Soldierly Silence: Is ours a Fake Democracy where Military has no Voice?

Dear Sir,
Your editorial of 12 Apr 2010 click here to read is again pillorying the Defence Services without reason. Your Editor forgot that Admiral Verma is Chairman of the Chiefs Of Staff Committee. The NDTV correspondent was interviewing him in that capacity and therefore, Adm Verma has the right to speak on behalf of the three services, in the absence of a CDS. That much for your declaring the Navy useless!

There have been any number of statements, within 24 hours, by senior police officers indicating that the unfortunate policemen did not follow the SOP. Were they being insensitive to a "bereaved and grieving" force or doing so to protect their necks. But a Service Chief saying something closer to the bone, becomes unpalatable. Double standards or is IE once again crawling before the powers which can strangle whatever squeaks that come out of it.

Your ignorant editor is not aware that the Indian army has survived any number of ambushes organised not by a rag tag rebel force but by troops equally well trained as itself.

Please do not belittle the INDIAN ARMY out of ignorance and stay away from casting baseless aspersions on the Service Chiefs. Blessed are those who know their limitations.
Lt Gen SK Bahri (Retd)
Soldierly Silence: chiefs of India's army and air force need not have weighed in on anti-Naxal operations
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Govt to recruit ex-servicemen to tackle Naxals

My Dear General SK Bahri,
This is an excellant peice of advice to the Govt click here but point is what an single honest man can do in amidst the collection of wolves who are determined to make money while in position, may be bureaucrats or ministers or MP's or MLA's.

They are all sold out to the system which is so deep rooted in corruption that any attempt to dislodge will be met with brutal attack from these very government servants or more appropriately I would say rulers of our independent country. To give a small example the rot is so deep and is evident from the simple fact you daily see on our highways in punjab may be similar in other states too, the so called TOLL tax (mind you this is in addition to the road tax we pay on our vehicles) collected on BOT roads/ bridges which have been placed within a distance of few kms goes to the pockets of CM's and his IAS stooges. It is an open secret everyone knows but nothing can be done as things are done so cleverly that the system gets bypassed. Similar is the case with all the departments of the Government may it be transport, revenue, PWD so on so forth.

The authority to counter check is also part of CM's conclave not only this the tribunals set up are also helpers to the issue of common loot. They all close their eyes. What can poor judiciary do when all the witnesses are bought by these very people so no witness hence no case and whatever is left stands dismissed---so clever a ploy to bypass the system. The beauty is same people are returned to rule us by "we the people".

Who conducts the raid to ascertain assets disproportionate to the known income of a person are also party to loot undertaken by bigwigs of the society including IAS, IPS, Allied Services, Politicians and Judiciary and in the end, who suffers is THE COMMON TAX PAYING HONEST MAN.

Therefore it is the common man who has to rise and stop the loot before it kills the nation and we will become slaves at the hands of mafia like the one surging in the hinterland of the country and if not done, soon it will over take the country like wild fire...

Now that we the veterans are all together to fight the issue of dominance by bureaucrats we should enlarge the issue to save the country from corruption by fighting the top as well as at grass root level. Let us get like- minded communities together and go ahead with common agenda.
Jai Hind
Col VJS GILL (Retd)

WHAT SHOULD THE SOLDIERS DO!
Are you thinking in terms of 1946 when the Gurkhas were ordered to open fire on the sailors of RIN who had 'mutinied', and the Gurkhas refused to do so.

I fully endorse the views of VADM Awati, except that going in for the lateral induction of ESM into CRPF etc should not be viewed as a 'price' but as a right and required step. Please also see the letter written by Lt Gen Bahri to Mr Chidambaram.

Army and IAF chiefs should put their feet firmly down and tell the netas that the armed forces will not be used for quelling internal dissidence which has turned violent totally because of inept handling by netas and civilian officials for the last many decades. It is a classic case of "Tang aamad, bajang aamad" ie woh itna tang aa gaya ke majbooran woh jang pe utar aaya!
Cdr Krishnan K Punchhi