Pranab defends NDA govt on Kargil issue

The 1999 clashes in Kargil made a comeback in Parliament as present Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee issued a statement saying the timing of air deployment had nothing to do with escalation of casualties in the clashes, as had been alleged in a media report after an in-house army report on the war got leaked.

With this Mukherjee virtually let the previous National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government and then Defence Minister George Fernandes off the hook.

He said "the number of casualties between May 8th and May 25th (when air power was deployed) the casualties were 35, From May 26th to the end of the Kargil operation on July 26th 1999, the casualties went up to 439."

Mukherjee said the although there was an 18-day gap between the demand for the use of air power and the government's decision on it, the matter was examined in depth by the Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS). Mukherjee's statement indicated that the previous government could not be faulted on any ground in this matter.

Both Fernandes and former Finance Minister Jaswant Singh, who wears his Army tag with pride duly, thanked Mukherjee.

"By not allowing this misrepresentation of facts to perpetuate, Mukherjee has shown that the Army's morale is far above any other consideration," said Jaswant Singh.

Singh did point out that their were minor inaccuracies in Mukherjee's statement. "Air support operations had already started on May 8th for administrative and recconaisance purposes," he said. "Our helicopter was attacked in Tololing on May 12," he added.

Hardly had the previous NDA government's defence minister George Fernandes heaved a sigh of relief at being exonerated over the Kargil report by current defence minister Pranab Mukherjee, that he found himself in another fix.

Mukherjee, in a statement outside Parliament, did raise an objection to Fernandes' possession of a document restricted under the Official Secrets Act.

Fernandes said that the confidential Kargil Report was according to the report's jacket "the narration of war accounted, an encapsulated diary of war, any disclosure to unauthorised personnel will be a cognizable offence under the Official Secrets Act."

He, however, failed to mention how the document, authored by former army chief V P Malik remained in his custody even after he had demitted office.

"I was presented a signed copy of the report by the author , Chief of Army Staff Gen V P Malik, and therefore it is my personal copy," he said. However, Malik has addressed Fernandes by his post of "Raksha Mantri" and not by name, hence the ownership of the book is being called in question.

"We have copies of the book to defend the Army and ourselves from a smear campaign. This is in accordance with the oath I took when I was commissioned in the Army in 1957," said an emotional Jaswant Singh.

The issue of how a confidential defence document could remain with a member of opposition is of course something that Fernandes will have to answer.