Pragmatic Euphony  

If the IAF is feeling the pinch by deploying four MI-17 helicopters for providing logistics support to anti-Maoist operations, it must withdraw the 17 helicopters deployed on UN peacekeeping missions in Africa first.

Indian Air Force[IAF] wants to withdraw its helicopters deployed for providing logistics support to the state and central police forces engaged in anti-Maoist operations. Out of its inventory of 200 MI-17 helicopters, four helicopters are deployed for the anti-Maoist operations. The reason behind this proposal:

A top IAF officer told HT, “We are hamstrung by inadequate resources. We have diverted helicopters to support anti-Naxal operations at the cost of training and air maintenance operations. It’s about time that the BSF steps into our shoes.”[HT]

While it is understandable to expect the BSF Air Wing to shoulder the responsibilities of internal security operations, the top IAF officer is only proffering a part of the whole truth. Besides helicopters on training and air maintenance operations, IAF has also deployed seventeen MI-17 helicopters [and eight attack helicopters] in two UN peacekeeping missions, in Congo and Sudan. It defies all logic then for the IAF to press for withdrawal of helicopters deployed in the Maoist-affected areas before withdrawing those with the UN peacekeeping missions in far-away Africa. Somewhere along the way, the Indian defence services seem to have lost track of the fact that their own priorities must always remain subservient to the larger national interest.

And just for the record, IAF has had an under-recovery of Rs 205 crore from the UN for the reimbursement of the helicopters deployed with the UN assignments between July 2003 and March 2008. Because it agreed to provide helicopters to the UN at much lower rates than its own actual cost of operation per flying hour and then forgot to revise the rates for the next three to five years, despite having signed the agreement for only one year. [2.9-I, Pages 46-47 of CAG Report No. CA 18 of 2008-09 (pdf here)]

Of course, needless to say that this fits in snugly with our long-held view at the INI that India must stop contributing its resources for UN peacekeeping missions.

A comparison with the number of senior ranks in the Israeli Defence Forces shows that Indian Army is overcrowded at the top.

In response to this Times UK article on the burgeoning number of senior officers in the British Army, KoW blog compares them to the number of senior officers in the Israeli Defence Forces.

By contrast, the Israeli Defence Forces, approximately the same size as the UK’s, appears (to judge by their ORBAT) to get by with just 40 brigadiers, and 16 generals of all types (1 Lt Gen) for all three services. How do they get by?[KoW]

It would be instructive to have a quick look at the number of senior ranks in the Indian Army in comparison.  Indian Army, by all publicly available estimates, is 12 to 14 times the size of the Israeli Defence Forces.  Indian Army, before the announcement of AVS-2 recommendations in October 2008, had 1 General, 67 Lieutenant Generals, 216 Major Generals and 866 Brigadiers. The AVS-2 recommendations have added another 20 Lieutenant Generals, 75 Major Generals and 222  Brigadiers to its rolls.

Simple arithmetic means multiplying the IDF senior ranks by 14 for a rough equivalence for the Indian Army. Although this would be a crude comparison, it would still provide an approximate idea of the overpopulation at senior levels in the Indian Army.  By applying IDF yardsticks to the Indian Army, the number of Generals should be 224 [16*14] and those of Brigadiers should be 560 [40*14]. Indian Army, in comparison, has 379 Generals [1.7 times the IDF ratio] and 1088 Brigadiers [1.95 times the IDF ratio] after implementation of the AVS-2 recommendations. Needless to say, it could certainly do with far less senior ranks. For that to happen however, our decision-makers would need to figure out that aggregated self-interest of a group of individuals serving in an organisation is not the same as organisational interest, leave alone the national interest.

This congestion at the top is exactly what former Navy Chief Admiral (Retd) Arun Prakash had warned the nation about in his piece a couple of years ago — All Chiefs and No Indians.

Fareed Zakaria advises the US to keep pressing on Pakistan.

Fareed Zakaria hails the only foreign policy success of Obama administration, Pakistan. But ends his piece with a huge warning and a friendly advice.

There are some who believe that Pakistan has changed its basic strategy and now understands that it should cut its ties to these groups altogether. Strangely this naive view is held by the U.S. military, whose top brass have spent so many hours with their counterparts in Islamabad that they’ve gone native. It’s up to Obama and his team to remind the generals that pressing Pakistan is a lot like running on a treadmill. If you stop, you move backward, and, most likely, you fall down.[Newsweek]

Today’s Ghaziabad Municipal corporation has much in common with the seventeenth century ancien régime in France.

In a piece in Foreign Affairs [subscription required], Sheri Berman wants the policymakers to look to Louis XIV and the development of France’s ancien régime for guidance while undertaking state-building in Afghanistan.

During the second half of the seventeenth century, accordingly, he and his ministers focused on buying off and winning over key individuals and social groups that might otherwise obstruct their state-building efforts.

Adapting and expanding a common practice, for example, they repeatedly sold state offices to the highest bidders; by the eighteenth century, almost all the posts in the French government were for sale, including those dealing with the administration of justice. These offices brought annual incomes, a license to extract further revenues from the population at large, and exemptions from various impositions.

The system had drawbacks in terms of technocratic effectiveness, but it also had compensating benefits for the crown: selling off public posts was an easy way to raise money and helped turn members of the gentry and the emerging bourgeoisie into officeholders.[Foreign Affairs]

But they are already following this approach at Ghaziabad Municipal Corporation in Uttar Pradesh, if Dilip Cheriyan’s piece in the Deccan Chronicle is to be trusted.

Municipal authorities in Ghaziabad, near Delhi, may have found the answer to an ancient riddle: how to make babus work efficiently. For suddenly the municipal corporation is awash in funds, from revenues collected by its army of babus. Apparently, the Ghaziabad Municipal Corporation earned Rs 121 crores in revenues in the current fiscal year — the highest collection in its history.

But more than the increased revenue, what is truly surprising is how the much-maligned babus are behind this remarkable turnaround in the municipality’s fortunes. In fact, the learning may be of some interest to management and administration gurus! Last year the municipal authorities decided to offer plum postings to its tax inspectors through a bidding process. The babus were invited to choose the postings they wanted, and in most cases were granted their request. The babus are now working hard to meet their collection targets and ensure that they retain their plum posting, according to A.S. Pandey, municipal commissioner. Those who miss their targets are likely to face departmental action while those who perform can look forward to out-of-turn promotions, even those who are facing departmental inquiries for previous alleged misdemeanours.[Deccan Chronicle]

History is repeating itself, that is, French history of the seventeenth century is repeating itself in twenty-first century India. And you thought that erecting your own statues at state’s expense, followed by raising a special police force to protect them, was the lowliest of it all.

One can only wish that Ms Mayawati had read her Thucydides: History is Philosophy teaching by examples. Or maybe she has!

India is ideally suited to provide the military trainers that NATO needs in Afghanistan.

Afghanistan needs more military trainers — NATO has been able to provide only 541 out of 1278 trainers needed for the growing Afghan Army and Police forces — and they aren’t getting them from anywhere. Pakistan has been rather keen to provide the trainers, but NATO has been guarded in its reactions to the Pakistani proposal. And there are valid reasons for that reluctance.

The issue of regional sensitivities has been mentioned by the NATO Senior Civilian Representative in Afghanistan upfront as the primary reason for their disinclination. In any case, Pakistan has favoured only one tribe, the Pashtuns, in Afghanistan and played them up against all the other tribes in that country. This, coupled with its continued support to the Afghan Taliban, has severely damaged Pakistan’s credibility among the Afghans. Moreover Pakistan army, despite all its claims to professionalism, has never been part of a real democracy and doesn’t understand the basic dynamics of a healthy civil-military relationship. A fledgling democracy like Afghanistan can ill-afford an example like Pakistan when it comes to the critical democratic principle of civilian control of the military. In addition, Afghanistan army and police forces have to be trained to fight  against Taliban, al Qaeda and other jehadis who are waging their war in the name of Islam against the Karzai government. Pakistan army, when asking its troops to fight the co-religionist jehadis on its own land, has often used the subterfuge of Pakistani Taliban being part of a Hindu-Zionist-Christian conspiracy hatched by RAW, Mossad and CIA who are hell-bent on destroying the Islamic republic of Pakistan. Can such an army ever be trusted to train the Afghan National Army?

In contrast, India suffers from none of these disadvantages. It has a professional armed force, which has been always subservient to the civilians, and which understands the constraints of operating in a vibrant democracy. Indian armed forces also possess the rich experience of conducting counter-insurgency campaigns in diverse social settings in various regions of the country, where successful security operations have often culminated in political negotiations for lasting peace. Moreover India, and Indians, have historically enjoyed a favourable reputation in Afghanistan, which has been further enhanced by India’s liberal economic and developmental assistance to the war-torn country since 2001.

But is the NATO asking India for its military trainers in Afghanistan? Going by the evidence so far, No. NATO’s anticipation of Pakistani objections to Indian involvement in military training in Afghanistan is perhaps holding it back.

Is Indian government offering its military trainers to NATO for Afghanistan? Nothing in the public domain suggests so. Perhaps, the belief that India can achieve its aims in Afghanistan by shovels alone is preventing the government from making that offer.

It is in the mutual interest of both the parties to overcome their doubts and start cooperating in Afghanistan. The earlier they do it, the better it is — for Afghanistan, for the region, and for exterminating the jehadi threat emanating from the region.

By Fourth Eye.

[The Guest blogger, Fourth Eye is a retired Indian Air Force officer, who holds a postgraduate degree in Operations Research from a foreign university. He has undertaken many studies on the subject while serving with the Indian Air Force. This is his response to the blogpost here on the way we allocate our defence budget.]

I agree with you that incremental budgeting (resources allocation) process fails to account for changing threat/security scenario. The implicit assumption in our planning is what was performed so far will be continued to be done in the same manner as before. Such budgeting has little relevance to any long term planning (if at all it was done) based on assessed threat or/and changes in technology. Such method of allocation of resources is very simple to perform and there is no need for complex analysis and making hard choices in an environment of change.

My question is “what is new now”? We are doing this type of incremental planning for more that twenty years. Nobody, including the many famous commentators inthe media, have raised any query at any time over this method of allocation of defence resources, among many competing needs. All the ills that we hear now about a poorly equipped Army without proper mix of ground based Artillery or an Armoured Corps without night fighting capability, an Air Force with out proper mix of strike Aircraft and poor Air Defence, and a Navy depleted due to inadequate submarine capability are the effects of an incremental approach to resources allocation. Only movement that we see northwards every year is in respect of Revenue Expenditure. There is always a scramble to spend at the last moment (December and January of every year) in Service Headquarters so that they do not miss out on more allocation in the next year’s budget.

All these big talks at Service Headquarters about threat evaluation, mission based planning to counter such threats, evaluating different alternatives and selection of Weapon Systems based on a Cost-Benefit Calculus have no meaning if we were to consider the actual results of such planning on the ground.

Defence Planning at the strategic level starts with complete understanding of our strategic goals and political objectives. I have seen reports recently that such strategic policy guidance has not been received yet by the LTIPP (2007-2022) planners to carry out any threat evaluation and mission based planning. In the absence of such guidance, one cannot imagine how our forces can be re-structured to meet our strategic objectives. No wonder, the long term plan has not seen the light of the day. Therefore, the easy and painless way to do this is by “incremental planning and budgeting”. During the last seven years there has been no procurement of any major weapon system through an open competitive tender system. All procurement has been through Government to Government transactions. Also remember that the last major exercise of restructuring our forces was carried out after we were squarely overpowered by the Chinese during the 1962 war.

Subsequent to this exercise, we are only carrying out incremental planning and budgeting. Often we were told in the early years as an excuse that we were short of required resources. Further there was a single supplier situation where we were forced to buy from Russia only. The whole planning exercise ended in substituting one piece of hardware with another later piece of hardware that was available with Russians, whenever we were forced to discard the obsolescent piece. We had made this type of force planning and re-equipment as an art because nobody asked relevant questions either in the Parliament or in the media.

Our potential enemy across our western borders has at least done better in planning under difficult circumstances. That country faced its worst defeat in Bangladesh war. They lost major part of their nation in a matter of ten days. Reality dawned on their defence planners as they realised that they can never win a conventional war against better equipped and trained India. First, they decided to go nuclear to ensure safety of their nation by nuclear deterrence. Second, they decided to plan to inflict ‘thousand cuts’ on the enemy through an irregular/asymmetrical war using ‘non-state actors’ sponsored, financed and trained to carry out terrorist acts in J&K and other parts of India by their own army and intelligence agencies. Perhaps, in their assessment, we are a ’soft state’ in managing our internal security. By making as many policy charges as needed, they also received doles by countries like USA and Saudi Arabia for re-equipping their forces for a conventional war against India, if it is thrust upon them. Ground results show that, in the short term, they have managed to survive in spite of a large number of constraints. Perhaps, in the long run, they will be consumed by the same monster that they have reared.

On our side, we had the sorry spectacle during the Kargil war where one of the Chiefs mentioned that he was handicapped due to lack of a suitable weapon to take upon targets on top of the Himalayan ranges and they were forced to innovate one of the existing weapon systems to engage the targets. Whose responsibility is to plan for procuring such a weapon system especially when we know very well that we faced a threat across the mountains? Incremental planning perhaps is to be blamed for such lapses. We hear many stories in the war in Afghanistan and Iraq about the effectiveness of UAVs & drones against terrorist hide outs. We have a known terrorist threat across our border. How many squadrons of drones do we have in our armoury to counter such threats? Incremental planning and budgeting is to be blamed. Our present focus is to procure a Multi-role fighter aircraft and every thing else is pushed to the back burner. How will we then, re-structure our forces as a “balanced force”?

The basic aspect of force structure planning is to look at the “margin” and ask relevant questions. We hear every day that Indian Air Force requires 39 operational squadrons. I do not find any body questioning the Defence Planners “why 39? why not 40? Or why not 38?”. Let us hear the justification from the Indian Air Force. One decides or designs weapon mixes and forces by their marginal effectiveness and marginal costs. That only will indicate the optimum point in the force effectiveness curve. All these are jargon to our defence planners.

We are stuck up with Incremental Planning because we do not know of any other way of doing defence planning. Constantly changing security environment demands innovative ideas of defence planning. What do we find in practice? More of the same old stuff. Sadly.

Only one reason — ensure the security and well-being of its citizens, thereby providing them with a better life.

Amidst all the hype over Indian involvement in Afghanistan and lamentations over declining India influence in that country, here is a quick check of the possible reasons that drive India’s continued interest in Afghanistan.

Let us start with the ridiculous one first. India is coveting Afghan natural resources to fuel its economic growth and thus it seeks a presence in Afghanistan. But Afghanistan is not rich in minerals, oil or other natural resources. What the heck, even Bangladesh has more natural gas reserves than Afghanistan and it is far closer to India and far less turbulent than Afghanistan.

Next is the belief that altruistic motives such as India’s historical relations with Afghanistan, promotion of democracy in Afghanistan and well-being of Afghan nationals drive India’s engagement with Afghanistan. India has far deeper historical relations with Indonesia, Myanmar closer home can surely do with some democracy and there are enough Indians whose well-being should be a higher priority for the Indian government. Indian foreign policy has never, not even in Nehru’s time, been driven by idealism. And it is no different today.

Now the outrageous one: the enemy’s view, repeated ad nauseam in the Pakistani media. India wants to create its strategic outpost in Afghanistan to encircle Pakistan and foment trouble inside Pakistan. But except for Rehman Malik’s bombastic pronouncements, not an iota of proof of an Indian hand has been presented so far by Pakistan. Moreover, India doesn’t need to go to Afghanistan — spend billions of dollars and lose Indian lives — to merely foment trouble inside Pakistan. It can very well do it from the Indian mainland with far lesser commitment of resources.

This argument, however, is bound to leave many people unconvinced and needs a little more deliberation. Many in India wish for a tit-for-tat policy of a Battle of thousand cuts against Pakistan now, reminiscing for the days when India retaliated to Pakistan’s fomentation of the Khalistan movement by paying Pakistan back in the same coin. But the situation in the 1980s was different: Pakistan wasn’t a nuclear power then, the jehadis were not threatening the existence of the Pakistani state, and India and Pakistan were poised geo-politically by the rivalries of the Cold War era. Today India cannot afford to trigger a condition that further destabilises Pakistan because a nuclear-armed, imploding Pakistan — teeming with jehadis and a radicalised army — is the last thing India would wish for on its western borders.

Finally, the idea that India is maintaining a presence in Afghanistan to deny strategic depth to Pakistan in case of a conventional war. Sounds good, especially when General Kayani spouts it so nonchalantly in front of the international media. But Pakistan is a declared nuclear power and the flexibility of its nuclear threshold provides Pakistan as much strategic depth as it desires, both in time and space. If there is no need for Pakistan to have that fig leaf of strategic depth in Afghanistan, then the question of India denying it the same in Afghanistan does not even arise.

Does that mean that India has no reason to stay engaged in Afghanistan and should completely pull out from there? No. On the contrary, there is a very valid reason for India to enhance its commitments in Afghanistan. India has to ensure the security and well-being of its citizens, thereby providing them with a better life. If India has to secure a better life for its population in the coming years, it urgently needs to log double digit growth rates consistently. A better security environment in the country, starting from and including the state of Jammu & Kashmir, is an essential precondition for achieving those growth rates.

Our experience of last two decades clearly shows that the trajectory of jehadi violence in India, and particularly in Jammu & Kashmir, is inextricably linked to the political and security situation in Afghanistan. The exit of the Soviets from Afghanistan coincided with the rise of militancy in J&K in 1989, and the sustained high level of violence by foreign terrorists in J&K — and terror strikes in other parts of the country — coincided with the Taliban’s reign in Kabul in the 1990s. The decline in violence and the return of normalcy to J&K occurred after 2001, when the US & NATO forces had displaced the Taliban regime in Kabul. With the perceptions of a US pull-out from Afghanistan gaining ground after President Obama’s announcement of a new AfPak policy, the recent attempts by Pakistan to send highly-trained terrorist teams and to fund organised stone-pelting in Kashmir valley reaffirms that connection between Afghanistan and J&K.

The increased threat of jehadi strikes has not been restricted only to Jammu & Kashmir but has impacted the whole country, as evident from the terror cloud hovering over various sporting events being organised in India. This kind of security situation, with adverse travel advisories issued by most western countries, dents India’s image as a rising economic power and makes it an unattractive business destination.

Thus India has no option but to do all it can to deny the Taliban and other jehadis a stable base in Afghanistan. Unfortunately, India cannot do that by shovels alone.

Incremental budgeting for defence expenditure by the government demolishes all talk of budgeting based on capability-based, long-term integrated defence planning.

Amidst all the pretentious talk about LTIPP (2007-2022), five-year defence plans, forward planning, capability based restructuring and more such gibberish  put forth by the defence services, defence ministry and myriad strategic commentators on allocations for the defence budget, the facts speak for themselves — and speak to the contrary. The government of India has already decided the yardsticks for preparing the defence budget for next few years, both under the revenue and the capital expenditure heads. Not surprisingly, it prefers simple incremental budgeting — a linear graph irrespective of the changing nature of threats, or our responses to those challenges. In this regard, the Report of the Thirteenth Finance Commission [pdf here] makes  for a very interesting and educative read.

For defence expenditure, the Ministry of Finance has projected a growth rate of 7 per cent per annum for defence revenue expenditure. Capital expenditure is projected to grow at 10 percent per annum. The Ministry of Defence has emphasised the need to provide adequately for enhanced force multipliers. We also recognise the need to provide for some real growth in defence revenue expenditure, to allow for adequate depreciation and maintenance. We are of the view that the Finance Ministry’s projections address these needs and have, therefore, adopted them. The resultant projection for the overall annual growth rate of defence expenditure works out to 8.33 per cent. [Paragraph 6.27 of the Report of the Thirteenth Finance Commission]

Based on this assessment and inputs from the Ministries of defence and finance, the Commission has made certain projections for the defence budget, both under the revenue and the capital expenditure heads [Annexure 6.3 of the Report]. For the year 2009-10, it had estimated that the defence expenditure would come down from the BE [Budgetary Estimates at the beginning of the financial year] of 141,703 crore to 128,792 crore in the RE [Revised Estimates close to the end of the financial year] stage, with all the savings coming from the revenue head (from 86,879 to 73,968 crore) and the complete capital budget (54,824 crore) being expended.

Now anyone — however buoyant with optimism — who has even cursorily glanced at the past records of Indian defence expenditure would dare to make such a claim. No surprises then that what turned out finally at the RE stage was an increase of  1,779 crore in the revenue budget and a reduction of 7,000 crore  in the capital expenditure budget for 2009-10. Consequently, the revenue estimates for 2010-2011 presented by the finance minister last week bear little resemblance to the figures projected in the finance commission’s report — 87,344 crore has been budgeted against the commission’s projection of 79,146 crore. To keep up the pretences, the finance minister has budgeted 60,000 crore against the commission’s projection of 60,306 crore for the capital portion of the defence budget. Based on past experience, one can be reasonably certain that a fair share of this estimated capital expenditure will be returned to government coffers and some more reappropriated to the revenue head. And the skewed nature of India’s defence spending will continue unabated for a few more years to come.

But what is the conclusion to be drawn from this sermon filled with data and bureaucratic terminology? Simply that the problem with the Indian defence budget is not really about how we spend the money, but it is how we allocate it.

Defence economics, anyone?

On the Tharoor controversy.

In response to the earlier blogpost on the controversy surrounding Mr. Shashi Tharoor’s ‘interlocutor’ statement in Riyadh, Ms. Suhasini Haider, Dy. Foreign Editor [CNN-IBN] replies.

Dear Pragmatic,

Permit me to suggest that you may be guilty of precisely the kind of ‘callousness and disdain’ you accuse me of in your article “A Manufactured Controversy”, re: the comments of the Minister of State for External Affairs Shashi Tharoor in Riyadh.

My own tweet that you have reproduced in the article was suggesting, in what I admit was a somewhat tongue-in-cheek manner, that perhaps Mr. Tharoor was a victim of the fact that his comments came on a Sunday, when newsrooms are understaffed, especially as it also came in the middle of the Holi weekend.

It also referred to the fact that any senior journalist covering the MEA beat would be able to tell you that regardless of the dictionary meanings and context of Mr. Tharoor’s remarks, India would not be announcing such a significant departure from enshrined policy of “no 3rd-party mediation’ right in the middle of such an important State visit. Mr. Tharoor’s command over the language, of which I am an admirer, is too well known for anyone to question his ability to use the appropriate word.

Incidentally, I plead guilty to having been on leave that day myself, but when I was called by the CNN-IBN newsdesk and apprised of the story- gave them the same inference, asking them to use only the exact quote and byte we had, and referring to the controversy that ensued. A few hours later, when the MEA spokesperson reverted back to me with Mr. Tharoor’s clarification of his comments, we reflected that as well. I am sure you would not hold us responsible for what other channels chose to do with the story.

My rejoinder tweet requires no explanation, and I have no quarrel with you choosing to portray my ‘smiley’ as ‘patronising’. What I do object to is your portrayal of me as someone who ‘reeks of unbridled power’. I think that is unfair, as also the idea that I think of bloggers as ‘petty’. I presume you say this because you see me as a TV journalist, and on the other side of some virtual divide- but let me assure you of my web-credentials- as a reporter for rediff.com (1997-1999), a web-contributor to CNN.com (1999-2004) and as a regular blogger on the ibnlive.com website since 2005.

I apologise for the length of this rejoinder, since clearly it would never fit on our regular 140-character exchange on Twitter, but I would be grateful if you could publish it in its entirety, and with the same prominence you gave to what you may now find was an erroneous understanding of my tweet on the matter.

Sincerely etc.

In this debate over building police capacity, quality is as important, if not more, than the quantity.

In the aftermath of the massacre of ill-trained and poorly-equipped policemen in West Bengal by the Maoists, Saikat Datta of the Outlook magazine unravels the depth of the crisis engulfing the Indian police forces. And Saikat does it by referring to a government document — a CAG report of last year on the subject.

Vinod Rai, the Comptroller & Auditor General of India, was so disturbed by his department’s findings that he shot off a letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh last year. Rai pointed out how “most police stations continue to depend on outdated and obsolete weapons, the police communication network was non-functional, the mobility of the force had been ignored and there was a severe shortage of police personnel in most states”.

He also pointed out that states like Jharkhand, West Bengal, Bihar and Orissa have been the worst performers when it came to filling up police vacancies. Orissa, which has borne its fair share of Maoist violence, has nearly 10,000 vacancies for policemen. Even if this shortfall were to be made up, the state lacks adequate training facilities to keep the men in shape. In Bihar, a mere “10 per cent of the total force” was trained in one training centre. The “training infrastructure was inadequate in the training schools”, the CAG noted. In his letter to the prime minister, Rai pointed out “there was a severe shortage of police personnel in all the categories in the state”. Even the available force, Rai said, “is not being trained at regular intervals as per Bureau of Police Research & Development norms, which inhibits them from tackling security-related incidents effectively”.[Outlook]

In a rather convoluted way, the rising power of the Maoists would have done this country a great favour if their ferocious assault against the state can help usher in a modern police force suited to a modern India. This is the debate — on how to create a modern police force amidst the burgeoning Maoist threat — this country needs today. The biggest security and governance challenge facing India now is of kick-starting police reforms.

Police in India — from the colonial pre-independence era — have been seen as a coercive instrument of the state rather than as public servants upholding, and bound by, the rule of law. This view has been exacerbated in Maoist-affected areas due to the ongoing violent conflict. Upholding the rule of law is a challenge in highly developed countries with well-educated professional police. Yet, somehow, when it comes to the Maoists, the poorly educated and minimally trained state police forces are expected to uphold the rule of law in regions afflicted with violence, poverty and political effeteness. Not surprisingly, the police fail ingloriously and suffer at the hands of the Maoists.

The expedient solution for the government then is to raise more central paramilitary forces and pump them into these troubled areas. If the centre is slightly reticent in sending paramilitary forces, the states ape the centre’s model by raising their own specialist police forces or pushing in reserve police forces into these areas.

However it is the civil police that will have to be the lynchpin of any successful counter-Maoist campaign. The local ties of the civil police provide intelligence and facilitate the development of symbiotic relationships between the community and the government, something not possible with the reserve police or the paramilitary forces, which have been brought in from outside the community.

Notwithstanding the constraints of a pan-India operational doctrine or a grand strategy, each state has to tailor its security operations against the Maoists to the local environment. As India’s successful experience of eradicating militancy in Punjab — where the state police were the key to defeating the Khalistani terrorists in the state’s critical rural periphery — demonstrates, the civil police deserve to be the major focus of our efforts against the Maoists.

However the reason for modernising the police must go beyond countering the threat of the Maoists. And it must also go well beyond the latest fad of just building up the numbers anyhow. The vast majority of the existing police force in India is perceived to be incompetent and corrupt; police reforms are thus a must concurrent to, if not prior to, expanding the police force. If efforts and resources are dedicated solely to expanding the police force, fewer will be available to reform the existing police. Even worse, putting more police into a corrupt and ineffective system will only breed more corrupt and ineffective police. The system has to be fixed immediately, or this expansion may end up doing more harm than good.

When it comes to expanding the police, quality is equally — perhaps even more — important than quantity.

Those who speak most of progress measure it by quantity and not by quality. ~George Santayana

P.S. — It irks this blogger no end that the CAG report referred to in the Outlook report is not available online — neither on the CAG nor on the MHA website. In today’s time and age of viral transmission and proliferation via social media, it is almost mandatory on the government to place such reports in the public domain. This is all the more incomprehensible when increased transparency in governance is the order of the day and the Union Home Minister has himself been rather open and forthcoming about the accountability of his ministry.

Incidentally, the website of the Bureau of Police Research and Development [BPRD] has the reports of all the police commissions and a resource page on police reforms. Kudos to them.

On the diabolical role of certain sections of electronic media in the latest Tharoor controversy.

Another public statement by Shashi Tharoor and another controversy. So what’s new with that? It is easy to dismiss that off with a shrug and get back to watching that heady cocktail of Bollywood, cricketers [its not about the sport any more, but only the stars], horrors of jehadi terror, saturated coverage of the union budget for days culminating in an overdose of stuffed nonsense on the budget day, and shrill studio debates which, at the end, leave you little wiser about the subject. Welcome to the world of Indian television news. And this excludes stations like India TV and Aaj Tak, which are not worth wasting your breath over, unless you are suffering from jetlag like GreatBong.

Incidentally the above description of Indian news television has been drawn from the blogposts [here and here] by two TV reporters themselves. And we are not even venturing into that apperceptive — and accusatory — piece by P Sainath in the Hindu, which has gone unanswered by otherwise so-prone-to-feign-indignation star editors and editor-cum-owners of the Indian news television houses.

Just a quick recap of what happened earlier today. In response to a question on whether India will seek Saudi Arabia’s support to influence Pakistan to address India’s concerns over terrorism emanating from Pakistani territory, Minister of state for external affairs Shashi Tharoor, as part of the Indian PM’s delegation to Saudi Arabia said:

We feel Saudi Arabia has a long and close relationship with Pakistan and that makes Saudi a more valuable interlocutor to us.[TOI]

The statement was unequivocal, on-the-record, captured by the TV cameras and accurately tweeted by ANI News editor  Ms. Smita Prakash. A little discussion on the subject took place on twitter between Smita, Acorn, Offstumped, Filter Coffee, and this blogger, which resulted in a blogpost on the subject by The Acorn. Attempts to search the above quote and related news item on the web met with no success for a couple of hours after that.

By late in the afternoon, the Indian TV news stations woke up from their Sunday slumber and flashing tickers on TV screens said that Tharoor had asked for Saudi mediation with Pakistan. More amazingly, TV news stations played the video clip of Tharoor making the statement and followed up the clip with newsreaders interchangeably using the words like interlocution, mediation and intervention in their commentary. English news channel editors are supposed to possess a decent knowledge of the language to not make such basic errors. Even if they don’t, a quick glance through a good dictionary or a Wiki search on the internet would have explained the meaning of interlocutor to the editors.  Perhaps, as someone suggested, this being a Holi weekend, editors were on leave, leaving this to rookie interns. More on that weekend thing later.

If one reads it carefully, this is not really a path-breaking statement. Even if one were to read signs of a tactical shift in India’s position on bilateral nature of disputes with Pakistan, it nowhere — by any stretch of imagination — calls for a mediation or intervention. It merely suggests that India is asking Saudi Arabia to use its influence over Pakistan so that India and its citizens are better protected from the jehadi terror emanating from Pakistan. They say it is a dramatic shift without looking back at the active interest displayed by the US [interlocution, mediation, intervention, interference... take your pick here] to bring the Kargil conflict to an end in 1999 and then to stall the military stand-off between India and Pakistan in the wake of the attack on the Indian Parliament. The Acorn explains the geo-political context in which this is a realistic option for India today; although other analysts and media houses are free to disagree with the proposition and criticise it vehemently. What they are not free to do though is twist the statement to suit their argument and create a controversy that harms the national interest.

That bring us to the real issue under the scanner. It is not about Shashi Tharoor or the choice of English words. It is about the nature of some media houses in this country to feed off manufactured controversies to sustain their TRPs. National interest be damned.

The callous and disdainful attitude of the electronic media is best exemplified by this twitter conversation between Suhasini Haidar, Deputy Foreign Affairs Editor of CNN-IBN and The Acorn. First, the tweets from Suhasini.

suhasinih Methinks the articulation of interlocution may have been particularly badly timed….on a long news-free holi weekend.

suhasinih Or maybe we say it like it is….that India wd love for US, China and Saudi to intervene on OUR behalf with Pak. But nt the other way around

suhasinih Anyway Tharoor has now clarified….

Here is Nitin Pai’s reply.

acorn @suhasinih It is shameful that media decided to misrepresent a nuanced point @shashitharoor made, because it was a news-free holi weekend

acorn Good people of India beware, the TV media has a long news-free weekend!

And here comes the killer patronising line, with a smiley in tow, from Suhasini against the other media [i.e. bloggers and twitter users]

suhasinih @acorn also beware of media that blames media rather than gov

And finally, Nitin again.

acorn @suhasinih We do need media to keep media on the ball. Government is checked by opposition, media & punished by public. Not so for media

It was more surprising because Suhasini, in her media pieces and social media interactions, comes out as one of the more sensible and down-to-earth journalists on Indian television. One can then well imagine the attitude of those starry TV news editors that populate and shine on the Indian news channels.

It is difficult to digest the patronising  and dismissive tone which reeks of unbridled power — We make the rules, we decide how it is done, we know best,  how dare these petty bloggers correct us or point out the facts to us? And finally, we give a damn.

There were even more cynical responses from the media fraternity. Mr Tharoor has again created a controversy to stay in the news. Well, one may disagree with Mr Tharoor and his conduct or views but to bring it down to the level of a personal vendetta campaign is rather disagreeable. Personal attacks are just not done, whether on a politician or on a journalist.

A related argument is that why can’t Mr. Tharoor be like other politicians and keep quiet. This actually seems to be the whole agenda of this campaign to create controversies around Mr. Tharoor and diss him in the public domain. Certain sections of the electronic media are so rooted in their old ways that they don’t want our ministers to directly talk to the people, and talk a lot more at that. Rather than report that accurately, they want to continue with the old-style nexus between certain journalists and ministers. These ministers will either provide leaks attributable to sources within the government or interviews to favoured news channels, resulting in exclusives. Once the government becomes more transparent and accessible to all in its direct communications, these journalists and media houses will lose this exclusivity and the business their channels derive from that nexus, and consequent exclusivity.

This is not a rant against a particular journalist or a media house or in favour of one smart politician. This is not even about bloggers versus mainstream media. That’s an old story played many times over. This is about the role and responsibility, or lack of it, amidst sections of the Indian mainstream media, especially those broadcasting in the English language on television. If they claim to hold a mirror to all the other sections of the society, they must learn to hold a mirror to themselves. Else it will hurt them badly when active sections of the society, or even the government, are forced to hold a mirror to them and their ugly reflection is out in the open. They won’t certainly want that to happen. Nor does the nation.

Update [03 March] — Here is the response from Ms. Suhasini Haider.

A correction. 36.6 percent of allocations for new defence acquisitions has been returned unexpended this year.

Indian Express report quoted by this blog yesterday was slightly off the mark. It assumed that all the money — Rs 5221 crore — being returned out of the defence budget of 2009-10 was from the capital expenditure account.  After the presentation of the budget today, it turns out that 7000 crore has been returned unexpended from the capital defence expenditure account, out of which 5221 crore has been returned to the government coffers and the balance 1779 crore re-appropriated towards revenue expenditure account of the defence budget.

So what does it mean in plain English? It means that the defence ministry [which includes the three service headquarters] was unable to spend 7000 crore out of an allocation of 19118.74 crore for new defence acquisitions in the current year. This is the real figure — 36.6%.

Just for the record, the corresponding figure for the preceding year, i.e. 2008-09 was 38.1%.

Rejoice, for St. Antony’s ministry was able to spend 1.5% more of new defence acquisitions allocation this year compared to the previous one. At this rate of progress, it is just a small matter of 25 years before the defence ministry starts spending all the money within that year. Like this blogger, aren’t you eagerly looking forward to union budget of 2035-36 then?

Only 27 percent of budget earmarked for new defence acquisitions has been returned unutilised this year, compared to 38 percent last year.

In the financial year 2008-09, the defence ministry had surrendered 38 percent of its budget earmarked for new defence acquisitions — 7482.35 out of 19636.2 crore. This year, the plan till January was to surrender 9149 crore out of an allocation of 19118.74 crore for new defence acquisitions, a whopping 47.85 percent. But “last-minute interventions at the highest levels and sealing of hardware deals” have brought this figure down to 5221 crore — 27.3 percent of money allocated for new acquisitions out of defence budget has been surrendered this year.

Although 27.3 percent is bad, it is still better than 38 percent. But then you are left wondering if all this fuss about unexpended defence budget is really worth it when outlays don’t necessarily get translated into outcomes.

The biggest service that Mr. Antony can do to national security is resign as the defence minister.

Congress MP and spokesperson, Manish Tewari’s recent piece suggesting that the defence ministry has not done enough to strengthen national security — though written in his personal capacity — has suddenly put the defence minister, AK Antony in the media spotlight. First off the block was Aditi Phadnis, who penned a column that was part-critical and part-defending of his actions in the Business Standard. That was followed by Suman Sharma ripping Mr. Antony apart [HT: Filter Coffee] in a very scathing appraisal of his performance till date. Now, we have John Elliott joining in [HT: Rajeev Mantri] to suggest that it is time for Mr. Antony and the Prime Minister to wake up and smell the coffee when it comes to defence preparedness.

But the most substantive and hard-hitting criticism of Mr. Antony as the defence minister comes from Ajai Shukla in the Business Standard. The piece is worth reading in full but here is an extract.

Here’s how it adds up. Antony’s obsessive quest for unblemished weapons procurement has delayed the acquisition of artillery and anti-aircraft guns, fighters, submarines, night fighting gear and a host of equipment upgrades. With arms inflation at 15 per cent per annum, a five-year delay means that India pays twice what it should have. And when that equipment is obtained through government-to-government purchases and other single-vendor contracts, the cost is about 25 per cent more than it would have been in competitive bidding. Conservatively estimating that delays afflict just half of the defence ministry’s Rs 50,000 crore procurement budget, India buys Rs 25,000 crore worth of weaponry for 125 per cent more than what it should have paid.

Over and above that figure is the cost to national prestige and the devaluation of India’s military deterrent when — as in the wake of the 26/11 terror strikes in Mumbai — India’s armed forces are unprepared for immediate strikes. That happened on Antony’s watch.

To inconvenient questions about procurement delays, Antony declares that “India is a democracy” and “we have to ensure full transparency”. Point out to him that many democracies manage timely procurement in a transparent manner, and you will get a patronising, “Don’t worry, we are doing all that is necessary to safeguard the security of the country.”[Business Standard]

As if almost on cue, Mr. Antony spoke at the inauguration of the 34th DRDO Directors’ Conference and blurted out the same old banalities.

We want the private sector to play a more prominent role in the defence sector. We are revising the Defence Procurement Policy. Our aim is to motivate private companies to invest more financial and human resources in R&D. However, any increased role for the private sector will not be allowed at the cost of the public sector. We want the public sector and the private sector to prosper mutually and not in isolation of each other. We will also never compromise on transparency and fairness in defence dealings.[PIB]

A friend’s appropriate, albeit clichéd, reaction summed it up all: It would be funny if it were not tragic.

Just for the record,  when Mr. Antony was reappointed the defence minister in UPA 2.0, this blog had asked him to be be radically different in this tenure. Alas, those hopes have all been dashed now.

Arjun Singh finished the HRD ministry in a blatant manner whereas Antony has done the same to defence ministry in a more discreet manner. Why a mention of AK Antony does not receive the same indignant reaction as Arjun Singh is only because of the opacity of media coverage and a lack of public knowledge on defence issues in India.[Link]

Mr. Antony didn’t even pay heed to the words of his American counterpart, Mr. Robert Gates which it seems were perhaps spoken only for him. The only way left for Mr. Antony now to redeem himself and save this nation is to resign as the defence minister. That would be his greatest contribution to the national security of this country. Harsh, but true. Unfortunately, both for Mr. Antony and the nation.

First, organised stone pelting and now, outsourced terror strikes.

Stone pelting by protesters during demonstrations is not a new thing. Over the past decades, our drawing rooms have been satiated with images beamed from all over the world — places in Europe, South East Asia, West Asia and South America easily come to the mind — where protesters have pelted stones against the security forces.  In Jammu & Kashmir,  stone pelting [kani jung in local lingo] gained popularity in the 1960s — when supporters of National Conference called sher (lions) and of the Awami Action Committee called bakra (goats) — would indulge in clashes that known as sher-bakra battles. But the recent news-reports of stone pelting in Kashmir valley have put these incidents under a sharper focus. So what is so different about stone-pelting in Kashmir valley this time around?

For one simple reason. Unlike the usual incidents of stone-pelting which are an expression of spontaneous outburst by the protesters, there is substantive evidence to prove that the latest rounds of stone-pelting in Kashmir valley are a well organised racket, a lucrative business being run at the behest of Pakistan and Pakistan-backed separatists. Having failed to reignite the fire of militancy in Kashmir valley in recent years — despite increased attempts at infiltration during the winter months from south of Pir Panjal ranges — this is indicative of a changed tactic against the security forces and the elected government of the state. Political parties like the PDP have jumped in to the fray with their voices of tacit support to stone-pelters further adding to the discomfiture of the state government. It must not, though, be forgotten that these incidents are restricted to only 8-10 police stations in the state but the extensive media coverage enhances their impact and visibility manifold.

You don’t need to be a rocket scientist to devise a counter-tactics to disrupt and degrade this menace of stone pelting. Simple actions like prompt use of non-lethal weapons, arrest of ring-leaders, jamming of mobile communication signals, close circuit cameras in affected areas, timely intelligence gathering, and community meetings with local elders on Friday mornings would go a long way in curtailing the menace. The most critical  aspect of this response is the speed at which the security forces adapt to changing tactics of the protesters. That is the key from preventing this stone-pelting business to turn into a scourge and dominate the narrative in the local media.

The state government — to be fair to it — has responded but not as nimbly as it should have. It has even declared stone-pelting as a crime amounting to waging war against the state and has started booking individuals under this charge. More interestingly, in a very astute move last year, Srinagar police chief Afadul Mujtaba had tried to thwart stone-pelting by claiming that there is a saying of the Prophet Muhammad that prohibits stone pelting. It generated a lot of debate in the Kashmiri media where some religious scholars supported him while others including the separatist leaders like Syed Ali Shah Geelani obviously expressed their disagreement. In light of the spurt in stone-pelting incidents in recent months, that debate seems to have been sealed in the favour of the separatists and the stone-pelters.

From North East to Punjab, history tells us that the Indian state eventually does find its own ways to successfully counter the separatists and their tactics. There is no reason that it is going to be any different this time around. However, that is little cause for satisfaction. The Pakistani military-jehadi complex has already moved on to a new tactics in Jammu & Kashmir: outsourcing terror strikes to freelancing terrorists still operating in the state, while various jehadi groups stake their claim for these terror incidents.

Having failed to keep the militancy in the state alive both politically and militarily, these new tactics are evidently signs of desperation from the separatists and their Pakistani backers. It can be safely assumed that they will continue to devise newer methods and tactics to confound the security forces and embarrass the state government. The  security forces and the state government will have to respond to the changed tactics adequately and in a calibrated manner; but it is the alacrity and nimbleness of the response that will remain the biggest challenge.

From Kishenji to JFK.

• Has it ever occurred to you that we gloat over the US getting its Baradar and Haqqani in Pakistan but can’t get one stupid Kishenji in our own country? While Kishenji isn’t the military supremo of the Maoists, getting him is important to correct the distorted media narrative of LWE menace in this country.
• After Congress in Andhra Pradesh and Shibu Soren in Jharkhand, Nitish Kumar is now trying out the time-tested formula of electoral success with Maoist collusion. The tacit support of Maoists sought by Nitish Kumar is reminiscent of PDP’s soft-separatist anti-India stand in Kashmir valley to get the votes of the Jamaitis and of Akalis in Punjab in the 1980s to get electoral patronage of the supporters of the Khalistan movement.
• While anti-Maoist operations in Orissa and West Bengal suffer due to lack of capacity,  it is the lack of political will that is stalling anti-Maoist operations in Jharkhand and Bihar. Anti-Maoist operations have been most successful in Chattisgarh and Andhra Pradesh due to a combination of political will and capacity accretion in the security infrastructure in those states.
• Finally, let us paraphrase JF Kennedy and remember it. We should not be afraid to negotiate with the Maoists, but let us never negotiate out of fear.

Draft Model Police Act of 2006, a part of police reforms, provided for Special Security Zones to overcome the differences between states on conducting security operations against Maoists.

Maoists are back in news again. Two dastardly attacks, one kidnapping, one Chief Minister publicly capitulating before the Maoists, another Chief Minister who publicly opposes any use of force against the Maoists and a union minister who doesn’t share the union cabinet’s convictions about Maoist menace in her state.

But the debate on the Maoist menace in this country — as has always happened earlier — will be taken over by extraneous issues: why are intellectuals supporting the Maoists; are Maoists terrorists or misguided youth; shouldn’t we have development and real democracy before security operations; let’s call the Maoists for talks first; it is Chidamabram versus Kishenji; lamentations about the poor state of our security forces; and so on. These issues are passé and need to be kept out of any debate hence forth. The government of India has already decided to conduct and facilitate security operations against the Maoists and re-establish the writ of the Indian state in the areas controlled by the Maoists. The issue to be considered now is to identify the most effective — and efficient — ways to successfully conduct these security operations. All the actions of the state — and the nation, by extension — should be aligned to break the will of the Maoists to fight. Nothing more, nothing less.

The biggest road block in such synergistic action by the country happens to be the constitutional stipulation of law and order being a state subject. As the Maoists affect the electoral outcome in these states, the elected state governments  [Congress in Andhra Pradesh earlier, JMM-BJP in Jharkhand, the NDA government in Bihar now and a prospective Trinamool-Congress government in West Bengal] are keen to emphasise their primacy in the domain of law and order to avoid any substantive security operations against the Maoists.

So what is the solution then? Ensuring that all the state governments are on the same page as the centre is one. But generating a political consensus and robust political will to act is an impossible dream in today’s India. Simply because there is little likelihood that an anti-Maoist state government would win elections in a state controlled by the Maoists (e.g. Jharkhand assembly polls in 2009).

Before we look at other solutions, let us take a short detour here. When it comes to fighting jehadi terror, it is very easy in this country to start a debate about the role of Pakistan and how India should either talk or bomb Pakistan out. Little attention though is paid in the aftermath of the terror strike to strengthening our internal security mechanisms, a process which has to start with the civil police. If this nation were to direct one-tenth of the attention and energy it devotes towards Bollywood and Cricket on to Police Reforms, India would be a far safer country today. And it would have certainly saved the lives of many more Indians than Bollywood and cricket put together have saved so far. [Note -- This blogger is not against Bollywood or Cricket, but against the disproportionately high bandwidth relative to their importance being captured by them in the national narrative.]

These police reforms are extremely important while fighting the Maoists as well. Had these reforms taken place, say in 2000, they would have obviously led to a more robust police force handling the law and order situation, including the Maoist menace, far more professionally than it does today. It doesn’t end there though. Even if the police reforms in this country were implemented sincerely after the Supreme Court decision of 2006, we would by now have a clear way to overcome the problem of different states pursuing different policies against the Maoists.

It is worth remembering that one of the important components of police reforms was the introduction of a new Model Police Act. The draft act was submitted to the government in October 2006 but is yet to see the light of the day across the country. The annual report card of the Home ministry for 2009 perfunctorily notes:

A copy of the draft Model Police Act was sent to the States for consideration and appropriate action. The Model Police Act provides for well-defined duties of the Police towards the public and accountability to the rule of law. A number of States have either framed New Police Acts or amended the existing Acts.[PIB]

That statement is typical bureaucratic obfuscation as very few states — barring those in the North East who need centre’s largesse tied to these reforms — have actually implemented it in letter and spirit. Kiran Bedi explains why passing of that model act by the states would have helped the nation unleash effective anti-Maoist operations.

I had a part in drafting the Model Police Act of 2006. it was submitted to the Government on October 30, 2006 and was chaired by Soli Sorabjee. First, it went nationwide and then to a small group. We deliberated on Chapter 11, Policing in the Context of Border and Internal Security, and I remember we deliberated on what to do? Can we go about it state-wise or can we look at it as a zone? And the suggestion was the creation of Special Security Zones (SSZ) something which Marwah also just mentioned. I am looking at the SSZ of the affected states which includes portions of West Bengal, Andhra, Bihar, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh etc., In Section 112, if the security of an area is threatened by insurgency, any terrorist or any militant activities of any organized crime groups, the Union Government may with the concurrence of the state government declare such area as a SSZ. Any such notification will be placed before appropriate legislature for ratification within six months from the date of issue or first sitting of the legislature provided further that the period of notification shall not exceed two years unless it is ratified by the Parliament with the concurrence of the state legislature. It also said that the state government shall create an appropriate police structure and a suitable command control and response system for each such special security zone.[India Today]

Police reforms, lest it be construed otherwise, are merely a start point in the whole gamut of things that need to be done to strengthen internal security. They are not a panacea to all the ills afflicting our internal security structures and processes. Lamentably, even this initial gambit of police reforms — despite the half-hearted attempts of the Supreme Court — hasn’t really moved forward in this country so far.  One of the possible ways to move forward is the GST model of bringing all the states on board.

The roll-over of police reforms remains a enormous challenge. It is a political challenge that has to be overcome forthwith if India has to be internally secure — from the threat of the jehadis or the violence of the Maoists or the hooliganism of political actors like the Shiv Sena.

One of the reasons armed forces are held to a higher standard than civil society.

Lt. General David Petraeus on learning leadership and management from business leaders:

But let me just say that at the end of the day what we do is different. And we should never lose sight of that. The responsibilities that our troopers have — where you have lieutenants and sergeants called strategic lieutenants and strategic sergeants because their tactical activities have potentially strategical effect for missions of enormous importance to our entire country, to our national security.

At the end of the day, this is also about life and death, so the premium on certain qualities in military leadership — integrity in particular — I think is very high.[WaPo]

Those harping on arcane legal aspects in the debate over what happened in Sukna land case with the Indian army should focus on just one word in the Petraeus’ statement: Integrity.

Just for the record, dictionary says integrity is “adherence to moral and ethical principles; soundness of moral character; honesty”.

India needs a holistic, well-crafted response that balances its short-term, mid-term and long-term goals vis-à-vis Pakistan.

The jehadis have struck again on the Indian mainland; this time in Pune, albeit more than a year after the horrendous terror attacks on Mumbai in November 2008. The initial response, while going with the most plausible and popular assumption that the blast was the handiwork of Pakistan based jehadi groups, is one of indignation. Perhaps understandably so as tempers are bound to run high. And this emotion is likely to be further amplified as the Indian mainstream media hyperventilates and virtually runs amok with its over the top coverage of the incident.

On the other end of the spectrum is the rather logical sounding response that India should unequivocally reaffirm its commitment to continue peace talks with Pakistan, as the sole aim of the perpetrators of this blast is to disrupt these peace talks. This response would appeal to both realists and peaceniks alike.

So what is the correct response — surgical strikes against Pakistan or talks with Pakistan come what may? The response, in the end, has to come from the government of India and it will not be easy for them to articulate one. One way of framing the desired response is by breaking it down into Indian goals in a short-term, mid-term and long-term framework.

The short-term goal of the Indian government is to assuage the hurt feelings of Indians and protect them from any terror attacks in the future. It has to also somehow convey to Pakistan that India is not willing to be pummelled by non-state actors sponsored by sections of the Pakistani establishment. But how does it do that? Indian government has not been able to figure it out for the last 25 years when the country has been prone to such terror attacks.  One of the simplest ways of conveying a message across the border is to emulate the deeds of Mossad in the UAE. Surely, it is not too much to ask of the Indian state.

In the mid-term, there is no option for India but to talk to Pakistan. This will deny Pakistan the excuse that Indian intransigence is preventing it from meeting the US goals in the region. Pakistan assumes great importance in the current US war plans which can be aptly described to be based on the hammer and anvil theory. As the US military offensive in Afghanistan moves southwards from Marja, Pakistan military will have to hold the jehadis from its side of the Durand Line. It is in India’s interest that the US strategy succeeds. India has to also continue to talk to Pakistan so that the idea that the complete region, India-Af-Pak is one single theatre, doesn’t gain ground and become accepted wisdom the world over.

When it comes to Indian long-term goals vis-à-vis Pakistan, it is a long story. To put it in a nutshell, Pakistan needs a Macarthur. Period.

If you look at the debate on the subject in this country, most of it is unbalanced and focused on only one of the above goals. This focus on only one of the goals, while completely ignoring the others, is detrimental to the national interest. However, it must be conceded that there are inherent conflicts between the three goals and balancing them simultaneously is a very tricky proposition. It presents a real challenge which the policy makers in the government of India must confront and overcome.

Some gaps in the understanding are filled, but more questions emerge.

Too many trees have been felled and much ether used to debate the Indian offer to recommence peace talks with Pakistan. Most of the sensible debate — not the jingoistic bit of how we have been shamed by Pakistan cocking a snook at us — is predicated on the Obama plan of starting the withdrawal of US-NATO forces from Afghanistan by the middle of next year. Combine this with the proposals at the London conference of buying out the Taliban and detractors of the Indian offer for talks are convinced that India has already ended up on the losing side.

While all this seems overtly true, it just might not be the complete truth — and certainly not the final truth. It is here that this piece in Indian Express by K Subrahmanyam assists us by filling in some of the blanks. He flags two important issues. First is the course of action followed by the US forces between the completion of the surge and start of the drawdown operation.

That depends on the course of the campaign the US will launch on completing the surge operation. The purpose of buying up the pseudo-Taliban is to pacify the Afghan territory as the US forces will move closer to the Durand line and intensify their attacks on the jihadis on the Pakistani side with their drones.[Indian Express]

The Time magazine story on Operation Moshatrak to capture Marja in Afghanistan further strengthens Subrahmanyam’s thesis.

If he and his forces prevail, it will serve as the template for the far more challenging battle this summer for the Taliban capital of Kandahar, about 100 miles to the east. Success in Kandahar, Afghanistan’s second largest city, would mean that McChrystal is on track to achieving Obama’s ultimate goal: to start sending U.S. troops back home in July 2011.[Time]

The second point that K Subrahmanyam notes was also pointed by this blogger earlier[here]. Let us hear it again in the words of K Subrahmanyam.

Faced with these alternatives, there is a distinct possibility of the Pakistani army getting yet another terrorist act perpetrated in India to provoke an Indian military response which can be used as an excuse to dodge responding to the US demand for action against the jihadis. …The most important issue for India today is not the purchasing campaign for the pseudo-Taliban, but how to deal with the likely Pakistani provocation to trigger an Indo-Pakistan war in order to dodge action against the jihadis.[Indian Express]

In no way can one argue that this makes an open-and-shut case for Indian offer of talks with Pakistan. This blogger is still not fully convinced of the case for talks but Mr Subrahmanyam’s piece does help us gain a better understanding of the reasons for this engagement. While concentrating on getting a better understanding of the situation is important, it is equally, if not more, important to explore and suggest ways in which India can make the best out of this engagement. That is the real challenge moving forward now.

While all this sounds fine and nice, it does leave us with a big question. Is it merely the US using India to further its goals in the region? Or is India also doing something to use the US to secure its own interests in the region? This is not a rhetorical question. Ponder.

P.S. — A couple of other related issues that must be highlighted here. They have been flagged courtesy a very vigorous email discussion with my fellow INI blogger Ananth.

One, it is now clear that the sudden surge in opinion pieces in the Indian mainstream media — albeit poorly-argued and hastily put together — asking for Indo-Pak talks was rather well-synchronised with the telephonic call made by the Indian foreign secretary to her Pakistani counterpart. It would be hard to digest that this was purely coincidental.

Two, Indian government has to handle its public diplomacy and strategic communication in a more professional manner. Although everything dealing with the nation’s diplomacy and national security can not be in the public domain — RTI or no RTI — the government owes the nation an explanation as to what prompted it to commence the talks now. A stony silence from the state is not an option in today’s time and age.