Gen VK Singh Framed?

He believes he is being targeted by a section of the media in connivance with corrupt portions of the Army he was fighting against while in service, some mutually adversarial officers and possibly arms lobbies.

It has been alleged in some sections of the media that documents related to the Technical Support Division of the Indian Army were destroyed days before Gen VK Singh retired as the Army Chief. Here are seven reasons he gives to dismiss those allegations, in brief:

– The allegedly destroyed files are classified. So the authority cannot confirm or deny what some journalists are claiming about its contents.

– The Army has a master copy of every document. Therefore, their alleged destruction is of no consequence.

– An Army chief is the head of the entire force of 1.3 million soldiers; he does not get into micro-management of individual wings like the Technical Support Division (TSD).

– Three media houses have been after him, toeing the line of each other — or, one reproducing the story of another with sentences rephrased — despite his repeated clarifications, explanations and rejoinders.

– The fact that his former colleagues in the Army who are inimical to him have cases of corruption against them is not being mentioned in these stories.

– Similarly, the obvious fact that the demand of his resignation from ministries by spokespersons of the Congress at the drop of a hat is politically motivated is not being highlighted.

– Another motivated party is the arms lobby against which Gen VK Singh had launched a crusade of sorts. No accuser is seeing its apparent hand in the spate of allegations against the former Army chief.

Before I begin quoting lines from the long interview I had with Gen VK Singh, two points he made that would rubbish The Hindu’s allegation against him must be stated. First, since the Technical Support Division’s (TSD’s) papers are officially secret, some journalists are taking undue liberty to claim anything pertaining to them — as the allegations can be neither confirmed nor denied. Second, which is a clinching argument, the Army has a master copy each of the documents The Hindu claims have been destroyed, thus making any such ‘destruction’ inconsequential.

Now the story begins. In December last, Ajit K Dubey of The Week reports about the Indian Army’s TSD, which was formed in the wake of the 26/11 Pakistani terror attack on Mumbai for the purpose of intelligence gathering vital for counter-strategies. Different journalists have, ever since, spun their own stories around it to frame Gen VK Singh — the Minister of State of External Affairs, Minister of State (Independent Charge) for Northeast Region and Minister of State (Independent Charge) under the Statistics and Programme Implementation portfolio believes.

“I have spoken to the editors of (The) Hindu. I have also written to Malini Parthasarathy. This is a long letter that I sent (not the rejoinder that was published by the said newspaper), telling her as to how The Hindu had embarked on a similar thing earlier when Chander Suta Dogra had written* and which resulted in some people being killed and then (Siddharth) Varadarajan went on a rampage to say that ‘this is what has happened in Kashmir’ etc etc. Once we wrote to Hindu (protesting against his article)… Varadarajan was removed for the type of thing that he was writing.”

*[Gen VK Singh’s rejoinder to the report by Dogra]

On my intervention, Gen VK Singh says it is possible that the family feud in Kasturi & Sons Ltd could also have played a role in Varadarajan’s ouster from The Hindu. Anyway, that newspaper’s internal matters are of no consequence to this report.

“Now I find today The Indian Express has done a story. Who in The Indian Express has done it? Ritu Sarin, who did the story with Shekhar Gupta on ‘coup’,” the minister says. [Pranab Dhal Samanta was the third co-reporter of the story; the Express and its three reporters were dragged to the court; the venerable Prof MD Nalapat of The Sunday Guardiansaw a UPA minister’s hand in the story “that took up the entire front page with an imaginary scenario that has inadvertently purveyed the falsehood that the Indian army is going the way of its Pakistan counterpart, and that General Singh is itching to do a Musharraf to Manmohan Singh’s Nawaz Sharif”.]

Sarin had also reported about the alleged allocations by the TSD along the lines of The Hindu report in The Indian Express.

I point out the irony that The Hindu had questioned The Indian Express’s claim that a unit of the Indian Army was on the verge of launching a coup against the civilian government of the day (Manmohan Singh government).

“Which only shows how things are! So somebody has got there to tell them to do what should be done,” Gen VK Singh joins the dots.

Editor of The Hindu “Malini Parthasarathy is very close to 10 Janpath,” Gen Singh alleges, adding, “Very few people know about it.” A bit inhibited to put this on paper, I ask the former Army chief and present minister in the NDA government whether I should put it on paper. He gives me an emphatic “yes”.

“Most of the time I found something or the other is done to distract (public) attention (from a scandal?). Army is undergoing a major thing now, where the military secretary is accused of taking money for promotions. He’s been sent on leave, pending (his) retirement,” Gen Singh says, referring to the allegation of corruption against Lt Gen Rajiv Bhalla. [Claims made to this effect in some media reports have been officially denied by the Army, leading to the newspapers apologising for the same.]

“There is also an ongoing case of Jorhat dacoity… which they have been trying to soft-paddle for a very long time,” Gen VK Singh says, adding, “There is also a case filed by (Lt Gen) Ravi Dastane against the Army…”

When I want to know more about the last officer named above, Gen Singh says, “Dastane actually should have been an Army commander. The present chief (Gen Dalbir Singh Suhag) was under DV (Discipline and Vigilance) ban. It took 10 days to remove that ban for them. In the meantime the post was vacant and, Army commander’s post, the moment it is vacant, it has to be, whosoever is the senior at that time — and who is cleared — has to go in… he has gone to the court.”

“There are certain things that both Josy (Joseph, The Hindu reporter whose story makes the latest controversy) and (The) Indian Express are trying to quote, attributing it to Lt Gen Vinod Bhatia. Now Lt Gen Vinod Bhatia was DG (Infantry), from where he was brought in as DGMO. And I think that carrot was used to put him (on) the Board of Officers. Now there’s nothing called ‘Board of Officers’. Board of Officers is meant to take stock. But they called it the Board of Officers to carry out an inquiry on TSD!” Gen VK Singh is amused.

When I ask whether the TSD was created by him, Gen Singh lauds journalist Dubey for his research in The Week, and asks me to consult it for relevant details.

“This report of his is supposed to be secret. People have asked for this report through RTIs. They have been told ‘this report is secret; nothing can be divulged out of it’. If that is the official stand, how is it that its portions are being quoted by Josy and now (The) Indian Express?”

I ask if it is a violation of the Official Secrets Act. “Absolutely! It is not only a violation of the Official Secrets Act, it is… if somebody called these people and made them read… I don’t know if he has done it… But if he has made them read, then that man is also totally culpable for giving out secrets. And they (the journalists) are culpable for receiving secrets,” Gen VK Singh asserts.

“Nobody knows what is there in the report. It is a secret, okay? So you can say anything against or for this report. You can attribute anything to this report. It will never be made public. So, anybody who is saying anything… In fact, very interestingly, two things have been said in The Indian Express: they’ve quoted that a minister was given so much of money to ‘destabilise the Omar (Abdullah) government’. Where did they get this from? If they don’t have the proof, …” the minister finds claims made in the reports against him not adding up.

I ask whether it could have come from former RAW chief AS Dulat who had made a similar claim about the Atal Bihari Vajpayee dispensation. “No, no, no, no, no. They are quoting Bhatia’s report to say so much of crores (sic) was given by (the) TSD to a minister to destabilise Omar’s government. Are they… I mean… Don’t they use their heads as journalists?”

“Then they have said there was an NGO called Yes Kashmir that got the money to fabricate a case against (Gen) Bikram Singh. Bikram Singh’s case is known all over Kashmir. Who needs to fabricate it?”

Gen VK Singh tells me the story that dates back to 2001: “An area that was considered to be the safest in Anantanag Janglat Mandi… he (Bikram Singh, at that time a brigadier) used to go there every third day or fourth day for some purchases.”

“What kind of purchases?” I ask. Gen VK Singh says it must have been for some personal needs of Brig (now retired general) Bikram Singh. “That’s what one has heard about him. I’m only telling you (from) hearsay. I am not privy to what exactly happened. This is what I have heard from the people out there,” the interviewee issues a disclaimer.

“One fine day, firing occurred out there. In that firing a TA (Territorial Army) battalion CO (Commissioned Officer) who had come to see him gets killed. Two/three more people get killed. He gets a bullet. He is also injured. Bikram Singh is injured.”

“An old man is killed out there on whom a damaged AK-47 rifle is found, and it is claimed that this old man is a Pakistani terrorist! He is buried by (the) police. Some people of this family ultimately file… they run around etc etc etc and ultimately they find details of him. They file an FIR. Necessary things are done. They go to a court,” Gen VK Singh questions the official account of the Army thus.

He continues, “Bikram Singh is injured. He was evacuated that day. The injury is shown as a bullet wound ‘on the back of the chest’. I don’t know what is ‘back of the chest’.”

The minister assumes the inspecting doctor must have got his English wrong, describing the back as “back of the chest”.

What is significant, “He (Bikram Singh) also gets an award for… God is great… so they are blaming that this Yes Kashmir was into this!” the case gets curioser for the minister. He insists, “Yes Kashmir NGO’s work is known all over Kashmir. But this incident was used by Bikram Singh to say TSD should be disbanded.”

“How is TSD related to this?” I ask.

“I don’t know…,” says Gen Singh and reckons that the case is like that in all intelligence communities, where there is “a lot of rift” between staffers. “The person who was chosen to lead TSD by the then Director General (Military Intelligence),” he says was “obviously… seen by others as, you know, ‘got a plum assignment; he’s doing well; let’s bring him down’. So it is this internal rivalry, which resulted in…”

“Office politics?” I ask.

“Yes,” Gen VK Singh says, “which resulted in all kinds of funny feedings been done.”

“(The) Jorhat dacoity occurred. The chap involved, the CO of the unit, was one Col Srikumar who was controlling this operation on telephone. Why do you have to go from Dimapur all the way to Jorhat into somebody else’s area? And they raid a contractor’s house and loot it. They tie up the family. And then the whole establishment goes on to protect this man! There’s something wrong, fishy,” Gen VK Singh looks upset as the authority is not being able to crack such cases.

“There have also been insinuations and allegations that this unit under this particular colonel saahab was involved in a lot of other things in the Northeast; whether it was gun-running, whether it was extortion…,” the former Army chief alleges.

Then he gets back to the present incumbent in the seat that he once occupied, Gen Dalbir Singh Suhag: “He (Srikumar) is the present chief’s blue-eyed boy. He was brought to Delhi, given some administrative appointment, but he is the ‘friend, philosopher and guide’ kind of a man to be advising him (Gen Suhag) — a man who was utilised by both the present man and the previous man (Gen VK Singh’s two successors) to start planting stories in India Today and Mail Today by posing as if he is posted in Delhi while he was actually posted in Dimapur!”

“India Today went again on a spate of articles saying various things.” [Refer to these articles, for example: Piece 1 and Piece 2]

“The basic fact remains that the TSD was raised based on government’s requirement — that we need an organisation which should be able to take action against things like Mumbai 26/11 attack. At that time when people were asked, they said ‘we don’t have any means’. So, it was raised. It had been given a particular task. It did the task. You’ll have various types of people who will say nahin ji, woh to falaan organisation karta hai (no, sir, such and such organisation does this job)… everybody does it; it is for the Government of India to take whatever means they want to. Nobody’s straitjacketed. And nobody speaks about it. It (the TSD) did its work. It proved its effectiveness. And when I was leaving the office, the file was put up to me as to the experiment of this unit has proved to be useful. And I wrote out there that the experiment has been useful. Decision to continue this or to wind it up rests with the next chief.”

“Which files are they (The Hindu and The Indian Express) talking about?” he refers to the documents whose copies were published the next day. “What are those documents? They are all by Southern Command Intelligence Unit, with some pertaining to TSD. I’ve seen those documents. I have viewed all of them. There is some photocopy of a passport, other things, some other thing… They mean nothing.”

Gen VK Singh explains that these were documents whose multiple copies existed and hence there was no point retaining all the copies. “We have one master copy, which is available.”

“(The) Southern Command Intelligence has done it. As for that VKK Chavan they are talking about, he is the head of intelligence organisation in the Southern Command. He has been questioned by the general Court Martial; he has given his reply. So, what are these of any consequence now?”

He says the Army has a master copy of all these documents. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have been destroyed, Gen Singh said. “If they had been the only documents, they would not have been destroyed,” he explains.

What the reporters fail to appreciate is, Gen VK Singh affirms, “Chiefs command the Army; they don’t command units. This unit (the TSD) was not the chief’s personal fiefdom. His ‘fiefdom’ is the entire Army of 1.3 million (soldiers). Only people who are brainless can think that he will be looking after units.”

“This unit functioned under the DGMI. He is the man responsible for them (TSD’s staff),” Gen VK Singh tries to set the record straight by saying that it is the DGMI who decides under whom this unit will work. “That’s the intelligence organisation; there is a proper lieutenant general available who takes charge of this. If chiefs start getting busy in minor things like this, then what are they (the intelligence staff) going to do?” he wants his detractors to explain.

“The problem with these people (the journalists who are after him) is that their brain is so narrow that they can’t look beyond that,” the former soldier sounds exasperated.

“Who are the people who are behind this? I’m quite sure the guy against whom the CBI has registered the case for that 14 crore thing has to be there,” Singh refers back to the recent case of corruption involving Military Secretary Bhalla. “The guy he was working for, the arms lobby, has to be there… because they still will be into hanky-panky. They can’t sit quiet.”

“There will be people like that Srikumar. Incidentally, his name is there in the Sardha scam. His name is written as K-o-r-n-a-l Surkumar. And the Army has refused to give this man to CBI, saying that ‘nobody of this name exists’ (whereas) 25 lakhs has been shown against this man. Where did the colonel saahab get 25 lakhs (from)?”

“And why has the Army refused? We should actually question these people.”

I tell Gen VK Singh that if all this was revealed, he would be accused of demoralising the Army. The minister laughs heartily, and says, “There is no demoralisation; people are taking crores for promotion. I think that something is wrong. Who all are involved in it have to be… the Army must straighten itself. That’s what at least I started with. Yes, it becomes difficult. I’ve got Adarsh lobby against me; I’ve got Sukhna lobby against me; I’ve got all these chaps who were peddling vehicles and arms and other things; they are against me. Let it continue. So what?”

To that I remind Gen VK Singh that he has made enemies everywhere — not only in the Army but also within the government — and talk about the defence ministry’s affidavit rubbishing his accusations and trying to quash his disciplinary actions against Suhag, the then Army vice chief (now chief).

“I had taken serious umbrage to it. And I said if my own government is writing a thing like this, then I don’t have a right to stay in this government. I am very clear in my conscience, okay? I know why it was done. From time to time you will have the same lot of people raising the cacophony, you know, ‘oh, he said this; so he must resign’, ‘oh, he said this; so he must resign’.”

“Who are these people? (Abhishek Manu) Singhvi, Manish Tewari, Kapil Sibal! … Don’t we know what kind of people they have been? And there has to be somebody who instigates them. Who is that chap?”

“Who is that madari (ringleader or mastermind)? We have to find that madari.”

I tell Gen VK Singh that, some time after the last occasion when he was targeted by the media, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had appreciated his work for the evacuation of Indians stranded in Yemen via Djibouti, and he says, “People were not very happy (about that).”

He says the prime minister appreciates his work. “He understood the type of work which was done. I am not the type of person who goes and starts tom-tomming his (own) work that some people do. I do my work and let the work speak for itself.”

Otherwise, he says, he has observed how a government functions. In the Army, he says, when somebody is entrusted with a task, the boss is 99 per cent sure it will be done; for a full 100 per cent, he appoints a supervisor. In the government, to ensure something is done, one has to be part of the team, Gen VK Singh underscores the fact that he must always be on his toes.