On Fri, Dec 21, 2012 at 12:26 PM, Promod Kapur <promod.kapur@gmail.com> wrote:
Our contract with the services ends the day we retire/leave and till that happens we are supposed to remain apolitical. Once we become ex, then we are first citizens and then any thing body else. If we do not make use of our experience of several years and of different conditions to the civil after we retire, then I think we may be wasting our talents and our experience as leaders.
A large problem with our politics is that the power has been clustered with a small group of people connected with a small group of influencers and everyone else de-legitimized for who they are. We have reached a point where a nuclear reactor built against people's wishes and in collaboration with Russia is "national good" and the locals protesting are the "foreign hand". For those not interested in anti-nuclear stands, pick a struggle. It has been de-legitimized and declared anti-national or foreign hand. One would imagine these jokers are the sum total of the country.
Similarly, the armed forces have been marginalized in the national discourse. Sans freedom to speak freely (something your average 16 year old is protesting now) to various kinds of neglect and manufactured paranoia about military takeovers and what not. While no one accuses out Army of taking over or even remotely showing signs of wanting to do it, there is an implicit dismissal of people from the forces in terms of legitimacy in politics. Some comment by a public figure comes to mind. I forget who, but it was a tweet referring to retired forces personnel in politics as "creeping dictatorship" - which makes no sense. I don't remember a retired "dictator" coming to power in the worst stories of military takeovers either. Other talk includes paranoid comparisons with Pakistan. The Indian Express article about the Army invading Delhi was - luckily - hilarious, but it had tremendous potential for harm, if people believed.
The point here is that there is a lot of garbage serving to alienate the military mind. In my view it serves two purposes - keeping any question of discipline and protocol out of arbitrary power mongering (most faujis are very systematic) and some kind of mental class system, where the soldiers are seen as inferior.
I think it is high time the soldiers had a voice. There is no one speaking for their rights as citizens. Also, I think it is high time that method trumped madness. The experience with discipline is an important contribution almost all of you make in addition to your specific talents. In my view, it is practice of a caste system if a role becomes identity and reason for exclusion in democratic representation.
Vidyut
PS: This refers to retired personnel, of course.
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Vidyut Kale
Vidyut Kale
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