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Terror and
justice Red beacon
for VIPs? |
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The
curse of two-thirds majority
Caught
in bumper-to-bumper traffic
Clear
advice from service chiefs missing
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Red beacon for VIPs? After
much sound and fury what the Supreme Court has delivered on the use of red beacons falls below expectations. At least two Supreme Court judges — Justices G.S. Singhvi and Gyan Sudha Misra — and former Solicitor General Harish Salve had expressed their displeasure over traffic curbs during VIP visits and consequent inconvenience to citizens, excessive police deployment for VIP security and an indiscriminate use of the red beacon. At times traffic restrictions, it has been seen, endanger the lives of injured or sick people on way to hospital. The court had raised valid questions: “How many people de facto use red light on their vehicles? Why do you only issue challan to those using it unlawfully and not confiscate their vehicles? What purpose do red lights actually serve if they are not a status symbol?” After such strong views, the court has only agreed to limit the use of red lights and sirens. Instead of allowing 27 categories of dignitaries holding constitutional posts at the Central level and their counterparts at the state level, thereby legitimising VIP culture, the court should have restricted this special facility enabling a preferential right of way to those providing emergency services like ambulances, fire engines and police vehicles. The judges of the Supreme Court and high courts, at least those who are opposed to VIP culture in principle, can set an example by voluntarily giving up such status symbols. Their words carry less weight if they criticise the annoying practices followed by those in the executive, while themselves enjoying some of the benefits extended to them. The executive is unlikely to outlaw such privileges which burden the exchequer and irritate citizens. Since policemen are generally scared of stopping a vehicle with a red beacon, the unauthorised use of the red beacon will continue. Even criminals take advantage of it. The colonial practices, which have aroused much public aversion, are here to continue, it seems.
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I know I am getting better at golf because I am hitting fewer spectators. — Gerald R. Ford
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Todar Mull’s statue
In his report for 1912-13 Pandit H. Krishna Sastri, Assistant Archaeological Superintendent for Epigraphy, Madras, tells us that “Sketches were prepared of the busts of copper statues of the famous Indian financier, Todar Mull, and his two wives……. These, as in the case of the statues of Krishnaraya and Venkatapati Raja, bear on their right shoulders in Nagari and Telugu characters the name of Todar Mull, his two wives Mata Mohanadevi and Pita Bibi and his proper name Lala Khemram.” Pandit Krishna Sastri stops short of explaining how the statues of Todar Mull and his two wives found their way to Tirupati. The information may be useful to the great financier's descendants in the Punjab and to students of history in Northern India. Another protest meeting in Bombay
We are very glad that another monster meeting was held at Bombay to protest against the cruel restrictions placed against Indians in South Africa. The facts that the Sheriff of Bombay convened the meeting, that H. H. the Aga Khan presided over it, that several Europeans were present and took an active part in it and that a large sum of money was subscribed-all show the absolute unanimity and the deep sense of insult felt by the people of Bombay and equally shared by the people of all India. This is a question on which not only are all Indians unanimous, but even the Government fully share the indignation of the people. Except a few Anglo-Indian papers whose opposition to Indian interests is undisguised in all things, India with one voice protest against the wrongs inflicted on loyal and peace-loving Indian subjects of His Imperial Majesty in South Africa.
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The curse of two-thirds majority
NOW that the excitement over our own elections in four north Indian states — in which the Congress, ruling at the Centre, was routed, especially in the national capital — has started to wane, it is time to spare a thought for Bangladesh, the crisis-prone eastern neighbour which is once again in the grip of a grim crisis, ironically, over elections. Currently, governed by Sheikh Hasina's Awami League, that country is scheduled to elect its next President as early as on January 5, 2014. But what it is going through is not vigorous electioneering but virulent political violence resulting in deaths and destruction on a large scale. This is happening because the principal opposition party, Bangladesh National Party (BNP), headed by Sheikh Hasina's arch rival, Begum Khaleda Zia, and its main ally, the extremist Jammat-e-Islami have boycotted the poll. In short, the “battling Begums”, who have alternated as Prime Minister over the last two decades, are back to their old ways of settling scores on the street by brute force rather than in Parliament through democratic means. To make matters worse, the Jatiya Party, Bangladesh’s third largest, led by a former military dictator, Hussain Muhammed Ershad, and, ironically, Sheikh Hasina’s key ally hitherto, has also joined the boycott. India’s distress over this state of affairs was conveyed to both the Begums only the other day by Foreign Secretary Sujatha Singh during a two-day official visit to Dhaka. She stated publicly that, as a “fellow democracy”, India wanted Bangladesh elections to be “free, fair and acceptable”. But this appeal hasn't had any effect, at least so far. Both the old adversaries are sticking inflexibly to their respective stands. Sheikh Hasina wants to go ahead with the election as scheduled even though, as a seasoned leader, she knows that what has become a one-horse race would have neither credibility nor legitimacy. On her part, Begum Zia is convinced that she can mobilise enough muscle power to wreck the elections. An envoy of the United Nations is camping in the Bangladesh capital in the hope of bringing about a settlement between the two old adversaries but the time is running out. My purpose here is not to speculate about what might happen in Bangladesh between now and January 5 but to explore why Sheikh Hasina, a leader respected for her liberal and secular approach as well as wisdom, has acted the way she has and lost much of her immense popularity. For, she has used her two-thirds majority in Parliament to amend the constitution and eliminate a wholesome provision that had ensured the fairness of elections since 1996. The wholesome provision that has been done away with required that before every election the government should cede power to a neutral administration, something which even Pakistan respected during its recent poll. Sheikh Hasina has opted instead for an all-party government, headed by her, which other parties have understandably rejected. A large number of people who have no sympathy for Begum Zia agree with her that the Prime Minister has dug up the level-playing field to her advantage. What an irony it is that Begum Zia, whose record when in power was uniformly appalling, is now able to claim the moral high ground! There are two other reasons for the erosion of Sheikh Hasina’s popularity. First, Bangladesh’s lucrative garments industry flourishes because workers are forced to labour through day and night in heavily dilapidated, multi-storey buildings. Many of them have either collapsed or caught fire, killing innocent workers, mostly women. Secondly, Begum Zia’s party has been able to convince sections of the population that death sentences awarded to several Jamaat-e-Islami leaders for their “war crimes” during the 1971 war of the country's liberation were, in fact, acts of vendetta and victimisation. However, the greatest damage has been done by her arbitrary amendment to the constitution. To be fair, Sheikh Hasina is not the only leader to use her huge majority in Parliament for crass-partisan purposes such as manipulation of the electoral process. In Sri Lanka President Mahinda Rajapaksa has outdone her in this dubious game. He has already pushed through constitutional amendments that have abolished limits on presidential terms and scrapped independent police and administrative commissions to concentrate power in his own hands. The judiciary he has overawed by peremptorily dismissing the Chief Justice. Buoyed by his "success" at the recent meeting of the Commonwealth heads of government in Colombo, he is now planning a major amendment to the constitution to curtail further the already limited powers of the nine provincial councils, especially those of the two councils in the north where the Tamils are in majority. This is his way to fulfil his country's commitment, dating back to 1987, to devolve more powers on the Tamil minority. It will take too much space to describe how power was misused during the long years when the Congress had a two-thirds majority in Parliament although a mention must be made of Rajiv Gandhi's disastrous decision to undo the Supreme Court's sound judgment in the Shahbano case. The irony is that even when the ruling coalition did not have the requisite majority in Parliament, the apex court's judgments were reversed through legislation whenever this suited both sides of the fence. Come to think of it, the ordinance to annul the Supreme Court’s welcome verdict heavily disqualifying convicted politicians would have sailed through but for Rahul Gandhi's eleventh-hour intervention denouncing it as a document “to be torn and thrown away”. He acted rudely and crudely but got the right thing done. An intriguing question arises. The monsoon session was a washout because of deep hostility between the two mainstream parties. What made the government sure then that it would get the two-thirds majority to get the ordinance enacted? Obviously, it knew that every party had its criminals who it had to protect. Franklin Roosevelt's doctrine of differentiating “between our sons of bitches and their sons of bitches” is followed only in “normal times”. Incidentally, misuse of huge majorities is not confined to South Asia. The same impulses are at work in Vladimir Putin's Russia and distant countries of Latin America. No wonder astute observers have started talking of the “curse of two-third majorities”.
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Caught in bumper-to-bumper traffic We met at 8 in the morning over breakfast. Each journalist was told which halls to cover, which conferences to attend. After the meeting we would all take taxis to the Pragati Maidan since parking was a nightmare. The penultimate day had been rather exhausting. By about 4 pm dark clouds rolled in, a slight drizzle started. A time to call it quits. I walked to the exit gate. There were dozens of scooter rickshaws and a few taxis. The problem was they all wanted to go home, not where I wanted to go. The drizzle got stronger, and I was out in the open. A rather elegant-looking Sardarji on the other side of Bhairon Marg waved to me. He was in a white kurta-pajama, a black sleeveless jacket, having a flowing white beard, a neat white turban. Very elegant looking for a Delhi taxi driver. “Come here!” he gesticulated. Risking life and limb, I crossed over to the other side. Bhairon Marg is a very wide divided road and traffic moves at break-neck speed. By the time I got to the taxi, the driver was holding the rear door open. I clambered in, grateful to be out of the drizzle. “Where to Sahib?” enquired the driver, a wizened old man, in a soft voice. “Defence Colony”, I said. At the Old Fort we did a left turn onto Mathura Road. The traffic was bumper to bumper. We crawled along. The rain kept up a steady drumming on the roof, the heater kept me warm. I was glad I was not in a three-wheeler. Barely a hundred meters on Mathura Road and the car following us started to blow the horn. The driver kept at it and failing to get a pass, he started to flash the head lights. An overtake was impossible, the traffic was that tight. The driver behind kept the horn blowing and lights flashing. Rather irritated at this foolish behaviour, I looked over my shoulder. The famous Mercedes star adorned the bonnet! I was even more surprised. A Merc driver should have some sense! As the road widened for the Sunder Nagar exit, the Merc overtook us from the left and squeezed ahead of us, cutting us off sharply. The driver was cool, braked hard, down shifted the gears and started to tail the Merc. “My goodness!”, I exclaimed, all that fuss just to overtake one car! “A garbage truck, Sahib! All garbage trucks drive like that!” “A garbage truck driver! That is an S-Class Mercedes. It must be worth around Rs 80 lakh!” “Ok Sahib! The car is a Mercedes but what is inside is ‘bilkul’ garbage”. Irrefutable! The wisdom of the ancients!
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Clear advice from service chiefs missing
Over
the past two decades, a growing number of former senior armed forces officers have been writing on issues relating to higher defence management. A criticism has been recurringly raised that impediments arise in functioning of the Ministry of Defence (MoD) because the civilian officers posted in the ministry exercise authority which far exceeds their mandate. In any discussion on defence management it is extremely important to note that in our democratic parliamentary framework the power lies with the elected representatives, from among whom Cabinet ministers are appointed. The ministers are responsibile for managing the affairs of their departments and decide all important matters except those which are required to be submitted to the Cabinet, Cabinet Committee on Security, Prime Minister, President or other specified authorities. The civil servants working in these departments are the tools for assisting the ministers in finalising policies and then ensuring that the same are effectively executed. Constitutional framework Some commentators allege that the role of political leaders has been hijacked by IAS
officers and what obtains in the MoD today is bureaucratic control and not civilian political
control of the military A factor which invariably came in the way of arriving at adequately prompt and satisfactory solutions in troubled times was failure to present to the Raksha Mantri clear cut options based on the advice from the Chiefs of Staff
Committee The proposal to create the post of a Chief of Defence Staff is hanging fire due to lack of
collective support by the three services and failure to secure approval for want of political consensus
The Constitution lays down the framework within which the union government and the states are required to carry out their respective responsibilities. List 1 of the 7th Schedule of the Constitution states that the union government is responsible for the “Defence of India and every part thereof”. The supreme command of the armed forces rests in the President. The responsibility for national defence vests with the Cabinet, which is discharged through the MoD that provides the policy framework for the armed forces to carry out their duties. The Raksha Mantri heads this ministry, the principal task of which is to obtain policy directions of the government on all defence and security related matters and see that these are implemented by the service headquarters and allied establishments. Further, the Government of India (Transaction of Business) Rules state that all business allotted to government departments shall be disposed off by, or under the directions of, the minister-in-charge of the department, and in each department the secretary shall be the administrative head thereof, and shall be responsible for the proper transaction of business. Thus, constitutionally, the overall responsibility for the MoD’s functioning rests entirely on the Raksha Mantri and that for ensuring the business of the Department of Defence is transacted in conformity with the Rules is vested in the defence secretary. In this context, the MoD is clearly responsible to the government for all matters relating to the defence of India and the armed forces and, further, as provided under the Defence Services Regulations, the chiefs of the three services are responsible to the President through the MoD for the command, discipline, recruitment, training, administration and preparation of war of their respective service. The civilian face of the MoD is represented by the Raksha Mantri, his junior ministerial colleagues, defence secretary and other civil servants. The structure and functioning of the MoD has undergone very significant changes after the amendment of business rules and the establishment of the Integrated Army, Navy, Air and Defence Staff Headquarters of the MoD. The Intergrated Headquarters (IHQ) are involved with policy formulation regarding the defence of India and the armed forces, and are responsible for providing executive directions in the implementation of MoD’s policies. Issues of contention A frequently voiced dissatisfaction is that the civilians posted in the MoD do not have adequate experience of working in this arena and also do not have long enough tenures to gain specialisation for effectively dealing with military matters. This perception is largely true. Perhaps only a few among them, particularly officers at joint secretary level, may have done previous stints in the defence or home ministries. As regards tenures, while the Central Secretariat Service officers may serve for long periods, the deputationist officers appointed to director and joint secretary level posts enjoy average tenures of 5 years. It is necessary to remedy this situation. Some commentators allege that the role of political leaders has been hijacked by IAS officers and what
obtains in the MoD today is “bureaucratic control and not civilian political control of the military”. It has been further argued that the civil services have succeeded in having their own way essentially because the political leadership has little or no past experience or expertise in handling defence matters, have little interest, and lack the will to support reforms in the defence management apparatus. This line of thinking is carried forward to conclude that as the MoD does not have the confidence and capability to adjudicate on the competing claim and demands made by the individual services, each service largely follows it own course. There cannot be any debate about the crucial need for the Integrated Defence Staff (IDS) to work overtime for securing a level of jointness which will enable critical inter-se prioritisation of the varied demands projected by the individual services and based thereon, to evolve a closely integrated defence plan that has a 10-15 year perspective. Some former senior officers opine that issues about civilian control have arisen essentially because successive Raksha Mantris have chosen not to exercise requisite influence and control and have been particularly amiss in never questioning the chiefs about the logic and assumptions relating to the execution of military plans, as this vital responsibility has been left entirely to the service headquarters. Operation Blue Star, Exercise Brass Tacks, Exercise Checker Board, IPKF operations in Sri Lanka and several other events are cited as examples of serious avoidable failures which happened because of the lack of clarity about the goals to be achieved and on account of major gaps in the operational plans. It is regrettable that the records relating to past operations and wars remain clothed in secrecy, having the adverse consequence of successive generations of military officers being denied the opportunity of learning from past mistakes. This issue was taken note of by the Group of Ministers on National Security and a committee set up by the Raksha Mantri in 2002 to review the publication of military histories clearly recommended that histories of the 1962, 1965 and 1971 wars be published without delay. The essence of coordination Some commentators have gone to the extent of taking the position that difficulties arise in the functioning of the MoD because Raksha Mantris do not have past exposure to military matters. This is not a well founded notion. Having faced two world wars, USA and some European nations were compelled to enfore conscription for two to three generations of their youth. Consequently, for many years, a number of ministers in these countries had earlier served in the armed forces and had been directly exposed to military functioning. Today, however, even in these countries there may now be no elected person having exposure to military service. In India, we have never had any conscription and military service is voluntary. It would, therefore, not be logical to suggest that our Raksha Mantris should necessarily have been exposed to military matters. It is disturbing to hear angry statements that the MoD has not been devoting timely attention to dealing with its tasks. During my days in the ministry I worked with eight Raksha Mantris, of whom five were the Prime Ministers, and can say without any hesitation, that even the Prime Ministers who held charge of the MoD remained most seriously concerned about national security issues while being overburdened with a horde of crisis situations on varied fronts. However, a factor which invariably came in the way of arriving at adequately prompt and satisfactory solutions, such as may have been possible in those troubled times, was our failure to present to the Raksha Mantri clear cut options based on the advice received from the Chiefs of Staff Committee (COSC). In this context it is relevant to recall the virtually established practice that the chiefs would raise no significant matters in the Raksha Mantri’s Monday morning meetings but seek to discuss substantive issues only in one-on-one meetings with him and, if possible, the Prime Minister. Whenever the chiefs met the Raksha Mantri together and presented him with even a broadly agreed approach, there was no delay in the required decisions being promptly arrived at and speedily promulgated. I would reiterate the importance of ensuring that the MoD functions on the basis of dynamic coordination between the civilian and military elements. In the late 1980s the MoD’s functioning was, among other factors, most adversely affected by a severe financial crisis in the country. Reckoning the understandable worries and tensions within the ministry, Prime Minister VP Singh, who was also the our Raksha Mantri, set up a Committee on Defence Expenditure (CDE) to review the existing defence set-up and recommend rationalisation of expenditure. I was then the defence secretary and Arun Singh, the committee’s chairman consulted me informally about the recommendations evolved by CDE. I gave him my personal opinion that while the proposal to create the proposed Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) set-up for advising the Raksha Mantri on all military matters would necessarily have to be processed for consideration at the political level, there appeared no difficulty whatsoever in implementing all other recommendations for enforcing economy, closing redundant ordnance factories, rationalising the finance wing functioning and enlarging the existing administrative and financial delegations. The COSC, after examining the CDE report, communicated that none of the committee’s recommendations would be accepted if the government did not accept the recommended restructuring of the COSC. To secure better resource management, the ministry went ahead and ordered financial delegation up to army command and equivalent, placed internal financial advisers in each service headquarters and directed several other useful changes. Revamping defence management The defence reforms process did not move much further till May 1998 when the successful nuclear tests at Pokhran catapulted India into the exclusive club of nuclear power states. This sudden development cast very high responsibility on the government, particularly the MoD, and led to the establishment of various arrangements and structures for handling strategic issues and decisions. The National Security Council was set up in November 1998 and a National Security Advisor (NSA) was appointed. Then, in summer 1999 came the Kargil War, which took the country entirely by surprise and generated grave misgivings about the failure of the defence apparatus and serious concerns about the army’s preparedness. The Kargil Review Committee (KRC) was set up to undertake a thorough review of the events leading up to the Pakistani aggression in Kargil and to recommend measures for safeguarding national security against such intrusions. The KRC report was speedily examined by a Group of Ministers (GoM) chaired by then Home Minister LK Advani. For undertaking national security reforms the GoM set up four task forces, one of which was on higher defence management. Among the foremost recommendations made was creation of the Integrated Defence Staff to improve the planning process, promote “jointness” among the armed forces and provide single point military advice to the government. While the GoM endorsed almost all the major recommendations of the task force on higher defence management, the proposal regarding the creation of a Chief of Defence Staff got involved in the lack of collective support by the three services and failed to secure approval for want of political consensus. To be concluded The writer is Governor of Jammu and Kashmir. Excerpted from the National Security Lecture -- 2013 on Civil Military Relations: Opportunities and Challenges, delivered at the United Services Institution, New Delhi
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