A national newspaper puts out an "investigative report" suggesting that a former Army chief, through intelligence funds available to his organisation, was party to money being made available to various people in Jammu and Kashmir, including a minister in the present state government, with the ostensible objective of ensuring "peace and stability" in that state. The recipients say that no such money was received; General V K Singh says that such compensations, or investments as some might call it, have been the fashion in the Army ever since 1947. One side says that these "revelations" have seriously compromised efforts made over decades to "normalise" the situation in Jammu and Kashmir and have given a stick to Pakistan with which to beat us. The other says this is mere government propaganda directed at the closeness being shown between the former Army chief and the main Opposition party. The editor-in-chief of the offending daily gets castigated in assorted blogs. In all this mud-slinging, the real issues involved are being glossed over.
First, all three military forces - the army, the navy and the air force - of every country have departments of intelligence. Some of their functions are related to protocol and interaction with foreign military attaches stationed in their respective countries; others relate to acquisition of military intelligence through their own attaches stationed in countries around the world or through "other sources". This is a legitimate function. For these purposes, they are provided with "funds" that are perceived to be unaccountable but actually are supervised and scrutinised at high levels. It is obvious that in most countries, certainly ours, the bulk of such funding, for good reason, is the preserve of the army. It is not anyone's case that these funds are sometimes not misused, largely for entertainment expenses incurred by the highest in the military hierarchies for presentations and entertainment during their visits abroad or for extending hospitality to visiting counterparts - but the extent of such spending is not huge. What is, however, certainly true is that they cannot and should not, legitimately, be used to suborn or seduce political persons or parties within our own country for any purpose whatsoever. So, when General Singh says that this has been happening ever since 1947, it is absolutely essential that the veracity of this assertion should be established and his credibility, or the lack of it, be made public. This is no secret matter, but one that can have potentially grave consequences for our polity and the entire democratic system. All political parties should come together on this matter because they are all trying to consolidate what the claim, if true, is trying to demolish. A closed-door enquiry, at an appropriately high level, is necessary.
The next issue is that of appropriate conduct by people who have served the government in high office, civil or military. Once retired, it is their right to seek political engagement and act towards that end. We have many examples of people who have done so in other democracies. The United States is the most visible example; it has produced several retired military men as secretaries of state - George Marshall, Alexander Haig and Colin Powell, to name only three. David Petraeus became head of the Central Intelligence Agency and James Jones a national security adviser, and one, Eisenhower, stood for and was elected president. All of them had served full and distinguished careers in the military. In our own country, Major Jaswant Singh left the Army prematurely and, in his political incarnation, rose to be a minister in the National Democratic Alliance government, holding charge, at different times, of the finance, external affairs and defence portfolios. Without being in active politics, former Army chief Shankar Roy Chowdhury served as member of the Rajya Sabha, elected to his seat from West Bengal. There have been others who have had chequered careers but their right to pursue a political career is a fundamental one. The bottom line, however, is different: in the pursuit of their new chosen vocation, they should not - must not - bring into play issues connected with the period in which they were in office, especially if they wore the country's uniform and held high and responsible positions. If they do this, they violate not just the oath of the offices they held, but also every single tenet of "good order and military discipline" by which they lived and conducted their affairs while in service and held others, subordinate to them, accountable. Sadly, General Singh seems to have come close to doing so, if not having done that already. By any standards, including those he applied to others in earlier years, he is accountable.
It is a matter of great satisfaction that many former military men who have held the highest positions, including those of the service chief, have publicly rejected the insinuations made by General Singh that the Army has been in the business of "consorting" with politicians and suborning them as it considered necessary or desirable. As for the "veterans", my plea to them is that they should follow their political leanings, join their parties of choice and seek office themselves or for others by canvassing or voting as provided under our Constitution. Most US military men in the US, serving or retired, are sympathetic to the more conservative Republican Party and, many of them, vote for that party's candidates. There would be nothing untoward if some of our own serving and retired categories do the same, as, indeed, they have been doing or continue to do. But to project a picture, as seems to be the case, in and by the media and on the internet that the ex-servicemen community stands behind one party or another is clearly rubbish. Fortunately, despite their conformist nature through their careers, they are quite an independent breed of people and to brand them as a group might well be counterproductive and unwise. That independence, not some shady "payments" made here and there, is the strength of India's democracy.
The writer is a former commander-in-chief of the Navy's Eastern Naval Command
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