P A G E
Wednesday, June 16, 1999
today's calendar
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E D I T O R I A L P A G E |
Wednesday, June 16, 1999 |
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No
cause for panic
NEW
ECONOMIC POLICY |
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Caught
on the backfoot in Kargil
On
resignations
The new Governor of Madras |
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No cause for panic PAKISTAN has created war hysteria among its own people and fear psychosis in Indians living in the border areas of Jammu and Kashmir, Punjab, Rajasthan and Gujarat. Its powerful electronic media can spread untruth and scare like wildfire. It is not enough to order the Indian cable operators to stop showing Pakistan Television (PTV) programmes on their networks. Radio Pakistan is spewing venom and vitriol round the clock. And there is no way to prevent any inquisitive, curious or afraid person from tuning into various radio stations in the Pakistani territory. The worst consequences of propagandist ideas, when cunningly and widely disseminated, are destabilisation of the population and demoralisation of the communities. War panic denotes a sudden overwhelming fear, with or without cause, that produces hysterical or irrational behaviour and which often spreads quickly through a group of persons, including foreign agents. By no stretch of the imagination, war has come to India yet. There are legitimate manifestations of fear in various pockets near our borders which have lost life and property during the past Pakistani invasions. It is necessary for the Government of Punjab to assure the people of the state that the Army is engaged in effectively chasing out the intruders from the Dras-Kargil-Batalik region. Pakistan's immense capacity for making mischief is widely known, but India's capability to inform the people adequately and to make them aware of the measures taken for protecting their life and limb is not public knowledge. During such times as we are passing through, the resoluteness to face any eventuality from his base should be the most vital part of the thinking of every individual. One should safeguard one's hearth and home by all means. If necessary, one can temporarily move into a place where emotional insecurity has no room. But what is being described as an "exodus" from border villages must be voluntarily and bravely contained by the people themselves. There is, however, one
essential thing to do: to put civil defence measures into
practice. These are protective steps and may be
classified into four categories: one, the measures taken
during peace time; two, the steps adopted just prior to
an actual attack; three, the action initiated during an
attack; and four, an unrelenting exercise undertaken to
provide rescue and relief following an attack. For the
peace-time category like the present one, the following
are the most important tips: revamping the strong
existing structures and making provision for shelter
within them; the construction of new shelters, including
living and working quarters; the reduction of fire
hazards by the maintenance of general cleanliness and by
the safe storage of strong combustibles; the protection
of cities by the temporary “removal” of
prominent industrial units; the reassessment of
"building codes" and of general urban planning
to incorporate such features as increase structural
safety; the fire-proofing of buildings; duplicate and
emergency public utility services; community shelters,
uncrowded streets and parks to provide firebreaks; the
stockpiling of first-aid materials and vital resources;
and the secure storage of important records. These are
conventional ideas and the basis of sound advice for the
consideration of the government as well as the people.
But there is no substitute for fearlessness and the
inter-dependence of the mutually trusting cross-sections
of society. Punjab is not at risk now. Residents of
various districts have seen and experienced wartime
crises. Faint-heartedness must be conquered by
determination and mental strength. The government should
play its due role in the fields mentioned above.
Political or bureaucratic harangues will have no effect
on the residents of the villages and towns where war
clouds are perceived as floating in. Our security is in
safe hands and the people must strengthen the will of the
soldiers fighting the battle of sovereignty in a crucial
area which has been aggressed against. |
Sharif in trouble IF reports about Mr Nawaz Sharif’s growing unpopularity in Pakistan have even an iota of truth, it is bad news for the subcontinent. The reports have dropped dark hints about the possibility of the Pakistan Prime Minister being eased out of office by the army establishment. The BBC’s special television report on his alleged acts of corruption has given an additional point to his critics. They, in any case, wanted him out for his autocratic style of functioning and the attempt to muzzle the Press. The media too has not forgiven him for the attempts to force the Jung group to follow the official line and make senior journalist Najam Sethi the target of official ire for having dared to question his policies during a seminar in Delhi. Pakistan’s economy even at the best of times was never in the pink of health. However, the well-documented BBC report on how he built his industrial empire at the expense of the country’s economy has evidently had a more damaging effect on his political rating than all the other points against him put together. The Pakistan Muslim League stormtroopers had organised nationwide celebrations when the judiciary pronounced former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, head of the rival Pakistan’s People Party, and her husband, Mr Asif Ali Zardari, guilty of the charges of corruption brought against them. But the BBC programme forced them to terminate their celebrations abruptly. The reason why Mr Nawaz
Sharif’s supporters have not dared to dismiss the
programme as politically motivated has something to do
with the credibility of the BBC among its viewers. If
anything, the charges against the Prime Minister are far
more damaging than the ones which have virtually forced
former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto not to return to
Pakistan. The reporter who investigated the charges
against Mr Nawaz Sharif for the programme called
“Correspondents Special” said that the most
sensational case involving the Pakistan Prime Minister
and his family was about the transfer of millions of
sterling pounds through fictitious bank accounts in
Pakistan in the name of the Qazi family. The
investigations revealed that the accounts had been opened
in the name of an agriculturist, Salman Zia, for
transferring the ill-gotten wealth to the accounts in
safe havens outside the country. Predictably the BBC
correspondent found the address mentioned in the account
was false. He deposited five pounds which were accepted
to indicate that the account was alive. The man who can
prove the charges was until last year number two in
Pakistan’s Federal Investigation Agency and is now
living in England following attempts on his life for
having dared to expose the dirty face of Mr Nawaz Sharif.
But will the Pakistan army, as reports suggest,actually
go to the extent of removing him for avenging the
humiliation it faced when General Jahangir Karamat was
sacked by Mr Nawaz Sharif in October last year? The
corruption charges can come handy for removing him
without inviting the ire of the people. |
Animal fat as vanaspati THE discovery of animal fat in the vanaspati imported from Nepal has not only caused a scare all over India but may also have long-term effects on the proposed free trade among the countries of the region. Some traders of the neighbouring country tried to make a quick buck perhaps without realising that this would blow up into a major issue between the two countries. Animal fats are widely used for non-edible purposes like making soaps all over the world but keeping in view the religious sentiments involved, the Indian Government does not allow tallow import at all. The use of mutton and beef tallow in vanaspati manufacture is particularly banned here. But some Nepalese traders apparently used animal tallow in place of crude palm oil because the former happens to be at least 30 per cent cheaper. Ironically, the tallow was imported from Malaysia via the Calcutta port, although it was wrongly declared to be palm oil. Since the two look almost alike, the customs officials were not able to detect the fraud. Only when the Vanaspati Manufacturers Association raised a hue and cry did the scandal come to light. On enquiry it was found that the vanaspati imported from Nepal indeed contained animal fat. As a result, the customs authorities in Calcutta have decided to test samples of each consignment from Nepal. Crude palm oil imported by Nepal will also be checked by the customs and the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence to ensure that it does not have animal tallow. But this will be easier said than done because there are so many points where leakage can take place. Naturally, it will be quite some time before the vanaspati from Nepal is able to regain consumer confidence. But the controversy has
come as a blessing in disguise for the Indian
manufacturers. They had been crying hoarse about the
uneven playing field for long without much response from
the authorities. The Nepalese vanaspati, which is cheaper
than Indian vanaspati by more than four rupees per
kilogram, has been flooding the markets in north Bengal,
north Bihar, Assam and eastern Uttar Pradesh. The
situation has turned so bad after the Indo-Nepal trade
treaty in 1997 that several vanaspati units in the
eastern region have been closed down. As they rightly
point out, an Indian manufacturer has to pay 16.75 per
cent import duty and surcharge on palmolein used for
making vanaspati while Nepal charges only 10 per cent
import duty. This duty element is also neutralised as
drawback when vanaspati is exported to India. The
situation might have continued for long had the
adulteration not come to light. Now that it has, there is
need to ensure that the imports from the neighbouring
countries not only conform to Indian food laws like the
Prevention of Food Adulteration Act but also do not choke
the Indian manufacturers. |
NEW ECONOMIC POLICY IN a developing country economic and population policies must go hand in hand, for one is closely inter-related to the other. Both production and distribution — the two main aspects of economics — influence population growth in a dynamic demographic situation whereas the very measure of any truly effective rise in production has to be in per capita terms, though the per capita measure of any production is meaningless if there is too much of distortion in the distribution of the output. But, unfortunately, the situation in India has been that its economic and population perspectives have always remained quite uncorrelated. The economic scenario of contemporary India has four clearly discernible phases. During the struggle for independence, Mahatma Gandhi gave the nation a comprehensive blueprint for our economy and future development. In brief, the Gandhian economic model envisaged village-level production and simple living. Gandhi abhorred industrialisation and greedy consumerism. It is amazing that in spite of being under foreign rule the nation had not only understood and accepted the Gandhian model but had even started practising it within the constraints of those difficult times. Gandhi did not believe in the Malthusian dictum that, if the population increase was not checked by using artificial means of contraception, the world would perish for want of food. He believed that the earth had enough for everybody’s needs. He was of the opinion that if only women could realise that they were not subordinate to men and were free, there would not remain any need for contraceptives. The problem, according to Gandhi, was that women did not resist husband when they wanted to have sex against the wishes of their wives. He was opposed to the use of any contraceptive as he considered sex without the objective of procreation harmful both for the individual and society. However, Gandhi was not — and this is very important and revealing — opposed to male sterilisation. While opposing the sterilisation of women, he said that he would not care if men, who are after all the “ackramankari”(the aggressors), got themselves sterilised voluntarily. Thus, the Gandhian model’s in-built mechanisms to forestall any population crisis are three-fold: first, consumption according to one’s needs (and not greed) and thereby promoting an equitable distribution of wealth resulting in poverty alleviation; Second, empowerment of women; and Third no “sex-violence” by men failing which voluntary sterilisation of males. With the assassination of Gandhiji in 1948, the first phase of the country’s economic developmental process ended. The architect of the second phase of India’s economic development was Jawahar Lal Nahru, who differed with Gandhi on a vital issue. Gandhi believed that the evils of industrialisation were very much intrinsic in it. But Nehru believed that industrialisation under socialistic control would be free from the harmful consequences which, according to him, were the results of the capitalistic control on industries. Therefore, Nehru took the path of industrialisation under State control. Thus the Nehruvian economic model could be characterised by two main features: (i) increase in production through industrialisation albeit mainly under State control; and (ii) distribution according to the Mahalonobisian “trickle down” process. Unfortunately, the Nehruvian model failed both on the production and distribution fronts. The failure of our public sector is all too well known. However, I believe, one of the main causes of this failure has not been properly highlighted yet. The Nehruvian mode of production failed in India because of a serious psychological reason. Gandhi had the most profound and deep-rooted influence on the Indian masses and their psyche. He called industrialisation exploitative and hence sinful, and this had gone deep into the Indian psyche. So, when Nehru took this “sinful” path of industrialisation, the nation’s heart and soul were not with him even though the nation loved Nehru profoundly. Like Gandhi, Nehru also differed with Malthus but for different reasons. Nehru, after the Marxist fashion, believed that population was an asset for a nation. But Nehru had nothing against contraceptives; rather he approved of them as any other invention of science. Family planning was acceptable to him as a matter of individual option and not as a Malthusian necessity. No wonder, India’s population increased from 36 crores in 1951 to 55 crores in 1971, and was still growing at a staggering rate of 2.24 per cent per year. Indira Gandhi initiated the third phase of India’s economic development by continuing with the Nehruvian mode of production — industrialisation under rigid government control — but made significant departures from the Nehru model in its distribution aspect as symbolised by her slogan “Garibi Hatao”. She enhanced significantly the direct subsidies to the poor. Thus the Indira economic model was both similar and dissimilar to the Nehru model. The distribution aspect of the Indira model endeared her to the masses who in return gave her rich electoral dividends. But the totally inefficient and highly corrupt mode of production with which she had opted to continue could hardly provide sufficient economic growth to remove poverty as the economic growth rate was only marginally higher than the population growth rate. By the time Indira Gandhi could consolidate her position politically and become powerful enough, India’s population had reached ominous proportions. Indira thought all that was needed to control population growth was to promote literacy and reduce the infant mortality rate. So, in spite of the fact that Indira Gandhi had no objection to the use of contraceptives like Mahatma Gandhi, and did not consider population as a national asset as Nehru did, she could not make any significant headway in controlling the population growth rate despite her concern over the rapid increase in the number of people. She did not care to formulate a national population policy. And then came the Emergency of 1975 and she pressed the panic button. The over enthusiasm to promote family planning proved counterproductive. Now started the fourth and the current phase of the Indian economy: the era of New Economic Policy (NEP). This new economic model is quite different from each of the three earlier models: it is radically different from the Gandhian model as the new model believes in full and free industrialisation with all the modern technological developments and automation; it differs from the Nehruvian model as the new model rejects the policy of State control on the industrial production and again it differs from the Indira model by renouncing the policies of subsidies. But the NEP is beset with several challenges such as those of sick public sector units, loss making State Electricity Boards, State Transport Corporations, etc, and that of the subsidies which are already being given to the poor or even the non-poor. Thus it is too early to assess the suitability or otherwise of the new economic model as is being practised in India now. Nevertheless, a few observations can be made. The nation has, by and large, forgotten Gandhi and hence the new economic path that India has now taken is not likely to encounter any serious psychological impediment the Nehruvian model suffered. Secondly, the distribution aspect of the new economic model is yet not quite clear. Needless to say, in a democracy like India where about 30 per cent of the people are below the poverty line, the distribution features of the economic policy will play a very significant role in its success in this country. Thirdly, the architects of the new economic policy are still in the process of formulating a compatible population policy. Two commissions — one headed by Mr K. Karunakaran and the other chaired by Dr M.S. Swaminathan — have already submitted their reports. But, unfortunately, Parliament has not yet been able to formulate a population policy despite the warnings that India’s population is going to become about 126 crore by the year 2016 when it would still be growing at the rate of 1.4 per cent per year. A sure way of defeating
the new economic policy is to keep it bereft of a
compatible and complementary population policy. And an
incompatible combination of economic and population
policies will surely prove to be disastrous for India,
which is fast heading towards a Malthusian crisis. |
Kargil in historical
perspective THE action against the Pakistani mischief in the Kargil area has now been going on for many days. According to reports, a certain degree of success has been achieved in the combined Army and IAF operations to evict the intruders. There are claims of heavy casualties to the intruders and this is certainly within the realms of probability. It is sure, however, that the Indian Army has also suffered fairly heavy casualties. The fact that regular Pakistan army personnel are involved along with some militants is now well established. It is said that there has been a big intelligence lapse in not getting to know the intrusion earlier. It further appears that some of the Indian posts were vacated due to heavy snowfall which could well have been a yearly feature and thus known to Pakistan, which took advantage of this and occupied some of them before the time of the Indian return to the posts. This is a case of not learning lessons from such lapses in the past. In December, 1948, during the J and K war, Haji Pir was in the occupation of Indian troops. When there was heavy snowfall, the post was vacated, only to be occupied by Pakistan before the ceasefire. This was the major route used for infiltration by militants from Pakistan prior to the 1965 war. Haji Pir was captured by a very gallant action of the Indian Paras during this war, but only to be lost again due to political decisions. Certain posts overlooking the road to Ladakh were also captured by Indian troops only to be handed back on political grounds. With the success of the Indian security forces to almost stop infiltration in other parts of J and K, it was obvious that the northern areas could be the next target. This sector now holds the maximum scope for Pakistani mischief. India has been caught in a strategic ambush by Pakistan. The action in the Kargil area is taking a heavy toll in all respects and showing deficiencies in advance thinking, planning and action in time. Not only has India been reactive on the military front, thanks to the policies of the government, but also its public relations efforts are shoddy and late. Pakistan keeps harping that India is not implementing the UN resolution on Kashmir, but it is not reminded of the fact that it is Pakistan which has not fulfilled the laid-down conditions: its troops are yet to withdraw from the occupied territory, it has handed over some area of the state to China and that the areas of Gilgit, etc, have been taken out of the occupied territory limits. In any case, the conditions now are no longer as those prevailing 50 years ago. Over a period of time, given the firmness of the present government —not really caretaker but a fully functioning one — the intrusions into the Kargil sector will be cleared. But this will not be the end of such mischief by Pakistan. Some means will have to be evolved to prevent such happenings in future and get almost immediate information. There are, of course, many sources available to India for this. The occupation of forward posts along the LoC, no matter how difficult and expensive, is one of them. It needs to be remembered, however, that defensive operations in mountains absorb endless number of troops. It is far better that the opponent is made to suffer from this by posing threats in diverse sectors and thus keeping him tied down and also apprehensive. Patrolling in the mountainous terrain is a very difficult and time-consuming operation. Over a period of time, maintaining alertness becomes a problem. It is not understood why our own satellites are not used for this purpose by having one of them pass over the required area and send back photos at regular intervals. None of these, however, will solve the basic problem which is political. No amount of military force can solve such problems. It can only create fleeting opportunities for timely and correct political input. What, then, are the options open to India? The first one is the supine one of continuing the way events are taking place now and trying to face Pakistani actions as they occur. A purely reactive action with the initiative with Pakistan. This means continuing casualties and lurching from one crisis to another. This is a process of being bled continuously without any adverse implications to Pakistan. This certainly is not an option to adopt. The next one is to become proactive. We claim that the entire J&K is part of India. Give this content. Start pinpricks in various sectors and make Pakistan react. If any area is captured, refuse to return it as it is a process of freeing the territory that is part of India. In this the possibility of war cannot be ruled out with all its attendant ramifications — nuclear capabilities and foreign intervention. But the problem, hopefully, would be solved once and for all. It must be admitted that neither country has the power to wrest the rest of the J&K state from the other. The Kashmir problem would not have been there if the voluntary offer of a plebiscite had not been made by Nehru, the case not referred to the UN, and also if the ceasefire had not been accepted till the entire territory was cleared. In the case of the border with China it needs to be remembered that even the British had not demarcated any fixed border but only a certain line had been suggested. However, India, while laying its claim to the border, went beyond this line. The situation inherited by India was thus fluid and needed deeper thought and analysis before laying claim to any particular line as the border. (The author is a
retired Brigadier.) |
On
resignations RESIGNATION is the most dominant word today. Mrs Sonia Gandhi resigned in a huff; and some of her followers, whatever may be their other inadequacies, then proved how good they are in emulating the action of the leader by filing their resignations too. It is another matter that later all of them withdrew their letters. How seriously shall we take the resignations? Then the eminent columnist, RGK, comes to my help: Some politicians make a pretence of retiring. They say goodbye to everybody, take one step, two steps, guardedly, then turn back to see if someone is in pursuit of them, crying, “Please don’t go. Please don’t retire.” “All right,” they reply. “If the people want me, I’ll stay. But on one condition. I must have a free hand. My only wish is to serve the people.” I do not know whether RGK came up with this gem of wisdom after watching repeated threats of resignation by Pandit Nehru. Hugh Sidey’s article in Time magazine(6-4-81) comes to my mind. The threat of resignation is about the only weapon that disgruntled top officials possess. (In the American system, the top officials are politicians.) The threat does not always work very well around the White House ... FDR’s Secretary of Interior, Harold Ickes used to send in his resignation periodically. Ickes never expected it to be accepted; and Roosevelt understand that the threat was a kind of body language of power. He would bring Ickes to the White House for warmth and flattery and, thus renewed, Ickes would go back to his tasks, one of which was being Roosevelt’s lightning rod. Resignation would be forgotten until next time. After Roosevelt’s death, the Secretary delivered his umpteenth offer of resignation. Harry Truman did not speak the same language. He took Ickes at his word. Goodbye, Ickes. Hugh Sidey adds: Henry Kissinger raised the threat to a real art. In 1971, when a leak of secret transcripts disclosed the White House tilt towards Pakistan, in its war with India over independence for Bangladesh, Kissinger was mortified. He never intended to resign, but he sent the signals out through his elaborate network of foreign policy friends. A resounding vote of confidence came quietly back. It shored him up spiritually and also with Nixon’s White House. The technique Kissinger used finds an obtuse reference from RGK: Executives, journalists and others regard themselves as priceless possessions of their employers and hope that their threat of resignation would be greeted with the offer of promotion. These gems of thought on resignation lead us to the golden rule: Resign if you are sure it won’t be accepted. Otherwise, DON’T. May be all those who
file their resignations know that they won’t be
allowed to quit. That is where the cheer springs from. |
Caught on the backfoot in Kargil SARTAJ Aziz’s visit to China (June 11), the Jaswant-Aziz talks (June 12), and the Indian Foreign Minister’s visit to Beijing, have all ended on a predictable pattern and note. With India and Pakistan telling China their side of the story, and little of consequence emerging from the Aziz-Jaswant talks, with the former wishing to internationalise the whole of Jammu and Kashmir, and the latter localising the Kargil conflict. In between all this, the return of six mutilated bodies of Indian soldiers at Post No. 43 near Kargil, has sent a wave of shock and anger all over the country. That on a purely, simple and straightforward bilateral issue, as the unwanted intrusions into Kargil, (and which should have been the concern of only India and Pakistan), we have to now see the looming shadow of a powerful intermediary in China, should in itself make us sit back and think, whether our foreign policy nuances and thrusts are in the right position. With the military position in Kargil still in a state of flux, with many of the intruders holed up still on Indian soil, Mr Aziz’s visit to China just a day before his talks with his Indian counterpart in New Delhi, has also come as a kind of a diplomatic embarrassment for us, no matter how we cloak our words. A China sensitive to India, would not have accepted such a visit. As regards Jaswant Singh’s parleys with his counterpart in Beijing, it has to be remembered that at present our problem is on the aggression across the LoC in Kargil, (no other sector on the LoC in J&K has been yet violated mercifully), and not the McMahon Line in the North-East, where there is total calm at the moment. China’s interest and role in the clashes in Kargil, should be kept to the bare minimum, with a message preferably akin to that of the USA who has very firmly opined that the intruders must first fall back to their side of the LoC, emanating from that country. That kind of assurance, however, has not as yet come to us from China, and neither is it likely to, in the foreseeable future. Diplomatically and strategically, Pakistan wishes to internationalise the situation on the LoC in the whole of J&K (which includes Ladakh, Kargil being one of its districts) and ask for a larger role for the UN and its peace-keeping forces in the region, with the UNIMOGIP military observer group playing a major role. They would wish for this super-imposition now at this stage, when the intruders are in adverse occupation of our territory, and when the “factual position” of the exact alignment of the LoC on the ground, has been altered and disturbed in many places. Any peace talks, with anyone anywhere in the world, (and much less Pakistan), would not only be counter-productive at this stage, but also slow down the military and air initiatives now halfway through, with the surgical ground actions and air strikes beginning to tell. As is by now well known in knowledgeable defence circles, the eviction of the intruders in this very inhospitable and difficult terrain, after an obvious intelligence and command failure, (our military commanders pinpointed and reacted too late to the infiltration and intrusion), at various levels and in many organisations, all points to a long haul ahead for our troops. Mountains eat up men as they say, and warfare at those dizzy heights is very time-consuming and laborious. Any tendency in asking for quick decisive military results within telescoped timeframes, should be best avoided. Still on the diplomatic front, the foreign Military Attaches and emissaries have to be convinced by our boys in the MEA, that the LoC that we see now, came about from the Simla Accord, (when the maps of the area were delineated, authenticated, and marked for possession by India and Pakistan), and before that, from the UN-sponsored Agreement of July 29, 1949, when both sides accepted the ceasefire line or CFL, as the present line of control was then known. After the 1971 Indo-Pak war, there has been no major border incident of any kind in Kargil, this in itself providing ample evidence that the LoC herein in this sector, was accepted and well-recognised by Pakistan. Their intention now to bring the war into the otherwise dormant Ladakh sector, and evident designs to interdict permanently the single road artery Srinagar-Kargil-Leh is ominous in many ways. India must never permit the cutting off of this line of communication, for on it depends the entire logistics of our forward postures facing both Pakistan and China. The world community must be educated too about the role of the mercenaries which includes the Taliban as reported in the Press, and the dangers of a violent conflagration between two nuclear powers. A military reversal in the “near conventional” war now under way in Kargil as Lieut-General H.M. Khanna, the Northern Army Commander, put it, could pave the way for a potential tactical nuclear mis-adventure from across the border, which then would be very difficult to subdue or stop from spreading. Quite regrettably our National Security Council, NSC, which should have been debating on this and other allied issues, finds itself in a state of inertia and complacency, with little to show in the way of policy papers or planning directives, which would have helped the MOD and the Service Headquarters at this stage. This writer has said before, that the composition and output of the NSC leaves much room for improvement. Even now it is not too late to refurbish it afresh, with competent military professionals. Even the foreign publicity on the conflict has not been well handled. Initially the MOD briefings to the Indian and world press saw a constant change in its spokespersons, and later on the Foreign Ministry spokesman appears to have completely overtaken the defence spokesman, while the fighting is still in progress. It would have been better to start with one or the other, and then stick to either the MOD or the MEA spokesmen throughout this crisis. Junior officers in any service can never be as experienced as their seniors, and in any case, the frequent changes in our spokespersons sent out wrong signals, as if the land and the air operations had not been going on as per design. On the military plane, there can be no compromises on a few issues. One. On all of the LoC from the Jammu-Sialkot border in the south to Siachen in the north right up to the glacial wastes, there can now be no let-up in our intelligence, and no infiltration, (much less an intrusion), can be permitted by the armed and para-military forces. Two. We have to urgently find ways and means of creating parallel and additional lines of communication, basically roads and diversions, so as to ensure that our logistic build-up is never hampered in the event of the Srinagar-Leh road being made non-operational, due to enemy action or sabotage. Three. The infantry soldier now fighting it out on the icy heights of Batalik and elsewhere needs to be equipped with Night Vision Devices (NVDs), so that he can be more operational for the battle at night, which is increasingly becoming the norm, since the lack of cover often precludes operations and attacks by day, for our troops who have to fight uphill to take on the intruders dug-in on the mountain tops. Four. And this is not going to be very palatable or welcome. Hereafter, the Indian Army and all those placed under its command, would have to keep occupied, (and not vacate), certain crucial heights on likely ingress routes, even during the height of the winter, and as is now being affected in Siachen. Even the reoccupation of our posts must be carried out well before all the snows have melted, so as not to be caught by surprise by the other side, as now appears to have been the case. There is another aspect in the realm of the organisational infrastructure that needs to be examined. Why is it that even today, we have a shortfall of nearly 13,000 officers when the crying need in every infantry battalion and regiment today, is its ‘authorised’ component of the officer cadre as opposed to the ‘hard core scales’ that many units are often operating on? This aspect needs to be rectified urgently. The career in the Army must be made very attractive, so that we have the very best, to stand sentinel on our borders. In the coming days, India must fully ‘restore’ the LoC to the original status quo that had obtained before the eruption of the current hostilities in May. Thereafter, a period of consolidation and plugging the loop-holes must begin in right earnest with the necessary counter-attack forces held close in reserve, to tilt the balance in our favour in case of another misadventure, anywhere along the LoC in J&K. Simultaneously, our diplomats and missions, must tell the world at large, in forceful terms, that it is Pakistan and not India that has transgressed into foreign territory. As for the new strategy to be followed, we should clear the LoC soonest, but definitely well before the early snows commence in end September. It must not be forgotten that it is extremely difficult to evict well-entrenched personnel from the commanding heights in winter. In the air operations too, as the weather turns inclement, (in these valleys, helicopter flying is nearly impossible after mid-day due to turbulence), more and more reliance will have to be put on the infantry to take on features with just artillery and mortar support. We would also have to in the long run, go in for more infantry recruitment from the hilly areas, so that they are more at home in fighting in the mountains, like the Pathans and others from the other side. And finally, we must all
rise and give one big salute to our Jawans who are doing
a good job against many odds. The country, to the last
man, is with you. |
The new Governor of Madras IT is but seldom that a Provincial Governor is able, by his first public utterances on the assumption of office, to raise the expectations of the people to a high pitch. The present Governor of Madras does not obviously belong to the exceptional category. There is not a word in his first speech in Madras, which was reported in these columns yesterday, which was not commonplace and which showed that His Excellency’s present outlook, at any rate, is that of the average bureaucrat in India. At a time when the whole country is thinking of self-government, he bids us expect nothing more than good government from him. When the eyes of the
whole country are fixed on the pole-star of freedom, he
bids it expect nothing but “peace and orderly
progress of the Presidency and the happiness and welfare
of all classes of her people,” every bureaucrat in
India has always professedly at heart, but which in the
present conditions are incapable of being realised by any
one who does not place the promotion of freedom in the
forefront of his programme. |
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