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Tuesday, September 11, 2012

SCANDALS IN THE MILITARY AND THE WAY FORWARD

by Sudhir Vombatkere

I am deeply saddened. The cause is the 7 Sep 2012 Indian Express front page, top-headlined article, “Major 'uploads' photos of Lt Col, his wife on porn sites”. This act of utter depravity and moral corruption following the several scandalous exposes of senior military officers involved in money corruption scandals makes it all the more hard to bear. To add to all this affecting the officer corps, the incidents of mutiny, near-mutiny, officer-OR scuffles and face-offs, fragging, and so on, only deepen the sadness. I ask myself, “Where have we as an organization gone wrong?”, “Have I done my duty adequately during my own service to keep the moral flag of our army flying high?”, “Have we always treated Philip Chetwode's dictum upside down in real life even though we swear after the Passing-Out Parade to put country first, the men next and self last 'always and everytime'?”
That such scandals are being put on the front pages of newspapers and discussed on prime-time TV is good, because hiding the reality can only make things worse, not better. Of course, there are those amongst us who will say that media (print & electronic) blows things out of proportion. Perhaps that is so, but then can there be smoke without fire? I am not concerned whether or to what extent the fact of each scandal is blown up (and the reasons therefor) but with the fact itself. Our JCOs/OR are fully aware of what is reported in the media. What standing would the officer corps in general have with the men they command when such utter moral depravity and lack of integrity among the officer corps becomes the subject of (gleeful? disgusted? angry?) discussion in the JCO Mess and OR Dining Hall or barracks?

This is not of course, to even imply that the majority of officers are corrupt, but such scandals rolling out especially in the last may be 7-8 years takes one to the inevitable conclusion that a substantial number of officers are involved in corrupt practices. And when I say “corrupt practices”, I include all those practices of taking or using what is not legitimately entitled or owned, regardless of scale in terms of quantity or of depravity. It is facile for me to say that all this is happening long after I retired, and the army was “okay” when I left it, but such things do not happen in months or even a couple of years. Surely, we must admit, the seeds of the current depravity and corruption were sown even when we were in service in the last century. We, myself included, have to accept at least a part of the responsibility.

One of the ways in which the now-retired generation of officers has failed (and the practice continues, as young and middle-level officers now in service assure me) is that IOs have not ensured that incompetent or fawning/bum-sucking or career-manipulative or corrupt officers do not get promoted, by giving them low ACR grades. The reasons for not writing off such officers is that the IO himself lacks both competence and courage, or himself has something to hide, or has received favours or services from the officer on whom he reports. However, how often have we seen officers who make mistakes or who are argumentative or “difficult” getting written off by their IOs so easily. All this falls under the general rubric of command failure of the IO himself. And we have all been IOs at some level or the other. Worse, every IO has his IO, who fails to recognize the command failure, and the system perpetuates such that mediocre or undesirable officers get promoted and eventually rise to general rank.

I am pretty sure that the (by now many) general officers named in corruption scandals or the middle-level officers involved in the 7 Sep 2012 Indian Express report of moral corruption, received good to very good ACRs from their IOs. (Maj Gen V.K.Madhok, in his undated recent letter No. No/VKM/Army/2 to the Defence Minister, writes, “It is of interest to note that nearly 80-90% officers are graded as Above Average by the IOs as they don’t want trouble in their units, or representations”). And surely many of today's retired officers were the IOs of the general officers in corruption scandals. (Happily, I am not one of those, but one never knows what scandal the morrow may bring forth, to shame me that the corrupt officer was one to whose promotion, the ACR that I initiated contributed). Of course people change as they get promoted (or kicked upstairs), and some change for the better, but the majority probably change for the worse, in accordance with the laws of social entropy. Norman Dixon's book “The Psychology of Military Incompetence” brings out issues of command failure, but does not deal with corruption or moral depravity.

Of the officer-JCO/OR or senior officer-junior officer (or in general, the commander-commanded) relationship, the time that officers get with their command is reduced for one or more of several reasons, and this impacts adversely on the relationship which, today, is far from being even satisfactory. It is easy to say that it is not the “quantity” of time alone that counts but the quality of available time spent, though that is essentially true. But I would say some of the important reasons are as follows. One, the shortage of officers and the hard-scale posting being much less than the authorized strength even in operational units makes officers' available time with troops less. Two, the insistence at higher command levels on unnecessary paper work that kills much of officers' time. Also, especially in staff jobs, officers sit late in office on a regular basis either because they are inefficient, or because they are overloaded (poor time-management, taking the load of under-performing colleagues, etc), or because their senior sits late and he does not have the guts to go home even when he has completed his assigned work. Thus, officers in units and certainly officers on staff rarely if ever get to see how and where their JCO/OR live. Three, the undue emphasis given to physical and material comfort of officers by officers themselves. Four, the skewed welfare that is practiced even at the institutional level. As an example of this, one may see that over the years, the AWHO (noting what “W” stands for) has constructed far more officers' dwellings than dwellings for JCOs/OR, even though the overwhelming numerical strength is that of the latter category. 

The functioning of AWWA also leaves much to be desired. There are other burning issues like separate (vastly superior) ration scales for officers, vastly superior accomodation scales and specifications for officers, diversion of disproportionate CSD Canteen profits to Officers' Messes, etc., which need immediate re-examination from the welfare point of view. Five, in spite of instructions and orders, many, many officers use their sahayaks to walk their pet dogs, and perform household chores like a domestic servant, while the officer's wife orders the sahayak about. This has never gone down well in any unit, and it is the “skill” of the CO and the Senior JCO that allows this practice to continue without too many disciplinary problems arising out of protests from OR. Six, there is the very important point of leadership and command, to which I will devote a separate (following) paragraph.

Today, as compared with the past, the socio-economic distance between the commander and the commanded has shrunk, because the youth from the upper middle class are going into corporate jobs and officer intake is from the lower middle class, including children of JCOs/OR. Thus many of today's young and middle-level officers are very conscious of their roots but do not want to show it to their command, with the result that they go to lengths to maintain their “officer” status by being peremptory and sometimes harsh. At the same time, today's JCOs/OR are more critical of officers, with an approach of “How is he any better than me? But he wields authority (granting leave, awarding punishments, etc) harshly”. The outcome of this is incidents like even refusal of leave (of course refusal of leave also happens because of short postings and absences on course, leave and hospital), which sometimes gets out of hand. Then there are cases like the OR who climbed a mobile tower in Delhi alleging mistreatment by his own officers and refusing to come down until he was allowed to meet the Defence Minister. This indicates that the OR has lost faith in the sense of justice and fair play from his own officers. Indeed, the fact that officers of various ranks (including several Lt Gens) have gone to civil court on a variety of causes, indicates that they too have little faith in fair play and justice in the very system in which they are themselves in the policy-making and decision-making levels! 

The point to be made here is that the officer corps does not provide to the subordinate Offr/JCO/OR hierarchy, the atmosphere of fair play and justice tempered with empathy and compassion, which it is expected to do as a part of the command function. Creating systemic fair play and justice, far from going against maintaining the necessary distance between the commander and the commanded, gives the subordinate faith in the system and loyalty to the team, be it in units or headquarters. In earlier times, officers played troops games and so got to regularly meet with their men on a one-to-one basis. Many or even most of today's young and middle level officers do not play troops games (I am open to correction in this regard), for they would rather play golf or other so-called officers' games where they get the opportunity to meet and become “visible” to senior officers, which is “good” for promotion. The senior officer also often only gets to see his juniors who make themselves “visible” for, even in Officers' Mess functions, senior officers stand apart and keep each other company, while the young and middle-level officers form their own separate groups, and in higher HQ mess functions, as often as not, the liquor and food served to senior ranks is qualitatively superior. All these go to stratify officers amongst themselves and officers from JCOs/OR.

Another point is the highly permissive so-called modern (western) style of dress and deportment that many officers and their wives pretend to. Promiscuity among officers and their families is not new. When I was ADG DV, I had handled cases of “key clubs” and “wife-swapping” among officers, being processed for disciplinary action for militarily unacceptable behaviour. But today, the ambitions of some officers (and sometimes of their wives) drives them to offer or seek sexual favours from other officers wives, and I am aware of at least one instance of a senior officer's wife calling some young officer home when her husband was working habitually late in office to “earn” his promotion. It is mercifully true that these are rare cases, but they are known to most officers and their wives, and finally nothing can be totally hidden from the sahayak who silently observes and speaks with his barrack-mates especially when his tongue is loosened with rum. Thus the loose morals of a few officers is thrust by loose tongues on the whole officer corps, while only the really professionally competent officers who are few in number (here professional competence is not only being good at his work but includes good command and control with justice and fair play to run an effective and happy team), command respect.

I also note that in retired life, most officers are largely unconcerned with the problems of JCOs/OR in general, but may engage themselves with the post-retirement problems of JCOs/OR of their own regiment. They are engaged in the rat race of a post-retirement job to earn more (true, some have on-going commitments of children still to be settled or aged parents, and need to supplement their pension) to live an extravagant life-style, or as they claim, “I have to keep busy, and cannot simply sit at home”. But little or no thought is given to JCOs/OR whose post-retirement life is one of struggle to live a half-decent life and bring up his family on a meagre pension. JCO/OR Veterans are, in general, quite unhappy with the attitude of Officer Veterans. These remarks are made based on my personal experience since I retired in 1996 and settled in Mysore, and observations in other places. I believe that an officer's command responsibility should continue voluntarily into retirement.

I am sure there will be many who read this mail, who will send in angry responses, pointing out how wrong I am. But even they will not be able to assert that all is well with our Army (and Navy and Air Force). We have to accept that the military's morale is nowhere as good as it should be for a fighting force to be really effective in war. There is an urgent need for all Veterans to not merely introspect but to take positive action to recommend to the Service Chiefs openly as to what needs to be done to retrieve the situation of deteriorating morale.This responsibility rests with all Veterans and especially Veterans of general rank. It would have more effect if a conclave of officers would get together to formulate a “white paper” or “status paper” and make action-oriented recommendations for immediate implementation at Services HQ.

Apart from the above, one of the most important strategic issues for this conclave to agitate for is creating the appointment of Chief of the Defence Staff (CDS) who will be National Security Advisor (External Security) in addition to the present bureaucrat who is the sole National Security Advisor to the Prime Minister who heads the National Security Council.

This December, the surviving officers of my course (30 Regular) meet at IMA to commemorate 50 years since commissioning. It will be a joy to meet those whom we have not met at all after December 1962, renew contact with those whom we may have met in the intervening half century, and remember coursemates who lost their lives in operations or otherwise. But now in early September, one cannot but help feeling a sense of deja vu that we felt 50 years ago as GCs in IMA, when an under-equipped Army with poor top leadership, further weakened because of political incompetence and bureaucratic arrogance, was shamed by China. We can safely assert that today as in the past, we have the best troops in the world, and that our junior officers' leadership-from-the-front is second to none as they have always demonstrated, most recently in war in Kargil 1999, and daily in on-going CI ops). But I personally find it impossible to be so confident when speaking of middle-level and especially senior officers. I shall continue to hope that I am wrong regarding senior officers, but I have a strong feeling that I am right. Correction of the present deteriorating trend needs to begin at the highest levels, for only then will it trickle down; a bottom-up approach cannot be much more than cosmetic.

The way forward
The need of the hour is for definite, concerted and assertive action to form a conclave as suggested above. One hopes that retired Service Chiefs and retired Lt Gens will take the initiative to form such a conclave, invite comments and suggestions from across the rank spectrum, and produce a valuable document on a (self-imposed) time-bound basis. Delay may have very serious consequences not only for our Army, Navy and Air Force, but for our Country as a whole. At least now, let the country come first, and the “men you command” come next.

Maj Gen S.G.Vombatkere (Retd)

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