At last minute, govt changes agenda for meet of Standing Committee on Defence to electronic voting facility for personnel, drawing Oppn’s criticism
The meeting of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Defence, scheduled to be held on Friday, is expected to generate fireworks as the government has decided not to brief the parliamentarians regarding the surgical strikes conducted by Army’s Special Forces across the LoC on September 29.
Congress members of the Parliamentary panel, Ambika Soni and Madhusudan Mistry, expressed deep disappointment over the government decision not even to brief the MPs “behind the closed door” .
Fearing that the MPs may demand information regarding the military operation, at the last minute, the government changed the agenda of the meeting to recording oral evidence of the Ministry of Defence, Ministry of Law and Justice, and the Election Commission of India on the status of implementation of the e-postal ballot system, or the electronic voting facility for the armed forces personnel.
Earlier, the agenda of the meeting was to take oral evidence of representatives of the Ministry of Defence regarding the shortage of ammunition for the army, including the Mountain Strike Corps. The meeting was postponed last week as the Defence Ministry seemed hesitant to respond to any query on the surgical strikes.
The ministry later agreed for a briefing after persuasion from committee chairman Major General (retd) B C Khanduri of BJP, but with the condition that no visuals of the Army action would be shown and the Army will not answer any questions regarding details of the surgical strike.
Afterward, the Defence Ministry wriggled out of the briefing stating that giving out any such details will affect the future Army operations against terrorists and it did want to discuss the acute shortage of arms and ammunition for the defence forces.
Demanding restoration of the original agenda for the meeting, Rajya Sabha members Soni and Mistry wanted the Army officers to inform the committee about the number of surgical strikes carried out since 2004. Sources said the Congress MPs had planned to quiz Army officers to embarrass Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar, who had said that no surgical strike across the LoC ever took place, except on September 29. Parrikar had given full credit to Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the decision to “teach Pakistan a lesson”.
“It is high time that the attitude of the Defence officials towards the standing committee members undergoes a change for the better, and the committee is informed about the problems that the defence forces face while combating adversaries on our borders,” they said.
The leaders also wondered what harm there would be in briefing the MPs when the leaders of Opposition parties could be briefed about the issue on the very day of the attack. They said the government decision amounted to a “lack of confidence” in the MPs, who were bound by the oath of secrecy. “This position is absolutely unacceptable to us,” they said.
“Despite repeated mentions in the committee, the Defence Ministry never presented their policies and preparedness to meet emergency situations, nor have they come out with valid reasons for delay in acquisition of defence equipment, including arms and ammunition. The Make in India initiative also seems to be a complete failure in the defence sector,” the Congress leaders said.
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