PUNE: If the civil administration decides to use the army “for protection and killing an insurgency network”, the army should be allowed to control it by “firing straight”, defence minister Manohar Parrikar said here on Saturday. “I don’t want to train the army to use lathis,” he added.
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I am slowly but surely becoming fan of this defense minister who i didn”t like before. Yes i agree with him about army not using lathi. Keep up the good job defense minister. The issue has come to the fore because of a recent judgment about the Northeast+ , he said, referring to the Supreme Court lashing out over the long deployment of the armed forces and the imposition of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA), which seeks to grants army personnel legal immunity for their actions, in Manipur. “We can’t lose people. So, wherever the army is used, the powers will have to be there, otherwise don’t use the army. In fact, I will be very happy if we don’t use the army anywhere in the country, other than disaster management,” he said.
Earlier in the day, asked by reporters to comment on the Kashmir situation+ , Parrikar, who was inaugurating a new building for the office of the principal director of defence estates, said the question should be directed at the home minister as the defence ministry is not directly involved in maintaining law and order in the state.
Referring to videos on social media showingIndian army men purportedly indulging in brutality, Parrikar said these were morphed and asserted that the Indian Army is not a brutal force. “We don’t kill for the sake of it. Kabhi kabhi galti hota hai. Indian army is capable of killing, but it is not a brutal army.”
(Source- Sanjha Morcha Blog)
Army makes GALTI at times as stated by the D M.depends upon the situation where one is operating. Army is fighting against the insurgents who are the enemy of the Nation.So if you have to decide at the juncture when you are under fire who is enemy and who is friend, one may not survive. It is easy said than done to fire below knee levels . Wish those advocating such things while fighting insurgency are there to face the bullets. My experience of fighting insurgency in N E is that most of the politicians in these areas want to keep the insurgency alive . It is their bread and butter. About 25 year back in Manipur when we made the life of the insurgents difficult to operate, they, with the help of their local supporters including a minister executed an ambush on the army and caused heavy casualties on it. The master mind of this ambush was a state minister. On specific information when we raided the ministers official residence in Imphal there were 19 insurgents hiding We apprehended them and handed over them to the police but nothing could be proved against them as they had hidden their weapons in their hideouts and the state machinery was with them. The pressure on them was so high that they found ministers official residence was the safest place to hide after the ambush.It was the D G police and the G o c Div who held our hands despite loud noises in the Parliament for raiding the Ministers Residence. . Otherwise some of us would have been sent to home dry. Unfortunately in such situations the Army hierarchy sitting away from the scene also come under pressure and do not support their subordinate units for the reasons best known to them .
ReplyDeleteTherefore, those who raise fingers on the S F must do so after studying the ground realities. The statement of DM is though late but most desirable at this juncture the morale of the S F is in boots. Wish the D M had started exerting himself from the day he took over.