Murky forces that are targeting Gen VK Singh

Chief of army staff General VK Singh blocked the appointment of then director general, defence intelligence agency, Lieutenant General Tejinder Singh, as chairman, National Technical Research Organisation, shortly after being offered the alleged bribe in the Tatra truck deal. He also red-flagged the Tatra contract, ensuring that the remaining order for 600-odd trucks was stopped. This has not been cleared till date.

General Singh had rushed to defence minister AK Antony to report the alleged offer of a bribe by Lt General Tejinder Singh to clear the Tatra file. Antony did not take cognisance of the serious charge by the chief, merely asking the general to take action as he thought best.

Sections of the media have reported that home minister P Chidambaram was pushing Lt General Tejinder Singh’s case for the NTRO top post. Significantly, the reports have not been denied, giving credence to speculation within the army that the retired DIA chief has high levels of political patronage.

Lt General Tejinder Singh, who dropped out of public view after the action taken by the army chief, has been very active recently against the army chief. Informed sources spoke of a taped conversation between Lt General Tejinder Singh and a senior army official where the former, referring to General VK Singh, said using an abusive word that there was enough to keep the latter active defending himself for two years. This information could not be independently verified, with the sources maintaining that the army did not want to release a tape as it did not want to compromise the other officer.

Senior defence officers, including former chief of naval staff, Admiral Vishnu Bhagwat, claimed that the army chief was the target of a politicians-arms dealers nexus. Significantly the public interest litigation filed in the Supreme Court by a retired naval chief, a senior journalist, a retired chief election commissioner, a former bureaucrat and three officers goes into details of the larger politics surrounding General VK Singh’s so-called age controversy.

Seeking to restore the army’s ‘institutional integrity’, the PIL step by step unravels some of the murky goings on behind the scenes. It points to the far-from-exemplary role of former army chiefs JJ Singh and, to a lesser extent, Deepak Kapoor, in determining the line of succession in the army with sections of the political leadership. It speaks of how the chiefs used the boards of at least four or five senior officers to move them from the line of succession, focusing on Major General Ravi Arora in detail. The major general was in the same batch as Lt General Bikram Singh, a gold medalist, senior and yet a year younger. He did not get through the major general to lieutenant general board.

The Supreme Court is yet to examine the document and take a decision about whether it should be admitted or not. The petitioners believe that vested interests are calling the shots in determining the line of succession, and in the process bringing the office of the chief of army staff into disrepute. This, the sources said, creates the space for political control with Lt General Bikram Singh and his declared successor, Lt General Dalbir Singh Suhag, commander of the Dimapur-based 3 Corps. In the process a general widely respected in the army and described by retired and serving generals as a ‘thinking commander’ Lt General KT Parnaik, currently GOC, Northern Command, will retire without making it as the army chief. However, if the government had accepted General Singh’s date of birth as May 31, 1951, Lt General Parnaik would have taken command. He is seen as an outstanding officer who would not countenance activities of shady arms dealers who still continue to influence the business and politics of defence.