who have consistently spread false and malicious propaganda against Prime Minister Modi and the BJP. Those placard carrying professional protestors and marchers, those five star activists, who have always created false narratives, have been conspicuously silent, they do not have the gumption to challenge Mamata, they are comfortable with attacking Modi and just because there is no Modi in West Bengal, they keep silent when democracy is being throttled in that State, they are complicit in this subversion.

The challenge for us is from three quarters: Those who perpetrate political terrorism and cover it with a veneer of being respectful to the Constitution — as Mamata Banerjee has done and is doing in West Bengal; from those who allow that kind of terrorisation to continue unabated because protesting against it will not serve their larger hate-inspired goal of demonising Modi; and finally from those self-professed rootless leaders — now mostly found in the Congress — who instead of trying to rein in their increasingly imbecile and volatile party president, continue showering plaudits on his effort at destablising the country, compromising our Constitutional institutions and at subverting democratic mandates. The larger struggle for the future of India, therefore, is against these three elements.

(The writer is director, Dr Syama Prasad Mookerjee, Research Foundation, New Delhi. Views expressed are personal)

Writer: Anirban Ganguly

Courtesy: The Pioneer

BJP president Amit Shah on Sunday shown confidence of winning the upcoming Assembly elections in Mizoram and announcing it to be the eighth northeastern state that would join the BJP in its aim of a ‘Congress-Mukt Northeast’.

Shah said this while addressing the third conclave of the BJP led North East Democratic Alliance (NEDA) at Srimanta Sankardeva Kalakshetra here on Sunday and added that all the eight Chief Ministers of northeastern States will be sitting in the next NEDA conclave after the Mizoram elections.

Shah’s visit to Assam witnessed protests by Krishak Mukti Sangram Samiti (KMSS) whose members waived black flags to Shah in protest against Centre’s move to pass the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill, 2016 on the stretch from airport near Guwahati to Srimanta Sankardeva Kalakshetra, where the conclave was organised. Police also arrested KMSS chief Akhil Gogoi and some of his colleagues from near the meeting venue to be release later.

“This is only the third conclave of NEDA and I can see representation from seven northeastern State here including the Chief Ministers, Deputy Chief Ministers, MLAs and MPs from our constituent parties,” said Shah while adding that all the eight Chief Ministers of northeastern States will be sitting here together after the Mizoram elections.

“NEDA was formed after we won the elections in Assam in 2016. Following Assam, we formed Governments in Manipur and Tripura. In Nagaland and Meghalaya, NEDA constituents NDPP and NPP respectively has formed the Governments with support from the BJP,” Shah said.

The BJP president also launched an attack on the Congress and said that all the Congress Chief Ministers of northeastern States have amassed bunglows and huge properties outside the State and in many Indian cities including Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore etc. “The BJP Government has ensured that every paisa sanctioned by the Centre reaches to the people in the grassroots in all the States,” he said.

Shah said that the NEDA is not only a political platform but geo-cultural platform which have brought together all the northeastern states to discuss and implement ways to ensure development.

“Earlier northeastern states are used to be known for corruptions. Now due to the presence of NEDA governments, the northeastern states have gone beyond ‘briefcase politics’ and new milestones of developments are being achieved in different states,” he said adding that the youths of the northeastern states are now looking up to NEDA with a hope.

It may be mentioned here that the conclave on Sunday was participated by Assam Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal, Meghalaya Chief Minister Conrad Sangma, Arunachal Pradesh Chief Minister Pema Khandu, Manipur Chief Minister N Biren Singh, Nagaland Chief Minister Neiphiu Rio, Tripura Chief Minister Biplab Kumar Deb and others. Sikkim Chief Minister Pawan Kumar Chamling could not attend due to other engagement.

Writer:  Anup Sharma

Courtesy: The Pioneer

The Congress today decided to stake claim to form government in Goa where it had emerged as the single largest party in the Assembly polls held last year. Chandrakant Kavlekar, Congress Legislature Party chief, said the party will stake claim by submitting a formal letter to Governor Mridula Sinha containing signatures of all the 16 party MLAs.

The BJP has, however, dismissed the Congress’ demand, as a result of frustration at being wiped out of the country’s political map, with the State Bharatiya Janata Party general secretary Sadanand Shet Tanavade even urging the Congress to bring its president Rahul Gandhi to Goa, to try and wrest the Government from the ruling BJP-led coalition alliance.

Earlier on Thursday, hours after Karnataka Governor Vajubhai Vala swore in senior BJP leader BS Yeddyurappa as Chief Minister, State Congress president Girish Chodankar in a missive to the Governor insisted that the Congress be invited to form power in Goa because “it is the single largest party” in the State, as far as legislative strength is concerned.

“We are requesting Her Excellency to follow big brother Karnataka Governor and invite the Congress to form the Goa Government to recitfy a wrong,” Congress State President Girish Chodankar told The Pioneer.

“If the Karnataka Governor can invite the Bharatiya Janata Party, the single largest party to form the Government, why can’t the Goa Governor invite the Congress, the single largest party in Goa, to form the Government here? Why two critieria for two States? Why double standards?” he also said, adding that the Congress had formally sought time from Sinha to state their case. The BJP in its reaction has said that the Congress was merely acting out of frustration.

“The BJP is ruling in Goa with the help of alliance. What is the point of crying now? Let them cry. They have realised now that no one is accepting them in the entire country. In Karnataka too, their seat share has shrunk and they do not have a Government anywhere,” Tanavade told The Pioneer.

“BJP alliance in Goa has an absolute majority. The Congress is frustrated because the party is being wiped out of India, therefore they are making wild allegations. BJP, Goa Forward, MGP Independents, all included we have 23 MLAs. They have 16, they should know how many of the 16 are actually with them,” Tanavade also said, accusing the Congress central leadership of being not on the ball during the Government formation process in Goa in March last year.

“When election results were announced (in March 2017), the BJP staked claim to form the Government before the Congress did. They were sleeping. They did not even have a leader. (AICC secretary) Chella Kumar and Digvijaya SIngh were sleeping in a hotel. Who asked them to sleep in a hotel,” he said, even egging the Congress to “fly down” Rahul Gandhi to plead the party’s case with the Governor.

Writer: Mayabhushan

Courtesy: The Pioneer

After panchayat polls in West Bengal, violence continued with four deaths from different regions taking the toll to 23 in past 36 hours, reported by the sources. Unsubstantiated reports put Tuesday’s toll at 5 taking the total number of poll-related deaths to 24 even as fresh violence was reported from far flung areas of Coochbehar, Raiganj, South 24 Parganas, Howrah and two Midnapores.

This, even as a mischievously silent State Election Commission engaged in weighing up observers’ reports for a final verdict on whether it was prepared to order re-poll in 500-plus booths from where micro-observers have sent adverse observations on Monday’s violence-torn elections. Three political workers one each from Trinamool Congress, BJP and CPI(M) were murdered in Coochbehar, North Dinajpur and South Dinajpur, sources said while two persons were found dead with bullet and bomb injuries in East Midanpore. Monday’s elections had claimed 19 lives and over 200 people sustained bomb and gun injuries in political clashes whereas hundreds of booths were either looted or rigged, some in the presence of police and even by police personnel, opposition parties alleged. Tuesday saw more violence at Basanti village in South 24 Parganas were two groups of Trinamool Congress clashed with bombs and guns leaving about half-a-dozen people injured. Meanwhile, the BJP on Tuesday launched a scathing attack on Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee for her acts of political treachery.

Attacking Banerjee for her tendency to “stab in the back,” BJP leader Kailash Vijaybargiya said “Mamata Banerjee is a habitual traitor. She would not have come to power had she not been supported by the BJP but she is now killing our people.

“Without Atal Behari Vajpayee’s support she would not have become the leader she is now. But first thing she did after coming to power was to stab in the BJP’s back. But she will have to repent for this in the coming elections. ”

On what the BJP’s strategy would be in the 2019 elections considering the violence the TMC resorts to in every elections, the saffron leader said “That election will be conducted by the national Election Commission which has been taking note of all that is happening here. Besides half of her Cabinet colleagues will be in jail in another six month’s time. Most of her own leaders will not be by her side by then.

“She loves none but her own self and her nephew. All others are used by her and then thrown away. See what she did to Mukul Roy. But now her days are coming and she will feel the consequence of her treachery.”

Writer: Saugar Sengupta

Courtesy: The Pioneer

The United States opened its embassy in Jerusalem under a contentious move by President Donald Trump. This has exasperated the Palestinians who fought with Israeli soldiers, who shot dead at least 52 of Palestinians in Gaza, in the fatal acceleration of violence since 2014.

Trump said the opening of the new US embassy in Jerusalem has been a “long time coming.” Trump gave a video address that aired at the opening of the new embassy. Trump, in an early morning tweet, hailed the opening of the US embassy in Jerusalem as “a great day for Israel.”

Trump made no reference to the violence in an early morning tweet but said, “A great day for Israel!”

Monday marked the biggest showdown in years between Israel’s military and Gaza’s Hamas rulers along the volatile border. The sides have largely observed a cease-fire since the 2014 war — their third in a decade.

In a show of anger fueled by the embassy move, protesters set tires on fire, sending plumes of black smoke into the air, and hurled firebombs and stones toward Israeli troops across the border. The Israeli military said its troops had come under fire, and accused protesters of trying to break through the border fence. It said troops shot and killed three Palestinians who were trying to plant a bomb.

At least 52 Palestinians, including a 14-year-old boy, were killed while more than 1,200 were wounded, including 27 critically, Palestinian health officials said.

The Hamas-led protest in Gaza was meant to be the biggest yet in a week-long campaign against a decade-old blockade of the territory.

The protests mark the culmination of a campaign, led by Hamas and fueled by despair among Gaza’s 2 million people, to break the decade-old border blockade of the territory imposed by Israel and Egypt after Hamas seized control of Gaza in 2007. Since weekly border marches began in late March, 79 Palestinian protesters have been killed and more than 2,300 wounded by Israeli army fire. Hamas said four members, including three security men, were among the dead.

Ismail Radwan, a senior Hamas figure, said the mass border protests against Israel will continue “until the rights of the Palestinian people are achieved.”

“Moving the US Embassy to Jerusalem will be a disaster on the American administration and a black day in the history of the American people because they are partners with the occupation and its aggression against the Palestinian people,” he added.

Hamas leaders have suggested a border breach is possible, something Israel has vowed to prevent at any cost.

Most of the casualties were in the southern Gaza towns of Khan Younis and Rafah. Israeli forces were firing volleys of tear gas to disperse the crowds, and the sound of heavy gunfire could be heard. Sirens were constantly wailing as the wounded were carried to nearby ambulances. Groups of young activists repeatedly approached the fence, but were quickly scattered by gunfire and tear gas.

Lt Col Jonathan Conricus, an Israeli military spokesman, said the army had set

up additional “layers” of security in and around communities near the border to defend Israeli civilians. He said there already had been several “significant attempts” to break through the fence.

“Even if the fence is breached, we will be able to protect Israeli civilians from attempts to massacre or kidnap or kill them,” he said.

In a statement, the army said troops had shot and killed three Palestinians who attempted to plant a bomb along the fence. It also said an aircraft had targeted a Hamas post in northern Gaza after Israeli troops came under fire.

The timing of Monday’s events was deeply symbolic, both to Israel and the Palestinians.

The US said it chose the date to coincide with the 70th anniversary of Israel’s establishment.

But it also marks the anniversary of what Palestinians call their “nakba,” or catastrophe, a reference to the uprooting of hundreds of thousands who fled or were expelled from what is now Israel during the 1948 war surrounding Israel’s independence.

Israel captured east Jerusalem in the 1967 Mideast war and annexed it in a move not recognized by the international community. The Palestinians seek the city’s eastern half as the capital of a future state.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas cut ties with the Trump administration and declared it unfit to mediate peace talks.

Writer: Agencies

Courtesy: The Pioneer

Rohingya refugees, who have found safe heaven in Jammu and Kashmir, pose a threat to the security of people in the region and should be “thrown out” of the state, said by the Vishwa Hindu Parishad. Though the Government said that Rohingyas are a security threat and not a religious problem, the top court has repeatedly postponed their exile. A solution to the problem is authoritative.

In an interview with Russia Today on the crisis in Europe, French politician Marine Le Pen said, “Immigration is an organised replacement of our population. This threatens our very survival.” Syria’s Grand Mufti, Sheikh Ahmad Badreddin Hassoun, supports New Delhi’s view that Rohingyas are a security threat and not a religious problem. Yet, the Supreme Court has repeatedly deferred the deportation of thousands of illegal Rohingyas and is even hearing their petition against expulsion.

In Jammu, the demographic and security threat posed by illegal Rohingyas and Bangladeshis has reached a boiling point. Local ‘permanent residents’ (hereditary State citizens) allege a well-funded and politically-backed conspiracy to settle them across the Province and trigger Hindu migration, as already reported from some villages. In November 2017, the United Nations High Commission for Refugees visited at least five Rohingya habitations in Jammu and urged them to leave, promising funds to settle elsewhere. They refused, saying, “We are used to Jammu, we know everyone over here, why would we leave?” That, in a nutshell, sums up their comfort levels in Hindu-majority Jammu, as opposed to living with their co-religionists in Kashmir.

Perhaps this is why Jammu led the campaign to deport Rohingyas from India. As is well-known, Hindus who fled West Pakistan in 1947-48 and landed in Jammu & Kashmir were treated shabbily by Sheikh Abdullah and are languishing without official recognition (identity certificates) needed for Government jobs, education in State institutions and other benefits. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) promised to address this seven-decade-old injustice during the 2014 election, but met with fierce resistance from Kashmiri separatists, the National Conference and the Congress; and also the People’s Democratic Party.

At the Union Home Minister’s nudging, the State Government set up a Group of Ministers in May 2017, to examine illegal Rohingya and Bangladeshi settlements in Jammu and Samba districts. But it was non-serious. The attack on the Army camp at Sunjwan in February this year increased the clamour to evict the Rohingyas, who have even settled near the camp. A senior police official said there are “consultation camps” on the border, which direct the groups to settle at a particular place or city. Jammu is preferred due to proximity with Pakistan and to “strengthen” its Muslim minority.

The infiltrators are given mobile phone, I-cards, Aadhaar cards, even ‘permanent resident’ cards, illegal power and water connections, and allowed to grab State lands and build houses on them. Funds for them are raised through hawala channels and routed through local NGOs, such as Jamaat Ahle Haider, Yateem Trust and Kashmiri Welfare Trust. The National Conference regime had forced schools in some localities to admit Bangladeshi and Rohingya children, who comprise 80 percent of the student body.

Rohingyas are active in Tablighi activities through local mosques in Jammu (as in Chennai and Hyderabad). Security agencies suspect them of having links with the Islamic State, Lashkar-e-Tayyeba, Al Qaeda and Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency. In fact, Rakhine (Arakan) is becoming an important node of the global jihadist movement and is being funded by organisations in Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. Rohingyas are linked to the Bangladesh Islami Chhatrashibir of Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami. They are involved in unsavoury activities such as trafficking girls from Myanmar and selling drugs.

Given the inexcusable sympathy for the infiltrators in some well-heeled sections of society, it is worth recollecting how they burst into the international limelight. Strategic analyst Brahma Chellaney observes that Rohingyas were among the first groups in Asia to be radicalised by the British Raj and to demand partition; they tried to expel Burma’s Buddhist population north of Arakan (170-odd miles) to join East Pakistan.

The current crisis began on August 25, 2017, when the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army attacked police posts in Maungdaw, Myanmar; over 100 people died. The jihadis also attacked the Hindu minority in Rakhine; over 500 were slaughtered; the Army later found mass graves with Hindu bodies.

Many Hindu families fled to Bangladesh to escape, but were again persecuted by the 4.5 lakh Rohingya Muslims fleeing the Myanmar Army. In the refugee camps, Hindu women were forced to break their bangles, read namaz, wear burqas, and convert. They sought shelter near two temples at Ukhia in Cox’s Bazar. The Hindus said they were attacked by Rohingyas and feared to return to Myanmar as several members of their families had been slaughtered and their homes burnt down. In October 2017, Bangladesh arrested 22 Rohingya Muslims posing as refugees, but who were linked to the massacre of Hindus in Myanmar. They were reportedly trained by Pakistan’s ISI.

The Jerusalem Post was the only international media to assert that while it was true that the Myanmar Army had begun ethnic cleansing of Rohingyas after the ARSA assault on police posts, the ethnic cleansing of Hindus in Arakan (‘Rohingya Hindus’) could not be ignored. Even while fighting the Army, jihadi groups were entering Hindu areas and “stabbing, shooting and raping the residents”. One survivor reported that the terrorists would dig three holes — one to dump the bodies of women, one for children and one for men; all overflowed. The paper noted that while conditions in Bangladesh refugee camps were tough, Hindu refugees were worst hit. Many wanted refuge in India.

By the end of September 2017, when matters subsided, the Myanmar Government urged Hindu refugees who fled to Bangladesh to return, and assured that they would be taken care of in Sittwe, capital of Rakhine State. So far, there has been no response to this plea and it seems unlikely that Hindus would return to Rakhine. The enmity between Myanmar’s majority Buddhists and Rohingyas, most of whom are denied citizenship on grounds of being British imports from the region now known as Bangladesh, has flared up intermittently since 1948 when Burma (Myanmar) became independent. But what happened to the miniscule Hindu community was genocide.

Rohingyas are known to have settled in Jammu, Hyderabad, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Delhi-NCR and Rajasthan. However, in April, Gorkha Janmukti Morcha leader Bimal Gurung alleged that Rohingyas were being settled in Darjeeling and Kalimpong districts of the Gorkhaland region of West Bengal, as part of a sinister conspiracy to alter the demography and marginalise the native Gorkhas, superseding national interests for vote-bank politics. Gorkhaland, which borders Nepal, Bhutan, Tibet and Bangladesh, is politically sensitive and any “replacement” of the population, as warned by Marine Le Pen, could have a deleterious impact on the nation. A solution to the Rohingya threat is an urgent imperative.

(The writer is Senior Fellow, Nehru Memorial Museum and Library; the views expressed are personal)

Writer: Sandhya Jain

Courtesy: The Pioneer

Union minister of consumer affairs, food and public distribution and Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) chief Ram Vilas Paswan has supported the demand raised by chief minister Nitish Kumar and the JDU for granting special status category to Bihar but within the guidelines set up by the National Development Council (NDC).

“Bihar is more backward while Andhra is comparatively developed State. If the States are considered for special status Bihar will get this privilege first,” said Paswan talking to media here on Sunday and said his party was always in in support of special status to Bihar and Nitish has all right to make such a demand. However, he admitted there were some constraints in granting this status because of the laid norms but Paswan stopped short of demanding change in the norms. Paswan was all praise for Bihar CM for including Paswan caste in the Mahadalit category and other welfare measure for the scheduled caste students like Rs 50,000 grant to those students qualifying in BPSC and Rs 1 lakh for those qualifying in UPSC. “All dalit castes are oppressed class and there should not be any discriminations as far as granting them some facilities,” said Paswan who had earlier been critical of Nitish for keeping Paswans out of the purview of Mahadalit category for political reasons. He also pointed out that the Supreme Court had ordered that the dalits should be called scheduled castes which is also written in the constitution and the same term was used by Dr B R Ambedkar.

Expressing confidence that BJP led NDA will form the Government in Karnataka, Paswan took pot shots at AICC president Rahul Gandhi for his statement that he was ready to be Prime Minister in 2019.

Writer: PNS

Courtesy: The Pioneer

The Defense Planning Committee appears to complicate defense planning and higher political Management. Missing defense reforms have to be enforced top down, superseding babucracy.

Four years after coming to office, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) led Government hurled a surprise at the defence and strategic community with newspapers last month splashed with the news of a new high-powered Defence Planning Committee (DPC) under NSA Ajit Doval to steer the country’s military security strategy and develop defence capability. Instead of first establishing Integrated Theatre Commands, appointing a Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) and creating jointness in existing planning headquarters, like the Ministry of Defence (MoD) and Integrated Defence Staff, the DPC appears as an attempt to obfuscate defence planning and higher political management.

India has waited for a CDS for 50 years. The first time this acronym was heard was after the 1971 war when Prime Minister Indira Gandhi told late Field Marshal Sam Manekshaw that he would be made CDS, but the idea whose time had come, never materialised. In 2001, following the Group of Ministers (GoM) report after the Kargil Review Committee report had recommended and the Government accepted 340 defence reforms, and some were implemented, the name of Admiral Sushil Isaacs as CDS was the breaking news on TV, his office chosen and rehearsals carried out for his appointment. The screens then went blank; the CDS disappeared into oblivion. It was not until the Naresh Chandra Task Force (NCTF) was set up in 2011 that the CDS was resurrected from among 97 recommendations made by the Task Force.

Defence Minister AK Antony, influenced by the bureaucracy, refused to approve the appointment of the CDS. By the end of September 2012, the MoD had accepted all the NCTF recommendations except two: Integration of the MoD and IDS; and the appointment of Permanent Chairman Chiefs of Staff Committee in lieu of CDS.

Of the three Defence Ministers appointed by this Government (Arun Jaitley twice holding additional charge of defence) only Manohar Parrikar was seriously working towards the CDS. He announced half a dozen times that a CDS will happen — in six months time.

With the CDS missing, without a genuinely integrated Inter Services Staff and several recommendations of the GoM not implemented, erecting a new defence planning architecture is creating another organisation on a weak platform. Without foundational reforms — missing CDS and no integration for jointness in planning structures — the DPC will be like a house of cards. Previously, the Government had tried working at National Security Council (NSC), National Security Advisory Board  (NSAB), and other ad hoc committees. The versatile and immortal Governor of Jammu & Kashmir, NN Vohra, has suggested a Ministry for National Security but India never produced a single worthwhile document on security and defence strategy.

But the reincarnated DPC is meant to be a permanent body consisting of the three Service Chiefs (one of whom is rotating chairman of CoSC) Secretaries of Defence, Foreign Affairs and Expenditure. The chief of IDS is member secretary who will service the DPC. IDS currently has five departments — Doctrine, Organisation and Training; Perspective Plans and Force Structures; Intelligence; Operations; and Medical. Because it is not fully staffed, does not have anyone from the Ministry of External Affairs, for example, and other expertise, there are holes in its output.

In April 2017, the IDS produced the joint doctrine of the Indian Armed Forces which was a very shoddy work and was criticised by the strategic community. Missing was the concept of jointness, joint war fighting capability and interoperability. Till some of the basic shortcomings of jointness and integration are rectified through joint commands, truly integrated headquarters and the CDS, the DPC will make no substantial difference to the existing outcomes. In the IDS, operations are planned and fought single service and separate defence plans are merely stitched together.

Almost similar to the IDS, the DPC has four subcommittees: Policy and Strategy; Planning and Capability Development; Defence Diplomacy and Defence Manufacturing. The last two would have been in IDS had the Ministry of External Affairs and Defence Research and Development Organisation initially posted their officers instead of keeping these slots vacant. The DPC will produce position papers which the MoD and IDS do today and forward them to the Raksha Mantri (RM). In other words, NSA will report to the RM. How all this will sharpen defence planning and capability building is hard to visualise. This one extra layer of bureaucracy of very busy bureaucrats will in no way catalyse strategic processes and tactical procedures as long as strategic political guidance is absent. The RM’s operational directive is currently written by the IDS and not the CCS or NSC.

Thus, the left arm does not know what the right arm is doing as illustrated by the establishment of yet another advisory panel for RM. A 13-member committee has been formed to explore why procurement procedures on capital projects exceeding five billion rupees face long delays. Ironically, principal resistance to its formation has come from MoD. The RM should also task the panel to investigate why modernisation funds, meagre as they are, are usually not utilised in full, usually for reasons of financial expediency — balancing the fiscal deficit.

The truth about higher defence management, defence planning and capacity building is the surfeit of ad hocism. Prime Minister Modi ordering 36 Rafale instead of allowing the fruition of the 126 Rafale aircraft deal, is a classic example. As long as the Government does not traverse the established planning processes, starting with a National Strategic Defence and Security Review, followed by building requisite military capability — which has never been done — Governments will indulge in bouts of tinkering and tampering as has been the practice excluding the KRC report. Even a White Paper on defence has never been attempted. The NSAB and IDS were  asked to draft a National Security Strategy. The UK last carried out its SDSR in 2011 and keeps updating it along with periodic military capability review.

A Defence Planning Staff was established in 1985 with hands on involvement of service chiefs and the defence Minister in systematising defence planning and higher defence management. It wrote the first ever 15-year Long Term Integrated Defence Plan which was recognised in Parliament. DPS was the harbinger of jointness and integration — with it morphing into IDS, but with jointness absent. The muddle-headedness will continue with NSA replacing Defence Secretary as virtual CDS. What is really needed is the revival of the Cabinet Committee on Defence. In many ways, The DPC is too little too late and akin to the Government’s charade of the latest RFI for 110 fighter jets. The missing defence reforms have to be forced top down, overruling the babucracy.

(The writer was founder member of the Defence Planning Staff which is today the Integrated Defence Staff)

Writer: Ashok K Mehta

Courtesy: The Pioneer