’62 war: When a DC lost confidence of the President

By Maninder Singh

India’s first Military Literature Festival just got over at Chandigarh. This seems to be one of the first of its kind anywhere in the world and if you Google for such festivals, there seem to be hardly any earlier commemoration of military literature.  In the course of various discussions during the festival, the 1962 India-China War was talked about and it set me thinking about an incident, which is little known today, but, for its time, caused a major upheaval for at least one member of the “heaven-born” civil service.

Tezpur town, district headquarters of then Darrang district in Assam, lies on the northern bank of the Brahmaputra, the red river of India’s north-east. It is a district full of tea gardens and borders the beautiful blue-green-grey hills of Arunachal Pradesh.  Senior officers of the district still live in the British-era made colonial bungalows, many of which are built upon grassy knolls, overlooking miles and miles of the eddying currents of the Amazon-like river that flows by.

Back to 1962 and down the same beautiful enchanting hills of India’s North-East Frontier Agency (NEFA) came an enemy force — the Chinese Red Army. For days, rumours had swirled about the movements of the enemy formations. As they came down after capturing Tawang, famous for its 17th century monastery, and Bomdila, the city of Tezpur lay in the path of the advancing cohorts. There, bank notes had begun to be burnt in the State Bank of India and coins were thrown into a lake, so as to avoid the possibility of any currency falling into enemy hands. 

The nomenclatures of the District Magistrate (DM), Deputy Commissioner (DC) or Collector, refer to the various roles of the personage that presides over this hoary office, rich in tradition, prestige and responsibility. The first DMs or DCs were appointed during the suzerainty of the East India Company and the districts that they commanded and governed were sometimes larger than many of today’s smaller countries.

The Deputy Commissioner of Tezpur, during the Chinese invasion, was Dr PK Das.  In the Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy of Administration at Mussoorie, there is much that is taught about the role, responsibilities and duties of the DC or DM.  When senior officers come visiting, they share vivid tales of the trials and tribulations and glories of their days as collectors.  Much may be forgotten, but the days spent as DMs are easily recalled by most officers.  

It is to the great delight of young IAS probationers, when a faculty member points out the de-jure and de-facto administrative hierarchy of the country.  In some classroom, overlooking Happy Valley, it is pointed out that you have the President and the Prime Minister at the top at the Central level followed by the Chief Minister and the Governor at the state level and, thereafter, the District Magistrate or the Deputy Commissioner at the district level.  In the district, young officers are always told that they represent the President and the government at all times, and must act accordingly. All officers of the All India Services are said to hold office during the pleasure of the President of India. What is to happen, if one was suddenly to lose that pleasure of the President?  Not many officers are likely to dwell on such pessimistic scenarios.

In Tezpur, then, amidst the gathering real and imagined news of the advance of an enemy force in October-November 1962, a large number of flights were landing and taking off from Tezpur airfield at Salonibari.  Many businessmen and civilians were in panic-driven flight to safety.  The Deputy Commissioner’s wife and family were also being flown out to Calcutta.   He went to see them off at the airport and came across the melee of teary departures of entire families, clutching whatever they could carry, fleeing from a dangerous enemy.  

Amidst the hubbub and pandemonium, the Deputy Commissioner’s wife and children were escorted to a military transport,  at that point the wife and children were all crying and entreating ‘dad’ to drop them in Calcutta and fly back.  Concern for family’s safety and a weakness towards the tearful and wailing entreaties of his family members, as well as the general sense of panic prevailing at the airport  (the Chinese army was then supposed to be not very far away from the town) made the DC commit the gravest mistake of his career.  He decided to drop them off in Calcutta and fly back by the next returning military transport.

As events turned out, that flight, carrying the Deputy Commissioner  and his family, was one of the last flights to take off from the Salomibari airfield. The Chinese forces had almost reached the outskirts of the city.  The DC, at the hour of gravest peril to the district he was sworn to protect and guard and command, had deserted his post. 

Thus it was that the DC Tezpur because the first IAS officer, in Independent India, to be dismissed from service and the tense communiqué dismissing him read that he no longer held the pleasure of the President of India.  The Chinese Red Army, as it turned out, never ever entered Tezpur town, and went back from the outskirts, probably fearful that they had gone too far inland into the Brahmaputra valley, with over-stretched logistical lines, and no doubt, scared of counter-attacks, ambushes and reprisals. And the case of the dismissing DC became a case study and a grim warning to generations of DCs and DMs.

The writer is chairman of the Chandigarh Housing Board