JFR Jacob (1923-2016): Farewell Jakes . . .

Lt Gen (Retd.) JFR Jacob (1923-2016) will long be remembered for his qualities of head and heart, the quintessential General Officer difficult to find today. 

Lt Gen JFR Jacob, former Governor Punjab and Goa, GOC in C Eastern Command and the man who played a larger than life role as Chief of Staff HQ Eastern Command during the liberation of Bangladesh, is no more. My deepest regrets at that.

Why would I, someone 32 years his junior and not even from his Arm or Regiment, be writing this ‘Remembrance’? Primarily because, he was my father’s dear colleague and friend. I spent the happiest years of my life at the Indian Army’s Defence Services Staff College (DSSC) Wellington, in 1961-63 when Gen Jacob (known as Jakes to my parents and their contemporaries in the Army’s large family) and my father were posted there as Directing Staff (DS).

Jakes (and I will affectionately continue to call him that), came from a Kolkata-based Jewish family and studied at Kurseong (Darjeeling) before signing up for the British Indian Army when he learnt of the holocaust in Europe. Having fought in North Africa and on the Burma front he was later assigned to Sumatra which is where he and my father met and became thick friends.

Being a Gunner (Artillery) he went on to do specialized gunnery courses abroad and after command of his Regiment was posted at DS DSSC. That is where I ran into him as a child. He was a bachelor and remained one all his life. He preferred to live at the Wellington Gymkhana Club (WGC) rather than the Officers Mess and was the life of the station after working hours. He would often dine at our house and raid my mother’s refrigerator at midnight whenever he was hungry. For him our house was ever open and I often stayed up at night to listen to his stories of shikar and angling. He also taught me a game called Hot Hands in which you have to strike your opponent’s hands while he tried to avoid that strike. Trips into the Nilgiris fishing spots were always a delight as there were great accompaniments of food and drink alongside the fishing gear. Jakes was posted from Wellington to Pune and that’s where we met him while my parents were proceeding on posting to Lansdowne and driving through  three fourths of India to do that. We stayed with Jakes as the RSI and dined at Dorabjees where I ate the first ‘Nan’ of my life.

Jakes went on to command the artillery and infantry brigades before he was assigned the command of 12 Infantry Division at Jodhpur in early 1967. India’s fledgling desert force was just coming into existence and he wrote the first manuals on desert warfare. In 1969, he was back to Kolkata but before that I had met him at DSSC Wellington again. Still a bachelor, he joined us for dinner all three days that he spent at Wellington. In fact the rumors that the Field Marshal wanted him in Kolkata were rife but he kept expressing his unwillingness to go back to his hometown until he was forced to. The rest became history.

As Lt Gen Jagjit Aurora’s Chief of Staff (in rank of Major General) he was first assigned the insurgencies of the north-east and the fledgling Naxalism which had erupted in West Bengal. However, his real claim to fame came as a result of the turbulent conditions in East Pakistan brought on by the obstinacy of Pakistan’s dictatorial leadership.

He along with Maj Gen (later Lt Gen ) BN Sarkar were assigned the role and task of coordinating the Mukti Bahini which had become a force to reckon with. Bangladesh’s exiled leadership also existed in Kolkata through 1971 and it was Jakes’ responsibility to keep in touch with them and seek their advice from time to time. As Gen Aurora’s  responsibilities multiplied with the piquant situation, it was Jakes who offered his firm shoulder and advice when needed.

Coordinating conferences at New Delhi were a regular affair and his proximity to the Field Marshal helped greatly in creating the right amount of confidence between the Eastern command and Army Headquarters. It needs to be mentioned that it was the game of ‘bridge’ which tied both Jakes and my father to the Field Marshal and Mrs Manekshaw who were avid bridge players themselves. Of course, Jakes shared some of the qualities of the Field Marshal in terms of his likeness for artifacts, carpets and china; one of the finest collections of which exists in his house even today.

When the war commenced on 3 December 1971, Jakes as Chief of Staff had his hands full with coordination. When the Indian Army formations drew close to Dhaka after bypassing islands of Pakistani resistance it was Jakes who was assigned by Gen Aurora to proceed to Dhaka to negotiate the surrender. The classic photographs of the surrender ceremony at Dhaka’s Maidan are now folk lore and prominent in all of them is the man who negotiated the surrender and drafted the surrender document.

The safe transportation of 93,000 prisoners of war was no mean feat itself. It all happened under is direct supervision and not one Pakistani PW could ever complain.

Jakes went on to raise HQ 16 Corps to take on the responsibility of the LoC south of the Pir Panjal in 1972 and was later assigned back to Eastern Command as Army Commander where he stayed for almost four years. The merger of Sikkim was in his tenure as was the stabilization of Bengal after the initial turbulence by the Naxalites.

Later, Jakes went on to be Governor of Punjab and Goa. Politically, he was close to the BJP. He authored two books ‘Surrender at Dacca: Birth of a Nation’ and ‘An Odyssey in War and Peace: An Autobiography’.

He was also instrumental in the early overtures to Israel after India decided to open diplomatic relations with that country. While some may have been critical of his claims that it was he and not Aurora or Manekshaw who drafted the grand strategy for the 1971 Indo-Pak War, that controversy is best rested with the idea that it was the finest hour of the Indian Armed Forces and who the author of it was, remains irrelevant.

So at the ripe age of 93, one of India’s great military icons goes on to his place with the Maker. Jakes will long be remembered for his qualities of head and heart, the quintessential General Officer difficult to find today. For me personally, a part of my finest memories of childhood will fade. Farewell ‘Uncle Jakes’; that is what I always called you and I will continue to call you long after you have gone. Thanks for giving me the memories to recall whenever I need to remember that soldiering is a gentleman’s profession.