The 'parakram' of feeble minds and weak knees

By Sumer Kaul

Remember the mood in the government after the terrorist attack on Parliament last December? The enough-is-enough rhetoric from the highest political pedestals? The unconcealed determination, further steeled by the Kaluchak massacre, to act against the enemy? The Army chief's categorical assertion, undoubtedly in reflection of the government's resolve, that the time for action had come, and the consequent order to the armed forces to mass in full battlegear on the border with Pakistan? The Prime Minister's visit to a forward area and his exhortation to the jawans to prepare for "balidaan" in the impending action, appropriately named Operation Parakram (prowess/valour)? Remember all this?

Ten months later, the whole thing - the mood, the resolve, the action plan - has gone with the wind. Quietly, unceremoniously. The troops have been asked to return to the barracks. Considering the hostile terrain, the extreme wheather, the nerve-racking uncertainty in which they had been all these long months, the move back to their peacetime stations cannot but be welcomed by them, as well as by their countrymen. But even as the tanks and trucks and guns roll back, a huge question mark looms over the national heroin. What was Operation Parakram all about?

This is a question the people of India and particularly the jawans and officers of the Indian Army are asking, silently but in palpable anger and bewilderment. After all, it was not as though a brigade or two had been rushed to some local trouble spot and after discovering that it was a false alarm, promptly asked to go back to their station. Involved in Operation Parakram was the biggest and longest ever deployment of Indian troops and armour on our international border. There must have been some aim, some objective behind this colossal effort. What was it? And was it achieved?

When the operation was set up the objective was clear: to deal a crippling blow to the enemy and teach it a terminal lesson. It was to be, in Prime Minister Vajpayee's words, an "aar paar ki ladai" (a decisive war). The government meant business, or so it seemed to the country - and to the world. While the country endorsed the resolve and stood behind the government and most of the world viewed India's concerns and intentions with a degree of understanding the United States (with Britain in tow, as always) stood bang in front of the inherently pliable Vajpayee government to block its path and break its resolve.

They did it directly and indirectly. They shuttlecocked between New Delhi and Islamabad and brought to the gullible Indian leadership Musharraf's "promise" of "permanently" stopping terrorist infiltration and attacks, and even as they underwrote the wily general's assurance they also more than hinted at the 'unwisdom' of an India-Pakistan war while American troops are in Pakistan! At the same time they commandered their think-tanks back home to create a subcontinental nuclear war scare, complete with horrendous destruction and casualty figures, and to buttress the nightmare, encouraged the Pakistan envoy at UN to say that his country would use nuclear arms in the event of a war with India. The bluff, the duplicity and the pressure worked!

Nobody in this feeble-minded, weak-kneed government is going to admit it, but this is how Operation Parakram was sabotaged. Although the back-to-the-barracks decision was ostensibly taken only the other day, the military option was in fact abandoned much earlier - as evidenced, among other things, by the abrupt capping of all that "aar-paar" rhetoric. And even as we withdraw our troops, Pakistan and its terrorists continue with their bloody deeds. In other words, we are back to the pre-Parakram era - plus the burden of the huge (tangible and intangible) costs of the spectacular damp squib!

In terms of monetary costs, the operation is said to have drained the exchequer of close to a staggering ten thousand crore. Add to it the degradation of armour and ammunition and a host of sophisticated war gadgetry because of lying for so long in the open at the mercy of the elements. Close to one hundred lives have been lost, and twice as many personnel injured, in the laying of mines over vast stretches and there is fear of more such casualties in the highly hazardous de-mining operations.

Equally if not more disturbing is the injury that the fiasco has caused to the morale of our soldiers. Geared to fight, deployed on the border, waiting in trenches in harsh environment, ready and eager to avenge the killing of thousands of their comrades and countrymen - only to discover at the end of the day that they were in the words of Maj. Gen. (Retd.) Afsir Karim, "mere pawans in the hands of politicians intent on pursuing their own agenda".

It is an agenda in which national self-respect and interests take a back seat to self-aggrandisement and party interests. Even in these last ten eventful months, our worthy politicians have been busy with their petty politicking, holding rallies, horse-trading, lusting for or clinging to power, celebrating imaginary successes. And amidst all this, see how the architects of Operation Parakram are projecting its wilful abortion. Without so much as batting an eyelid, they now say that there was no intention of any military action and that the whole operation was simply a diplomatic tactic and "as coercive diplomacy". George Fernandes said in a Doordarshan interview last week, "we have achieved a magnificent Victory".

What victory, Mr Defence Minister? with Pakistan continuing with its bloody mischief, with Indian soldiers and civilians continuing to get killed, with the global warrior against terrorism "anywhere and everywhere" continuing to hoodwink your government, what victory are you talking about? And what is the "firm message" that your brand new counterpart in the Foreign Ministry says India has conveyed to Pakistan through Operation Parakram? Surely, it should not be difficult for even an IQ-challenged government to realise that the only message in fact conveyed to the military-mullah machine there is that India may bark occasionally but it will never bite, and so they can go on with their diabolical games.

I am not a war monger. Far from it. But like millions of other Indians I cannot countenance this country and its honour and interests being mauled endlessly. Nor, like my countrymen again, am I prepared to be taken in by the government's rhetorical bravado. The ruling establishment may persuade some committed commentators to echo and endorse the pretence of victory, but the people at large can no longer be fooled. They now clearly see this government for what it is  -  timid, ever fumbling and bungling, out-smarted by Pakistan and cheated by the US (and still clinging to it!)' in short, a complete travesty of what people expected a BJP-led government to be when they voted for this party and its ragtag allies.

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