The confrontation between the Army Chief VK Singh and the Government ..
One really does not know what is the truth behind the age of the Army Chief, whether the year of birth is 1950 or 1951. It is also important to see that the army chiefs in the 2 neighboring nations of India and Pakistan are having a skirmish with their civilian superior agencies. However, as of now, the comparison between the 2 countries is not much of a comparison, since in Pakistan, the army chief is having a skirmish with the civilian authorities over their attempt to challenge the hegemony of the army in Pakistani affairs; in India, the army is much more controlled, with no visible action by the army to resent the control of civilians as part of the defence establishment setup.
One is pretty sure that the relationship between the army (or the other defense services) and the Government will not change, with overall civilian control remaining high. The Indian Army continues to be a disciplined force, serving under the control of the Indian Government, and no one envisages a position like what happens in Pakistan. However, there is something seriously wrong here. It has been known for some time that there has been disagreement in terms of the age of the Army Chief, and that the Army Chief remains dissatisfied with the current state of affairs.
I am no legal expert, but that does not stop people in this country from airing their opinion on an issue, so here goes. In the absence of birth certificates in the year of birth, the standard proof of age of birth is the School certificate (typically the 10th standard one). That certificate mentions the year of birth as 1951, and then there is a lot of confusion about the year of birth marked in later records. Apparently, the Government has sought legal advice from the Attorney General of India, and the AG agrees that the year of birth can be treated as 1950.
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Categories: Accountable, Army, Babudom, Congress, Controversy, India Tags: Age of Army Chief, AK Antony, Army, Army Chief, Controversy, Court case, Defense, General VK Singh, Indian Amry, Supreme Court
The mess in Kashmir, and the Government being ineffective in doing anything to counter it
The current mess in Kashmir offers no easy option for the Government in terms of how to handle the situation, and bring the overall situation to the peace that was there just a few months ago. After a long period of time, the Indian Government was feeling happy about the situation in Kashmir. Tourists were arriving in droves, the local economy was working fine, security incidents were minimum in terms of attacks by terrorists (and the casualties in terms of deaths in violent incidents as well as in cross-fire between the security forces and the terrorists was at a minimum). Further, in the overall situation, the tolerance for using terrorism as a method of furthering their goals had gone out of style, and as a result, support structure and media support for the terrorist movement in Kashmir had been drastically reduced, giving the Government a big plus. Also, local elections had been held and there was enough participation by the local electorate that a claim of electoral boycott could not be sustained.
And then, everything turned upside down. There seems to have been a new strategy in place to bring the status of Kashmir back to a boil, using the weapon a public protest. Public protests can be very difficult to handle, since you are no longer dealing with terrorists whom you can attack with the full force of security weapons, and without too many political issues. In this case, the Government is dealing with normal citizens, with young men, with women, and with many others. They pelt stones at the security forces, target individual policemen, try to burn and destroy Government institutions, and in a case of what one would think to be suicidal actions, they target the barracks and the posts of the security services. And as a result, even though the state Government has tried to restrain the security forces from harsh action, the direct attacks on the security forces have resulted in firing.
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Categories: Army, Congress, Disturbance, Emergency, J & K, Law, Police, Politics, Power Tags: Agitation, Armed Forces, Hurriyat, India, Insurrection, Kashmir, Omar Abdullah, Police, Political, Stone throwers
Armymen to be tried in civil courts for criminal offences
The military forces in India have almost a separate life with a separate code of honor and law; their life is much more controlled than the lives of ordinary civilians. As a result, they have a separate process for justice, with a separate legal system that governs them. This includes offences they commit that are normally treated as criminal offences for the normal citizens of the country such as rape, murder, theft, etc; instead, these were normally handled through the military process of court-martials where military designated justices handle these offences. This would make sense if the crime was committed at a military owned location, or at the border of the country. However, in the past, it was argued that if a soldier was on leave and then committed a crime, even this was under the jurisdiction of military justice. This was because even under casual leave, the soldier was still under the jurisdiction of the army. However, a judge of the Madras High Court has ruled that such offences can also be handled in the civilian court system (link to article):
