Pakistan Army Chief Wants His Officers To Read This Book That Tells India’s Success In Keeping Army Out Of Politics

In what turned out to be an unusual advice, Pakistan’s Army chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa told the officers gathered for his first speech last year to read Army and Nation: The Military and Indian Democracy since Independence, written by Steven I Wilkinson, the Nilekani Professor of India and South Asian Studies at Yale University. The book explains how India has been successful in keeping the military out of politics.

The book also looks at political and strategic decisions that have made the “army safe for Indian democracy”. Many reports have stated that Bajwa reads a lot about India and does not nurse a “visceral hatred” towards it. A report from The Nation stated that Bajwa informed his officers that the Pakistan Army “must remain within its constitutionally defined role.” The same report claimed that General Bajwa has belief in civilian supremacy and has said in his public remarks that the army will support and assist the civilian government in the national interest.