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MG DEVASAHAYAM CHENNAI: MAN-MADE DISASTER p12

ASHOK LAVASA INDIAS VOICE AT COP21 p8

January 5, 2016 `


VOL. 9, ISSUE 10

FIRST STIRRINGS
MADHUKAR GUPTA

p39

WORLD
WAR
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Is the globe poised to explode?

AS

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From the Editor

vol. 9, ISSUE 10 | JANUARY 2016


Anil Tyagi | editor
TR Ramachandran | executive editor
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GS Sood | consulting business editor
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Rakesh Bhardwaj | editorial consultant
Naresh Minocha | contributing editor
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RE we heading for World War III? I have pondered this disturbing


question for a long time after observing the ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq
and al-Sham) activities and the exodus of the Syrian population in
traumatic conditions. Look at the attacks in Paris on the night of November
13 last year by gunmen and suicide bombers, the incident in which Syed
Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik opened fire at a holiday party at the Inland
Regional Centre in San Bernardino in the US on December 2 and the latest
terrorist attack in Pathankot. These may be called stray but the implications
are seriouspossibly rewriting global history in favour of a greater conflict.
World leaders, even after knowing the suffering the world is passing through,
are acting as if the need to resolve the catastrophe is somebody elses
business. So, even after knowing that there are remote possibilities of World
War III, as everybody is aware of the repercussions, why is gfiles carrying a
cover story on WW III? gfiles cover story is an endeavour to comprehend
what is happening in the world these days. Our two senior writers, Alam
Srinivas and Neeraj Mahajan, have analysed the future scenario.
Mahajan, while explaining the devastation of war, writes, 185 out of a
total of 196 countries in the world today are engaged in some form of
armed conflict, civil war, insurgency or other forms of violent unrest. Armed
conflicts around the world have claimed the lives of more than 180,000
people in 2014. Russia and the US appear to be in confrontation mode
without a direct face-off. In the G20 meeting in Istanbul, President Vladimir
Putin of Russia dropped a bombshell. He circulated a list of 40 countries
who, in one way or another, were supporting, funding or arming the ISIS. Is
the aim to topple the only existing superpower? The answer is not so simple.
Global politics has its own dynamics and dimensions. It has elements of
ideology, religion, currency or natural resources; its like a cocktail.
Srinivas says, In effect, imagine an America that uses its political,
diplomatic, military and corporate clout to wage an overt and covert war
not just in Iraq or Syria but across the Middle East, Africa and Asia. Substitute
America with Russia, China, or even the ISIS, and one can visualise the
character and contour of World War III.
After observing the devastations of World War I and II, nobody can even
visualise a WW III. If it happens, nothing will remain in the world. The era of
conventional warfare is gone; one push of the button somewhere will destroy
all habitation across the globe. War has its own economic mechanism and
the tycoons who are involved in this devastating industry, mint money
beyond dreams. Global diplomacy is emerging as a tacit way to achieve
currency dominance and capture more and more natural resources while
camouflaging it with terror and religion. No doubt, religion is the opiate of
the masses. Nobody can now initiate a war but the world is sitting on a spark
and it can burst into flame anywhere, anytime. Developing economies will be
the biggest losersnot only of natural resources but of human resources too.
Everybody in the world has to say a big no to war and has to expose those
who are determined to take the planet towards ruin.
ANIL TYAGI

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editor@gfilesindia.com

gfiles inside the government

vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

CONTENTS

LETTERS
editor@gfilesindia.com

5 Bric-a-Brac

congress looks for leaders, new breed


of party heroes, rss to review bjp
agenda, shinzos friends

the trajectory of Indian politics as of now.


I am remembering a song of the 1960s
era, Jaga hai insaan zamana badal raha,
utha hai toofan zamana badal raha. I
congratulate the author for this beautiful
portrayal of the political scenario post
the Bihar elections.
Ranjit Banerjee via blog

8 Governance

india@cop21
12 chennai: the deluge
44 delhi pollution: political smog

16 Cover Story

sparks that may turn to flames: is the


world poised for world war III?

Civil services: perks


and performance

28 In Conversation

shiv kunal verma discusses the 1962


war, and the mistakes of that era

36 Book Review

on sharad pawars terms


38 role of the civil service

39 First Stirrings

down memory lane with


madhukar gupta

42 Economy

reforming income tax

47 Leisure

travel to madhav national park

50 Perspective
bowing before life

57 By the Way

search for foreign secretary, states


dread pay commission, bsnl sidelined,
delhi officers woes

Good work recognised


This is with reference to the article,
Thinking out of the box (gfiles,
December 2015). I really appreciate the
gfiles initiative as it helps the officers to
be acknowledged, praised and
encourages them to continue their good
work in their field of public service. Such
an award function gives tremendous
encouragement to the real heroes of
India who are 24x7 ready to serve their
nation and sacrifice their lives for
their motherland.
Deepak Mukund via mail

gfiles Governance Awards is an awaited


event of the year. The selection of the
awardees, chief guest, jury, guest of
honour and the ambassadors make this
event remarkable and unique in its own
way. The honouring of Dr Anil Kakodkar,
who was given the Lifetime Achievement
Award for his contribution as a nuclear
scientist, is a well-taken decision by the
jury. One can easily judge that this
award function is undoubtedly genuine
and a favourite among civil servants.
Satish Kumar via email

Bihar elections
I fully agree with the authors
assessment in the article, After the
Bihar storm (gfiles, December 2015) on

gfiles inside the government


vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

An interesting article (Civil services: par,


perk and performance, gfiles, December
2015) has been written on the Seventh
Pay Commission by the writer. The
details provided in the write-up are
mindblowing. The Seventh Pay
Commission has already made headlines
in India and all the news related to it is
very fascinating to read. It helps the
public to understand the working and
payscales of the Indian Government. I
loved this edition of gfiles the most.
Hope to read more in future.
Satish Sao via email
It is ironical that while you are giving
awards to civil servants for excellent
governance, MG Devasahayam condemns
them outright on the very next page.
Taken to the logical conclusion, the
entire civil service from top to bottom
should be abolished because it is beyond
redemption and does not deserve even a
pay hike.
Dr G Sundaram via email

The Modi silence


This is with reference to the article, The
strategy of silence (gfiles, December
2015). What a unique topic related to PM
Narendra Modi. The writer has smartly
written about the drawbacks and
benefits of the Prime Ministers silence
strategy. It is worth a read. If his silence
is one of the reasons for the BJPs loss in
the Bihar election, he must develop a
new strategy.
Shivam Sharma via email

www.gfilesindia.com

Bric-a-brac
friends & foes

Congress in leadership deficit


scindia for mpcc?

HE Congress party has to immediately decide on


two important issues. First, the party has to select
ct
the Deputy Leader of the Lok Sabha as Captain
Amarinder Singh who was holding the post has been
hey
appointed President of the Punjab Congress. Second, they
have to choose a new President of the Madhya Pradesh
h
Congress Committee. The problem is that there are few
w
senior leaders available in the Lok Sabha. The top contender
ender
for the post is Kamal Nath, the seniormost member of the
Congress Legislature Party. Observing the political situation,
uation, he
may not agree to take the post. Another strong contender
der is
Jyotiraditya Scindia. In the given circumstances, he is an
impressive leader but if insiders are to be believed, the
Congress leadership is planning to appoint him the
President of the Madhya Pradesh Congress
Committee. Kamal Nath and Scindia are both articulatee
rty
and influential leaders but their hands are full with party
activity. There are two other important leaders, Ashok Chavan, former Chief Minister of
Maharashtra, and Kanti Lal Bhuria. Both are seasoned politicians and fulfil the loyalty
prerequisite of the Congress.

Speaking to the nation


party spokespersons are the new heroes

HE demands of television have created a furore in


every political party. Every TV channel needs a party
o . If the
ow
spokesperson on its evening show.
representative of a political party is not
ot
seen on screen, it appears hell will
break loose and the nation will be
disappointed. Not surprisingly, every
party has a department with these
guest coordinators for TV
channels. Its a full-time department
that tracks the news, reads
newspapers, keeps track of tweets
and so on. The job of the media
department and these so-called
spokespersons starts from the morning.
ng.
This new breed of politicians dresses up in
the morning and is ready to speak to the
nation from morning till evening. They
ey are
the new heroes of their political

www.indianbuzz.com

parties. However, being in the opposition, the Congress is


faced with a peculiar predicament. The party has 44
members of Parliament and 64 spokespersons. The guest
coordinators are in great demand and are not averse to
throw their weight around. They have their own whims
and fancies and they send those
spokespersons who take care of their
personal needs. Nobody wants to
go to the less-known TV channels
and popular TV channels have
their own choice of leaders.
When the controversy about Robert
Vadra, Sonia Gandhis son-in-law, was
highlighted by the media, the instructions were
to defend Vadra but some spokespersons
refused, stating that Vadra was not a Congress
party member and officially the Congress was under no
obligation to defend him. Those who dared to defy the
diktat have been shown the door. Sources even disclose
that some newly recruited spokespersons brief senior
team members on how to behave, speak and deal with
the media.

gfiles inside the government

vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

INSIDE EYE

ILLUSTRATIONS: ARUNA

Catch-22 situation
rss to discuss bjp agenda

HESE days, it is learnt, the RSS is a concerned


organisation. First, they fought to get the power and,
after achieving it, the top leadership is worried. The
BJP, its political wing, is not delivering the agenda as per the
desired speed. January is going to be a decisive month for
the BJP. The future of two top leadersAmit
adersAmit Shah and
and
n Arun
Jaitleywill have to be decided. RSS chief
Mohan Bhagwat, Bhaiya ji Joshi,,
Dattatreya Hosabale and Krishna
a
Gopal, have to plan the BJPs
roadmap. Earlier, other RSS
stalwarts like Suresh Soni and
Indresh used to advise and
their inputs were considered
valuable but now they have
been reportedly sidelined.
There are many pending
agendas which have to be
implemented and ministers

gfiles inside the government


vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

are helpless to implement in doing so. Sources say that the


top leadership of the RSS is discussing the role of the BJP
leadership in managing the nation. Earlier there was a
discussion that Arun Jaitley be shifted to External Affairs
but with the onslaught by Arvind Kejriwal, this appears to be
a remote possibility. Basically, its a Catch-22 situation for
the BJP and the RSS. In Atal Bihari Vajpayees regime, there
was Lal Krishna Advani, Murli Manohar Joshi and Jaswant
Singh who were working as a team. In Modis regime, there
is only Modi; the word team
team has disappeared. The BJPs
Margd
gdarshak Mandal comprising
compr
Margdarshak
Advani and Joshi is at
log
loggerheads with the RSS.
Advani is not even on talking
terms with the RSS
leadership, though Joshi still
h
has some working relationship
wi
with the RSS. Modi has his own
agend
agenda in mind and is working like
a bullet
b
train. But some voices of
di
dissent are growing louder in
th
the party while others are
waiting for the RSS hammer tto strike.

www.gfilesindia.com

Bric-a-brac
friends & foes

Keeper of promises
shinzo makes time for friends

APANESE Prime Minister Shinzo Abe did the aarti in


Varanasi along with Prime Minister Narendra Modi
during his recent visit in December. One was surprised
to see Shinzo wearing a beautiful yellow jacket, shedding hiss
traditional suit and tie. Shinzo was gifted the jacket by none
other than his friend, Vibhav Kant Upadhyay, who heads thee
India Center Foundation. Sources disclosed that Shinzo
had been asked to wear the jacket during the aarti and not
while travelling with Modi; Shinzo respected the advisory.
When a dignitary like Shinzo visits India officially, there is
no scope for a common citizen to interact with him. Shinzo
has established a good rapport with the India Center
Foundation. Shinzo and Upadhyay know each other for the
last 20 years. And so Shinzo took time off from official
engagements and met Upadhyays influential friendsDr Vivek
ivek Lall,
Global CEO, General Atomics; Rajesh V Shah, Co-Chairman
n and
Managing Director, Mukand Ltd; Dr Shamsheer Vayalil, Founder and
Managing Director, VPS Healthcare; Vivek Nair, Vice Chairman and MD, Hotel Leela; and Saleem lqbal Shervani,
former Minister of State, Foreign Affairs, Government of India. At the meeting, Shinzo said, The role of the India
Center in the India-Japan relationship is significant. The foundation has been working for a very long time in ideating
and authoring initiatives including but not limited to the Varanasi-Kyoto partnership, DMIC and the high-speed train.
In 2005, I visited India just ahead of the visit by the then Prime Minister, Junichiro Koizumi. At that time, Vibhav and I
visited many key policy leaders, including the then Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh, and conveyed these ideas and
initiatives. Shinzo is now the Prime Minister of Japan but he has not forgotten his friendship with those who stood by
him and, irrespective of diplomatic nuances, he kept his word to Upadhyay.

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gfiles inside the government

vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

GOVERNANCE
cop21 ashok lavasa

Climate justice served


India returned from COP21 having played a positive and proactive role in
evolving a consensus on contentious issues and at the same time not
compromising on the issues that mattered in preserving our development
space and the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities.

gfiles inside the government

vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

PHOTOS: PIB

EW things have generated as


much interest worldwide as the
climate change negotiations
in Paris in December 2015. Seldom
in the history of the modern world
have over 150 heads of state and government got together as they did on
November 30, the day the fortnightlong high-voltage, high-decibel negotiations commenced. Le Bourget, an
erstwhile airfield, was converted into
a convention complex to host the
40,000 delegates that had registered
to witness what could be a historic
compact or catastrophe. The shadow
of Copenhagen loomed large and so
did the manoeuvres of the developed
countries and the aspirations of the
developing world.
The challenge before the developing countries, or the non-Annex
countries, was to maintain the sanctity of the principles enshrined in
the UN Framework Convention on
Climate Change. The Annex countries, or the developed countries, on
the other hand, wanted to do away
with the bifurcation represented by
the division of the world into Annex
and non-Annex countries. Their sole
effort was to dilute the differentiation denoted by common but differentiated responsibilities and erase
the concept of historic responsibility.
Their argument was that the world
had changed in the last two decades
and that many non-Annex countries
could no longer be characterised as

Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the President of France, Francois Hollande, at the
launch of the International Solar Alliance during the COP21 summit in Paris on
November 30, 2015.

developing. The argument propagated by India was that despite economic


growth witnessed in the past 20 years,
there continues to be wide disparity in
the world and the developing countries have a long way to go in providing a decent standard of living to their
citizens. It was this right to development that couldnt be compromised
even while developing countries were
committed to following a low emission pathway. It was in this pursuit
of growth that they required technol-

ogy and technology transfer, capacity


building and financial support both
for their mitigation as well as adaptation efforts in order to deal with the
challenge of climate change.
The Paris Agreement on climate
change was adopted on December
12, 2015. It is a legally binding agreement that covers all countries, developed and developing, with the aim to
strengthen the global response to the
threat of climate change, in the context of sustainable development and

www.gfilesindia.com

efforts to eradicate poverty.


The salient features of the Paris
Agreement are as under:
(a) It acknowledges the development
imperatives of developing countries.
It recognises the developing countries right to development and their
efforts to harmonise development
with environment, while protecting
the interests of the most vulnerable.
(b) It recognises the importance of
sustainable lifestyles and sustainable
patterns of consumption with
developed countries taking the lead,
and notes the importance of climate
justice in its preamble.
(c) It seeks to enhance the implementation of the Convention whilst
reflecting the principles of equity
and common but differentiated
responsibilities and respective capabilities, in the light of different
national circumstances.
(d) The objective further ensures
that it is not mitigation-centric and
includes other important elements
such as adaptation, loss and
damage, finance, technology, capacity
building and transparency of action
and support.
(e) Parties contributions under

the Paris Agreement are defined


as
Nationally
Determined
Contributions (NDCs), and a topdown approach of undertaking
mitigation ambition has been
avoided. The NDCs are country-driven and comprehensive.
(f) It maintains differentiation in
mitigation actions of developed and
developing countries.
(g) It recognises that the timeframe
for peaking will be longer for
developing countries.
(h) It recognises that enhanced
support from developed countries to

The Paris Agreement


acknowledges the
development imperatives
of developing countries. It
recognises the developing
countries right to
development and their
efforts to harmonise
development with
environment, while
protecting the interests of
the most vulnerable

developing countries will allow for


higher ambition in their action.
(i) It mandates developed countries to
provide financial resources to developing countries. Other parties may
also contribute, but on a purely voluntary basis.
(j) The accompanying decision to the
Paris Agreement also lays down that
US$100 billion mobilisation of funds
per year by developed countries will
be scaled up after 2020 and before
2025, taking into account the needs
and priorities of developing countries.
(k) It also establishes a new technology framework. This framework notes
the importance of fully realising technology development and transfer in
order to improve resilience to climate
change and to reduce greenhouse gas
emissions. The framework also strives
to support collaborative approaches
to research and development, and
facilitating access to technology, in
particular for early stages of the technology cycle, to developing countries.
(l) A global goal has been established
to increase the adaptive capacity,
strengthening resilience and reducing vulnerability to climate change.
Adaptation has also been accorded
equal importance as mitigation as
demanded by developing countries.
(m) In addition to adaptation, the
Paris Agreement includes the concept
of Loss & Damage and recognises
the importance of averting, minimising and addressing loss and damage
associated with the adverse effects of
climate change and extreme weather
events, and identifies various areas of
cooperation and support.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi addressing the Innovation Summit at COP21 in


Paris on November 30, 2015. US
President Barack Obama, French
President Francois Hollande and Bill
Gates are also seen.

www.indianbuzz.com

gfiles inside the government

vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

GOVERNANCE
cop21 ashok lavasa

(n) A global stocktake, covering


all elements, will take place every
five years to assess the progress in
addressing climate change.
(o) Implementation of REDD+
(Reducing
Emissions
from
Deforestation
and
Forest
Degradation) mechanism has been
anchored in the Paris Agreement.
(p) A new market mechanism to
provide opportunities for voluntary
cooperation in the implementation of
the NDCs has been agreed.
(q) An enhanced system for transparency has been agreed to. This will
cover not only mitigation and adaptation actions, but also the support provided by developed countries.
(r) A separate Capacity Building
Initiative for transparency to help
developing countries has been agreed
to in order to build institutional and
technical capacity.
(s) A new institutional arrangement,
viz. Paris Committee on Capacity
Building,
will
be
established
for enhancing capacity building
activities in developing countries
under the agreement. Developed
countries are to provide financial
support for capacity building to
developing countries.
(t) Pre-2020 actions are also part of
the decisions. The developed country parties are urged to scale up their
level of financial support with a complete roadmap to achieve the goal of
jointly providing US$100 billion by
2020 for mitigation and adaptation
by significantly increasing adaptation
finance from current levels and to further provide appropriate technology
and capacity building support.
The Conference of Parties also
witnessed the launch of the historic
International Solar Alliance (ISA),
conceived as a coalition of solar
resource-rich countries to address
their energy needs and will provide a

10

gfiles inside the government

vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the India Pavilion at the Conference of Parties with
other dignitaries (above); view of the pavilion from outside (below)

platform to collaborate on addressing


the identified gaps through a common,
agreed approach. This alliance was
jointly launched by Prime Minister
Narendra Modi and French President
Franois Hollande on November 30
with representatives of more than 70
countries, including 33 Heads of State
and Heads of Government, attending
the launch ceremony. Prime Minister
Modi also participated in the launch
of Mission Innovation, the publicprivate initiative for collaborative
research and development in cleaner
frontier technologies.
The Ministry of Environment,
Forest & Climate Change set up a
pavilion which was the cynosure
of the COP. It hosted 25 events and
attracted over 6,500 visitors, who
appreciated the story of Indias multi-

farious initiatives and the manner in


which the story was told. Parampara,
a book on traditional Indian climatefriendly lifestyles, was launched by
the Prime Minister at the pavilion.
All in all, India returned from
COP21 having played a positive and
proactive role in evolving a consensus on contentious issues and at
the same time not compromising on
the issues that mattered in preserving our development space and the
principle of common but differentiated responsibilities.
As PM Modi said: The outcome
of the Paris Agreement has no winners or losers. Climate justice has
won and we are all working towards
a greener future. g
The writer is Secretary, Ministry of
Environment, Forests and Climate Change

www.gfilesindia.com

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gfiles inside the government

vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

11

GOVERNANCE

disaster management mg devasahayam

PHOTOS: PIB

A metropolis in deluge
The recent floods in Chennai were the cumulative
outcome of governance failure and the lack of
emergency planning response action

OR once, Prakash Javadekar has


spoken as a true Union environment minister. Though couched
in diplomatic language, he has made
one point clearthe recent deluge
that devastated Indias fourth largest
metropolis with a population of 10 million plus was neither caused by nature
nor was it a climate change event as
being touted by the Government of
Tamil Nadu and its cohorts.
Javadekar said in the Rajya
Sabha that the Chennai floods were
due to heavy rain and the excess
water released from the reservoir
at Chembarambakkam which inundated the floodplains of the River
Adyar. He went on to say: In this

12

gfiles inside the government


vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

case, three days advance warnings


were issued for placing emergency
planning response action by the local
authorities. According to him the
non-climatic reasons for flooding in
cities and industries located in highrisk locations include lack of proper
urban planning, demographic pressures, improper sewage disposal and
drainage systems, and encroachment
of land. What he implied is that the
deluge was the cumulative outcome of
failure in all the above and the lack of
emergency planning response action.
In sum, it is a case of failure of governance, both civil and environmental.
Yet, the Government of Tamil
Nadu has chosen to call this deluge

as a rarest of rare natural calamity.


The Merriam Webster dictionary defines calamity as a disastrous
event marked by great loss and lasting distress and suffering. Disaster
is something that happens suddenly
and causes much suffering or loss to
many people. While the second part
of the definition is true for the recent
deluge in the Chennai metropolis,
the first part is not applicable. While
it caused much suffering and loss to
many people resulting in great loss
and lasting distress and suffering, it
neither happened suddenly nor was it
caused by nature.
Chennai did have some excessive
monsoon in November and December
2015rainfall of 1,608 mmbut this
was less than the 2005 downpour
of 1,984.5 mm. Yet the inundation
was much more severe, widespread
and devastating. There are three

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reasons for this. One, the delayed,


excessive and unannounced water
release from the Chembarambakkam
reservoir and two, the near-absence
of any disaster management or
emergency
planning
response
action. These are due to the style of
administration in Tamil Nadu wherein
there is extreme concentration of
power, authority and decision making
at one centre, which has drained out
suo moto actions and initiatives from
RIFLDOVDFURVVWKHERDUG
Three, this time around Chennai
had to bear the brunt of excessive
rains in the neighbouring districts
of Kancheepuram (1,815 mm) and
Thiruvallur (1,466.4 mm). This is due
to the marauding urban sprawlthe
unplanned, uncontrolled spreading of
urban development into rural areas
of these two districts which are on
the periphery of Chennai city, caused
out by greedy land grabbers and real
HVWDWH PDD IDFLOLWDWHG E\ FROOXVLYH
and corrupt government machinery.
This had choked and blocked natures
right-of-way and storage for the rain
waterlakes, ponds, rivers, rivulets,
marsh, wetlands.
)LUVW WKLQJV UVW 7KHUH ZDV D
complete mess-up regarding the
release of surplus waters from the
Chembarambakkam reservoir, the
citys main water storage tank, into
the Adyar river which runs to the Bay
of Bengal almost through the centre of
the city. On the evening of December
1, 2015, the Adyar was already in spate
due to incessant rain in the catchment
areas. As against the warning issued
around 5 pm that 7,500 cusecs of
water would be released from the
lake, around midnight four times
that (29,000 cusecs) gushed out. All
KHOOEURNHORRVHDQGRRGOHYHOVURVH
to 12 feet in some areas as the river
unleashed its fury.
Why did this happen? There was

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VSHFLF DGYDQFH ZDUQLQJ IURP WKH


Meteorological Department about
very heavy rainfall in the week
beginning November 29. Even the
quantum of rain was forecast. The
Chembarambakkam reservoir was
OOLQJ XS IDVW DQG WKH 3XEOLF :RUNV
Department engineers were agitated.
They dare not open the sluice gates
without the green signal from the
Chief Minister. So they wrote to the
PWD Secretary who in turn sought

No attention was given to


the emotional and
psychological side of the
victims, most of whom
were traumatised by the
devastation and humiliated
by the alms-giving
attitude of the officials.
To make things worse,
political workers and
politicians of all shapes
and sizes descended on
the scene, indulging in
blatant rent-seeking
from the tragedy

instructions from the Chief Secretary.


In Tamil Nadu under the present
dispensation, even the Chief Secretary
cannot approach the Chief Minister
directly. By the time the maze of
bureaucratic red tape was cut, it was
past midnight of December 1 and the
water level had crossed the threshold.
The released surplus waters rushed
into the swollen Adyar without
any warning for the people living
downstream and most of Chennai
city was deluged, resulting in huge
destruction and killing 280 people
that night. Even now water-turnedsewage is stagnating at several places
in the city, spreading disease.

ACED with severe criticism, the


Chief Secretary admitted that
the Controlling Officer of the
Chembarambakkam reservoir is the
competent authority under the Rules
for Flood Regulation to regulate flood
discharge.The Chief Secretary states
that as heavy rain was forecast, senior
Supervisory Officers of PWD were also
present at the site, personally monitoring the situation. True indeed, but
the engineers will not dare to use their
authority because in the Tamil Nadu
government, every activity should

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vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

13

GOVERNANCE

disaster management mg devasahayam

be carried out only under the orders


of the Honourable Chief Minister.
Ministers worshipfully invoke her
name multiple times in every sentence they speak. Even under disaster
conditions, this holds true. Officers
coordinating relief work publicly
stated that they are doing so not as
their duty but only under CMs orders.
Even the directly elected Mayor of the
city distributes food packets only on
the orders of the CM.
War-footing is the word used when
major disasters are to be managed.
This term describes the condition
or status of a military force or other
organisation when operating under
a state of war or as if a state of war
existed. This was not so in Chennai.
Firstly, the organisations responsible
were not in a state of readiness to
act. During the initial hours critically
affecting the safety of the citizens,
there was no systematic operation or
emergency mobilisation for rescuing
the marooned victims. There were
only patchy and disjointed efforts
put in mostly by volunteers and some
RIFLDOV(YHQWKHOLPLWHGUHOLHIHIIRUWV
were only targetted at the physical
side of the victims like moving
them to relief centres, providing
food packets, old clothing, etc. No
attention was given to the emotional
and psychological side of the victims,
most of whom were traumatised by
the devastation and humiliated by the
DOPVJLYLQJDWWLWXGHRIWKHRIFLDOV
8QWUDLQHG JRYHUQPHQW RIFLDOV
IRXQG LW GLIFXOW WR VHHN RXW WKH
victims and offer spontaneous relief/
assistance. To make things worse,
political workers and politicians of
all shapes and sizes descended on
the scene, indulging in blatant rentseeking from the tragedy. These
worthies and busybodies, having no
knowledge of relief management,
elbowed out the government agencies

14

gfiles inside the government


vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

and voluntary groups to display that


they were the only people to stand
by the masses! No wonder that none
of the international and national
NGOs trained and equipped to deal
with such disasters made their
appearance though many of them had
rushed in within days of the tsunami
that struck the Tamil Nadu coast
on December 26, 2004. The NGOhounding indulged in by the Central
Government of late also contributed
to this indifference!

GNORING these realities, government sources talked of mega-operations by central and armed forces
including warships, army boats and
helicopters. Such interventions have
only limited impact unless the political leadership and civil administration remains nimble-footed, capable
of taking quick decisions and acting
upon them. Rescue, relief and rehabilitation involve nuts-and-bolts jobs,
local knowledge and an awareness of
the local topography/demography.
In the Chennai context, the Mayor,
Corporation Commissioner, District
Collector and Police Commissioner
are the ideal sources of information,
requirements and solutions. But all
were waiting for orders from above.

The Tamil Nadu


government has not set up
functional Disaster
Management Agencies as
mandated by the Disaster
Management Act, 2005. In
the event, the Madras High
Court had to step in suo
moto and seek explanation
from the state government
for the lack of response
and coordination

This led to lack of coordination between the local authorities and the
National Disaster Management Force
as well as the Army rescue team. This
was so because the Tamil Nadu government has not set up functional
state district/city Disaster Management Agencies as mandated by the
Disaster Management Act, 2005. In
the event, the Madras High Court had
to step in suo moto and seek an explanation from the state government.
Now to the urban sprawl. This is
due to the predatory development
model and two catastrophic decisions
of the UPA I government in 2004:
one, to liberalise extremely the Special
Economic Zone Rules, and the other,
allowing 100 per cent FDI in the real
estate business. With the pumping in
of a massive quantum of black money,
the property market boomed and
land prices within city limits hit the
sky. Unscrupulous elements and real
estate sharks moved to the outskirts
of the city and grabbed agricultural
and low-lying land of all shapes and
sizes which constituted the natural
rainwater storage and drains that are
ecologically sensitive areas.
The Chennai Master Plan-cumDevelopment Regulations notified in
2008 prohibited construction in these
places. Following up the Master Plan,
at the request of the Corporation of
Chennai, an expert group, including

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The Union Minister for Urban Development,


Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation and
Parliamentary Affairs, M Venkaiah Naidu,
meeting the Tamil Nadu Chief Minister,
J Jayalalithaa, to discuss the flood situation
and its management in Tamil Nadu.

this writer, submitted the Revised


Chennai City Development Plan
2009, (CDP), suggesting rehabilitation of the citys waterways to ward off
threat of floods to the city. The purpose of the plan was to guide development of the Chennai Metropolitan
Area (CMA) through the year 2026
and to make Chennai a prime metropolis which will become more liveable,
economically vibrant, environmentally sustainable and with better assets
for the future generations.
CDP mapped and identified the
ecologically sensitive areas of CMA
and suggested a macro-level growth
strategy with strongest steps to
maintain critical environmental
assets in the CMA by further discouraging sprawling town and village
growth and continuing a high level
of development support to priority
peri-urban areas. It recommended
nil construction in waterways, water
bodies, rivers and marshes, low-riselow density construction in adjacent
lands and medium to high-rise-highdensity construction at other places.
As a solution to demographic pressures CDP suggested sustainable
neighbourhood development and
satellite townships with well-designed
transport corridors to the city.
In the battle between the planners
and the real estate mafia, the latter
won hands down. What is worse, both

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the central and state governments


chipped in with large infrastructure
and other constructions in these very
eco-sensitive areas. The Elevated
Expressway from Madras Port to
Maduravoil is being constructed over
the Cooum river, a natural drain;
the Mass Rapid Transport System,
a concrete monster, runs above the
Buckingham Canal, the longest manmade drain; a wide highway with IT
skyscrapers split the vast marshland
of Pallikaranai. As to private development, Phoenix Mall, the largest in the
metropolis, sits right on the Velachery
lake bed.
The world class, multi-specialty MIOT Hospital is perched on
the banks of River Adyar. Global
Hospital of the same class is deep
in the low-lying paddy fields. Large
engineering colleges and private
universities have come up on marshes, water bodies or floodplains,
mostly on encroached or puramboke land. The posh high-rise MRC
Nagar, described as the Manhattan
of Chennai, has blossomed on the
prohibited Coastal Regulation Zone
near the high tide line and the estuary of the Adyar. All these constitute
a recipe for disaster.
We need to have a look at the growth
pattern of CMA to understand where
the metropolis is heading. Population
density has gone up from 769 persons

per sq km in 1971 to 2,109 in 2011.


During the same period, built-up
area has gone up from 1.46 per cent to
18.6 per cent. Since 1991, area under
vegetation has gone down by 22 per
cent and open spaces, marshy land
and floodplains reduced by 18.14 per
cent. At this rate, by 2016, built-up
area will increase to 36.6 per cent of
the total city mass while open spaces
and eco-sensitive areas will shrink to
just 33 per cent!

HE Chennai deluge is a combination of greed, corruption


and disaster leading to destruction and death. No estimation has
been made so far, since the central
fact-finding team that made a brief
appearance after the first bout of
rains has not reappeared even
three weeks after the real deluge.
Undaunted, the Tamil Nadu Chief
Minister has made a pitch for about
`26,000 crore and wants the central
government to bankroll the entire
amount because: The costs are very
large and it is very difficult for the
State to meet the cost, particularly
after the huge loss of Central tax
devolution and transfers suffered by
it consequent on the 14th Finance
Commissions recommendations.
Despite tall talk of development
and governance, we are back to
square one. Governance failure
and destructive development were
responsible for the deluge and the
taxpayers, the victims, will have to
foot the bill. What a travesty! g

The writer is a former Army and IAS


officer. Email: deva1940@gmail.com

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vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

15

COVER STORY
world war III

World War III


It is clear that World War III will be inspired and characterised by three
factorsan aggressive attack on national currencies, capture of nations
natural resources, and either direct or indirect terror-like military
strategiesand camouflaging them with religion are evident now.
Alam Srinivas and Neeraj Mahajan analyse.

16

gfiles inside the government

vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

www.gfilesindia.com

Is the third global war


round the corner?
by ALAM SRINIVAS

OR the past seven decades, since


the end of World War II, global
leaders, defence policymakers
and military experts have speculated
about how, when and where World
War III will happen. The when and
where is immaterial today; given the
hundreds of hot and dangerous spots
across the globe, it can happen anytime, anywhere. The how, though, is
still relevant. During the Cold War, it
was felt that the new global war would
be instigated by one of the two superpowers, America or the Soviet Union.
The Cuban missile crisis was a prime
example of this mindset.
After the Soviet break-up, the focus
shifted to rogue elements, who could
access nuclear weapons from the
disintegrated Communist regimes to
spark a world war. Later came the
theory of the clash of civilisations
Christianity versus Islamwhich
initially popular, was later discredited,
and then revived in recent years.
During the Second Gulf War, the
thinking was about weapons of mass
destruction, be it biological, chemical
or nuclear. There was also talk
about a global cyber or technological
war that could lead to a global
economic meltdown.
In the second decade of the 21st
century, it is clear that World War III
will be inspired and characterised by
three factorsan aggressive attack on
national currencies, capture of
nations natural resources, and either

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direct or indirect terror-like military


strategies. The trio can conspire to
bring nations to their knees, and force
them to bow to the diktats of nations,
or elements, that are able to realise
such objectives. In fact, a look at
events over the past two decades is
enough to prove that such conspiracies
are already being enacted.
There is now a clash between currencies to gain global primacydollar, euro, yuan, and possibly the
rupeeover the next two decades.
The US, Europe, China, India and
others have joined an aggressive and
neverending race to acquire global
natural resources in Africa, central
Asia, Latin America, and even some of
the developed nations. At the same
time, while the smaller countries and
informal global groups have resorted
to direct terror tactics, developed
ones like the US, France, Russia and
China are using their military
strengths to terrorise the world.

What was till a few years ago seen


as disparate global trends have converged into an umbrella strategy that
can lead to World War III. Imagine a
nation, or a global group, that can
crystallise a vision to combine currency warfare with the battle for natural resources, and underline it with
terror tactics to achieve the first two
objectives. Imagine the combination
between Al-Qaeda or IS (Islamic
State), George Soros, the legendary
currency speculator, China with its
single-minded focus to capture global
natural resources, and Russia with its
military strength.
In effect, imagine an America that
uses its political, diplomatic, military
and corporate clout to wage an overt
and covert war not just in Iraq or
Syria, but across the Middle East,
Africa and Asia. Substitute America
with Russia, China, or even the IS,
and one can visualise the character
and contour of World War III. It will

VIOLENCE

COSTS

13.4%
OF WORLD GDP

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vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

17

COVER STORY
world war III

not be about religions or territories. It


will be about a nations or groups
ability to effect a grandiose
combination of different kinds of
naked powers.
Currency wars
Over the past three decades, entire
nations, even continents, have capitulated to attacks on their currencies.
Speculators and traders, whether
cajoled by vested national and global
interests, or for sheer greed of profits,
have forced governments to accept
their scheme of things. They have
shoved and pushed regimes across
the globe to adhere to their visions
and blueprints. Currency warfare has
become one of the best ways to push
the world to the brink of a global war.
Even the most powerful currencies,
be it the dollar, pound or euro, are not
safe anymore.
The turbulent 1990s witnessed
waves of attacks on various global
currencies. In the early years of the
decade, hedge funds, either led or
violently aided by the legendary
Soros, launched a virulent war on the
British pound. Apparently, Soros
made a billion-dollar profit as the
pound fell and lost its relevance.

18

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vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

While the smaller countries


and informal global groups
have resorted to direct
terror tactics, developed
ones like the US, France,
Russia and China are using
their military strengths to
terrorise the world
It forced Britain and Italy to opt out
of the newly formed European
Monetary System, a precursor to
the grand European Union. The
hedge funds wrecked the foundations
of the European Exchange Rate
Mechanism, which was a critical pillar
of the Union.

HE late 1990s saw the onset of


the Asian currency crisis, which
was engineered by currency
speculators, possibly backed by interested nations. As currencies across
East Asia, including Malaysia, spiralled into an unstoppable free fall,
the then Prime Minister of Malaysia,
Mahathir Mohammed, questioned
the motives of the speculators.
According to a paper by Rawi Abdelal
and Laura Alfaro, Mahathir called

Sorosthe former thought the latter


was behind the currency crisisa
moron. Soros said Mahathir was a
menace to his own country.
It turned out to be a classic Market
versus Mahathir interaction, where
the market-backers felt it was
important to discipline errant
governments, and the rulers felt that
the idea that the market will discipline
government is sheer nonsense. It was
a case of who will decide what is good
for a nationexternal forces or
nationalistic ones. It was a narrative
where a country had to decide whether
it would accept the diktats of western
interests, or adhere to its notions of
right and wrong. In the end, apart
from Malaysia, other East Asian
nations accepted the market.
After the East Asian crisis came the
Russian rouble collapse. In the late
1990s, Russias leader, Boris Yeltsin,
was unable to appoint a Prime
Minister that he wanted as the currency downfall led to deeper economic crisis in Russia. In the end, Yeltsin
had to accept nationalistic demands,
and appoint a Prime Minister who
was a compromise candidate. Yet
again, a former superpower almost
lost its economic freedom, and had

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to fight to regain its clout. It took


almost two decades for a smaller
Russia to become a recognised global
force in 2015.
The 21st century witnessed an epic
currency battle, the kind that can easily lead to World War III. It was a tussle between the dollar, which had
dominated global currencies for several decades, especially after World
War II, and the fledgling euro, a
European currency that was born in
1999. In the initial period, the euro
lost out to the dollar. From 1
euro=$1.2, the euro slumped to 83
cents within months. But suddenly
things changed. A slowdown in the US
economy, slump in its share prices,
and 9/11 forced investors to shift from
dollar to euro.
However, the crucial support for
the euro came when the largest oil
producers decided that they wanted
their income from crude sales to be
designated in euros rather than
dollars. First, in November 2000,
Iraq told the United Nations that its
earnings from the Food-for-Oil
programme should be in euros. Iran,
another America-hater, converted
half its foreign exchange reserves
from dollar to euro. North Korea,
which was among Americas top-most
enemies, too said that it would
soon shift to the euro. These shifts
could have proved cataclysmic for
the dollar.
In the early part of this century, the
dollar was so powerful that half of the
global exports, two-thirds of all the
official global foreign exchange
reserves held by various nations, and
four-fifths of global foreign exchange
transactions were denominated in
dollars. As nations bought dollar
assets to save their incomes, the
inflows helped America. If the nations,
especially those who earned huge
amounts from sale of oil, decided to

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shift to the euro, they would sell their


dollar assets, which would force the
dollar down. It would mark the end of
the dollar hegemony.
Several experts felt that this was
one of the reasons for Americas second attack on Iraq. It wasnt really
about weapons of mass destruction,
but it was an attempt to preserve the
dominance of the dollar too. As
Outlook wrote in 2003, Once
(George) Bush gains control over
Iraqs oilfields, he can pressure OPEC
to fall in line. He can then send signals
to unfriendly nationsincluding oil
producers like Russia and importers
like Chinato stick with the dollar.
The US can also play the stick-andcarrot game with Saudi Arabia, whose
switch is critical in the currency war.
The objective: prevent oil producers
and global importers to shift from the
dollar to euro.

Battle for natural resources


FTER World War II, most of
the nations in the Middle East,
Africa, Latin America and Asia
turned their backs on Western
hegemonies like the US and European
countries. Over the next few decades,
natural resources assets, especially in
oil and gas, and minerals, were
nationalised, or appropriated from
the western companies. A wave of
nationalised capitalism set the tone
for ownership of natural resources.
This forced American and European
firms to seek new agreements with
nations, or seek new opportunities in

uncharted territories.
Then came the China wave. By the
end of the first decade of this century,
it was clear that China was into
aggressive acquisition of global natural resources. According to a 2010
study by Theodore H Moran, Backed
by the Chinese government, Chinese
companies have been acquiring equity stakes in natural resources, extending loans to mining and petroleum
investors, and writing long-term procurement contracts for oil and minerals. These activities have aroused concern that China might be locking up
natural resource supplies, gaining
preferential access to available output, extending control over the
worlds extractive industries.
One of the prime examples of such
control was in Africa. According to
venturesafrica.com, Across Africa,
the growing presence of Chinese
investments in economy and infrastructure is evident. In the last ten
years, various state-owned firms
have become major investors in Africa
with China being the single largest
bilateral source of annual foreign
investment in Africa. However, what
was unique about China was its alternative and innovative attempts to
forge close links with African nations.
For example, in sports, Chinas
investments in Africa, popularly
termed Stadium Diplomacy, has
been focused on infrastructural developments which has and will, inevitably in the future, result in marked
improvements in certain sports.
China built several football stadiums across Africa in a soccer-crazed
continent. In most cases, China bore
the entire cost of construction through
concessional bilateral loans. In other
cases, strategic partnerships were
forged that enabled the building up of
world-class football facilities. The
recent rise of African nations in World

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vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

19

COVER STORY
world war III

World War I
Also known as the War to End All Wars, and the Great War. It was one of the deadliest conflicts in history
Duration: 4 years, 3 months and 2 weeks (July 28, 1914 to
November 11, 1918)
How did it end: The fighting stopped after a general armistice was agreed upon and the signing of the Treaty of
Versailles by both sides.
Cause: Differences in foreign policies. Immediate cause
was the assassination of Austrias Archduke Franz
Ferdinand. After the assassination, Austria declared war on
Serbia. Russia stepped in to defend Serbia. Germany
declared war on Russia to protect Austria. This led France
to declare war on Germany. Germany invaded Belgium.
This caused Britain to declare war on Germanyall in just
a few days.
Fought between: WWI was fought between the Allied
Powers (France, Russia, United States and Britain) and the
Central Powers (Germany, Austria-Hungary, the Ottoman
Empire, and Bulgaria). In total, 30 countries were involved
in the conflict. Italy, once part of the Triple Alliance
with Germany and Austria-Hungary, fought on the side of
the Allies.
Conflict zone: Europe, Africa, Middle East, Pacific islands,
China and coastal South & North America. Majority of the
fighting took place in Europe along two fronts: the western
front and the eastern front. The western front was a long
line of trenches that ran from the coast of Belgium to
Switzerland. A lot of the fighting on this front took place in
France and Belgium. The eastern front was between
Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Bulgaria on one side and
Russia and Romania on the other.
Strategy: Soldiers fought largely in trenches during the
war. Thousands suffered from stress, known as shell-shock.
The British and French trenches were squalid, whereas the
German trenches were luxurious in comparison, with
bunks and decent cooking facilities.
Major Battles: A lot of the war was fought along the western front. The armies hardly moved. They just bombed and
shot at each other from the trenches. Some of the major
battles included the First Battle of Marne, and the Battles of
Somme, Tannenberg, Gallipoli, and Verdun.
Casualties: More than 70 million military personnel participated in one of the largest wars in history. Over 9 million
combatants and 7 million civilians died and another 21 million were wounded as a result of the war. Over a million
soldiers were killed in the infamous Battle of the Somme
aloneabout 30,000 in just one day.

20

gfiles inside the government

vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

Around 11 per cent of the population of France was


killed or wounded during the war. About 116,000
Americans were killed, even though the US was only in the
war for about 7 months.
Odd facts:
t *U XBT UIF GJSTU NBKPS XBS XIFSF BJSQMBOFT BOE UBOLT
were used.
t %PHTBOE1JHFPOTXFSFVTFEUPDBSSZNFTTBHFTJODBQsules attached to their body. Dogs played a role in carrying telegraph wires while about 500,000 pigeons carrying messages were dropped by parachute behind
enemy lines.
t "O VOPGGJDJBM USVDF XBT EFDMBSFE PO $ISJTUNBT &WF JO
1914. Both sides sang Christmas carols and played
matches on that day in no-mans land and exchanged
food and souvenirs. The ceasefire was known as the
Christmas Truce and sentries on both sides had orders to
shoot any soldier carrying weapons.
Long-term Impact:
t $BOOPOT BOE BSUJMMFSZ XFSF GPVOE UP CF FYUSFNFMZ
loudexplosives used to destroy a bridge in France
could be heard 130 miles away in London. Hence, many
new weapons like the famous Big Bertha, a 48-tonne
gun capable of firing shells over 9 miles away, were
invented. It took several hours for over 200 men to
assemble the gun.
t 5BOLT5IF GJSTU UBOLT JOWFOUFE CZ UIF #SJUJTI XFSF
called landships." Some of them, called male tanks, had
cannons while female tanks had machine guns.
t /JOFUZQFSDFOUPGUIFNJMMJPOTPMEJFSTGSPN"VTUSJB
Hungary were either injured or killed.
t "UFSSPSJTUHSPVQDBMMFEUIF#MBDL)BOEXBTSFTQPOTJCMF
for assassinating Archduke Ferdinand.
t .BSJF$VSJFIFMQFEUPFRVJQWBOTXJUIYSBZNBDIJOFT
that enabled French doctors to see bullets in wounded
men. These vans were called petites Curies, meaning
little Curies.
Result:
t "MMJFTXPO
t 5IF (FSNBO 3VTTJBO 0UUPNBO  BOE "VTUSP
Hungarianempires ended.
t 5SBOTGFSPG(FSNBOBOEGPSNFS0UUPNBO&NQJSFDPMPniesto other powers.
t /FXDPVOUSJFTFNFSHFEJO&VSPQFBOEUIF.JEEMF&BTU

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World War II
WW II was the bloodiest conflict in human history. The world was in a state of total war.
Duration: 6 years 1 day (Sept 1, 1939 to Sept 2, 1945).
Germany started an unprovoked attack on Poland. In
retaliation, France and Britain declared war on Germany.
Japan was already at war with the Republic of China. Many
of the world's countries got involved.
How did it end: WW II ended with the unconditional surrender of the Axis powers. On 8 May 1945, the Allies accepted Germany's surrender, about a week after Adolf Hitler
committed suicide.
Causes of World War Two: One of the long-term causes of
the war was the anger felt in Weimar Germany over the
Treaty of Versailles and inability of the League of Nations to
deal with major international issues. Hitler wanted to push
the boundaries and see what he could get away with. His
first major transgression was his defiance of the Versailles
Treaty. In 1936 Hitlers Nazi Germany re-occupied
Rhineland, forbidden by Versailles. Hitler was determined
to expand east. Czechoslovakia and Poland were his next
targets. Hitler referred to the Munich Agreement as a scrap
of paper.
Fought between: The Axis [(Germany, Italy, Japan,
Slovakia, Nov. 1940), Hungary (Nov. 1940), Romania (Nov.
1940), Bulgaria (March 1941)] and the Allies [Australia,
Belgium, Brazil, Canada, China, Czechoslovakia, Denmark,
Estonia, France, Greece, India, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, The
Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, South Africa,
United Kingdom, United States, USSR, Yugoslavia]
Major Battles: WW II was fought on different frontiers such
as Russia, the Pacific Ocean, Western Europe and China.
Some of these battles were Battle of Khalkhin Gol, Battle of
Britain (air battle for England), Invasion of Poland, Operation
Barbarossa (Case Barbarossa), Battle of Moscow, Battle of

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Stalingrad, Invasion of Normandy, Battle of Okinawa, Battle


of Berlin and Battle of the Bulge.
Casualties: Over 60-80 million people, about 3% of the
1940 world population (2.3 billion), were killed.
Odd Facts:
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the Allied and Axis nations.
t 'JOMBOEOFWFSPGGJDJBMMZKPJOFEFJUIFSUIF"MMJFTPSUIF"YJT
and was at war with the Soviet Union at the outbreak of
World War II. In 1940, Finland joined forces with Nazi
Germany to repel the Soviets; however, in 1944, Finland
joined the Soviets to oust the Germans.
t 4XJU[FSMBOE 4QBJO 1PSUVHBMBOE4XFEFOXFSFOFVUSBM
in the war.
t 5IF 4PWJFU 6OJPO MPTU UIF NPTU TPMEJFSTNPSF UIBO
seven million.
t "QQSPYJNBUFMZTJYNJMMJPO+FXTEJFEJO/B[JDPODFOUSBUJPO
camps.
t )JSPP 0OPEB  B +BQBOFTF TPMEJFS TUJMM GJHIUJOH UIF XBS 
was found by a search party on Lubang island in the
Philippines in March 1974. After being convinced that
the war was over he was flown to Manila and formally
surrendered to President Ferdinand Marcos. Onoda died
on January 16, 2014, at the age of 91.
Long-term Impact:
t #FHJOOJOH PG OVDMFBS BOE DPOWFOUJPOBM BSNT SBDF5IF
atomic bomb invented during World War II is still a
problematic leftover from World War II.
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t $PME8BSCFUXFFOUIFUXPSFNBJOJOHTVQFSQPXFST
t $JWJMXBSTJOEP[FOTPGQMBDFTBSPVOEUIFXPSME
Result:
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Britain by annexing the Baltic states (Estonia, Latvia, and
Lithuania) and by making extreme reparations demands
upon Germany, Hungary, and Poland. They also
supported rebels in Greece, Turkey, and Iran, aided the
Communist uprising in China. These actions led to a
prolonged period of tension called the 'cold war'
between the Western powers.
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separated from the rest of the world by an iron curtain.
t 6OJUFE /BUJPOT XBT FTUBCMJTIFE BOE JUT DIBSUFS XBT
signed by 51 countries in 1945.

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21

COVER STORY
world war III

Cup football tournaments can be


attributed to the building of such
assets that allowed citizens to watch
world-class teams in action.
An article in The Economist noted,
Chinese firms are going global for the
usual reasons: to acquire raw
materials, get technical know-how
and gain access to foreign markets.
But they are under the guidance of a
state that many countries consider as
a strategic competitor, not an ally. As
our briefing explains, it often appoints
executives, direct deals and finances
them through state banks. Once
bought, natural resource firms can
become captive suppliers of the
Middle Kingdom.
Now several other nations have
joined the new global game. The ones
which own the natural resources, like
Australia and Latin America, wish to
leverage their strengths to get the best
out of competing nations like India
and China. The ones which seek natural resources, like India and China,
hope to do deals that will favour them.
In some cases, India and China have
joined hands in strategic partnerships
to acquire natural resource assets.
Links with terror
Now add to the wars on currencies
and battle for natural resources, statesponsored terror, indirect form of

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vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

militancy, and the rise of global


groups that can control the economies
of a nation or region. State-sponsored
terror is not akin to what Pakistan
does in India, but what America has
done in Afghanistan, Iraq, and now
Syria. It is equivalent to the rise of
Russias regional ambitions that have
rejuvenated in the past year or so with
its humungous rise in military
expenditure. It is akin to Chinas support of dictatorial regimes across continents, just the manner in which
America and Britain did in the past
few decades.

NDIRECT form of terrorism was


perfected by Saudi Arabia over the
past few decades as it reportedly
exported jihad through donations,
support to conservative educational
institutions in the Islamic world, and
covert aid to nations and groups that
were keen to support militancy. This
has happened for several decades but
Saudi Arabia, and then Iran as the
Shia competitor, took it to another
level. Over the years, Pakistan tried to
act as a Sunni counterbalance to Saudi
Arabia, but the size of its nation and
economy prevented it from usurping
Saudis global objectives.
The rise of Al-Qaeda, and now the
IS, are sure-shot examples of what
independent groups can achieve, and

aid in fuelling a global war. Americanled efforts to neutralise and decimate


Al-Qaeda were a form of a global war.
The same is true with the globalised,
though uncoordinated, attempts to
eliminate the IS. But imagine if the
IS, or the new form of Al-Qaeda,
get support from several nations, as
was, and is, the case with them. Until
now, Europe and the US have
prevented such focused strategy. But
whos to know what can happen in the
near future.
Combine all the above three
elements and one can imagine the
face of World War III. It will be unlike
what one has imagined so far. It will be
completely different from the various
theories that have emerged so far. It
will be a combustible combination
of economics, diplomacy, politics,
militarian and terrorism. It will take a
form that will be complex and difficult
to unravel.
So finally it seems the flaring
may happen along religious lines.
Neither currency nor natural resource
can possibly become the trigger.
The first light may come from terror,
which is divided and conflicted
around religion. So it is back to the
clash of civilisations, or to be unfair
to Samuel Huntington, the clash
of civilisations versus cultures, or
merely the clash. g

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World War III:


myth or reality?
Where is peace? Armed conflicts around the world have claimed the lives of
more than 180,000 people in 2014 while deaths due to terrorist activities have
increased 61 per cent in the past five years. As many as 18,000 lives have been
lost in just five countriesIraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Nigeria and Syria.
by NEERAJ MAHAJAN

EACE is the greatest illusion


today. The whole world is a
battlefield. There is no place in
the whole physical or virtual
world put together that you can call
totally peaceful.
As many as 185 out of a total of 196
countries in the world today are currently engaged in some form of armed
conflict, civil war, insurgency or other
forms of violent unrest. There are
only less than a dozen countries in the
world today that are not involved in
any violence or conflict within or outside their borders.
Just the US alone is involved in 134
wars. These include the recent military actions in Afghanistan, Vietnam,
Iraq, Somalia and Yemen besides the
global war on terror which has culminated in military actions against the

Islamic State, Al-Qaeda and its affiliates and other major counterterrorism operations. On May 1, 2011, US
Navy SEALs killed Osama bin Laden
in a night raid in Abbottabad,
Pakistan. Similar CIA, US Special
Forces and counterterrorism operations have been reported in Iraq,
Afghanistan, Algeria, Iran, Malaysia,
Mali, Nigeria, Pakistan, Philippines,
Somalia, Syria and Yemen. A more
exhaustive list could involve countries
like Indonesia, Thailand, Colombia,
Peru, as well as several other countries in Eastern and Central Asia. This
is notwithstanding the fact that the
US Congress hasnt officially declared
war since 1942.
Some experts believe that America
tops the list of countries that have
fought the most wars in its 200-yearold history. The British have invaded
almost 90 per cent of the countries

2014
42

2012
51

active conflicts

active conflicts

2010
55

2008
63

active conflicts

active conflicts

180,000

110,000

49,000

56,000

fatalities

fatalities

fatalities

fatalities

IISS

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around the globe. Just 22 out of the


200-odd countries in the worldlike
Mongolia, Guatemala, Tajikistan,
Marshall Islands and Luxembourg
have never been invaded by the
British according to a book titled All
the Countries We've Ever Invaded:
And the Few We Never Got Round To.
The only other nation which comes
close is Francewhich also holds the
record for facing the brunt of most
British invasions.
Prominent among the countries
experiencing armed conflicts or warlike situations today include the US,
Russia, Afghanistan, Algeria, Africa,
Colombia, Congo, Ethiopia, India,
Pakistan,
Philippines,
Somalia,
Sudan, South Sudan, Syria, Thailand,
Turkey, Uganda, Yemen, Israel,
Libya, Malaysia, Mali, Mozambique,
Myanmar, Nigeria and Iraq.
In terms of casualties, the largest
conflicts are in Afghanistan, Congo,
Israel, Iraq, Libya, Nigeria, Pakistan,
South Sudan, Syria and Ukraine. The
Middle East and North Africa are hotbeds of violence, terrorist activity and
revolutionary upsurge. Countries like
Syria and Libya are without any doubt
the most violent regions in the world.
Almost half the population of Syria
has been displaced by the civil war.

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23

COVER STORY
world war III

HESE armed conflicts have


forced more than 1 per cent of
the global population, or about
73 million people, to leave their
homes. According to the Global Peace
Index, a report published by the
Institute for Economics and Peace,
the actual number of refugees and
internally displaced persons today is
more than even World War II. One in
every 130 people on Earth is currently
a refugee or displacedmostly as a
fallout of the conflicts in the Middle
East. In Syria, alone, 13 million out of
22 million people are displaced. The
cost of waging war, homicide, internal
security, violence and crimes has
reached $14.3 trillion in the past year.
Out of this, the cost of supporting
refugees and displaced persons is
$128 billionit has risen 267 per cent
since 2008.
The number of people killed in conflict has risen from 49,000 in 2010 to
180,000 in 2014. Out of this, the
number of deaths from terrorism is
estimated to be around 20,000 a year.
With groups like Islamic State and
Boko Haram expanding their networks, the number of deaths caused
by terrorism more than doubled from
8,450 to almost 18,000 in the last
eight years. These numbers are

Countries that never fought a war


Strange though it might seem, there is probably not a single country that has
never been involved in war in any shape or form in its history.
Even a country like Switzerland, known for its neutrality, has engaged
in wars in the early 20th century. Even relatively younger nations, formedafter
the break-up of the Soviet Union, have been involved in wars
in history.
Greenland is the only country which has never fought a war (though Denmark
has had a military presence in the country).
Then there are countries like Australia, which has not engaged in war on its
own soil. The only war Iceland ever fought was a civil war on its own soil.
Countries adopting an officially neutral policy today include Austria, Costa
Rica, Ireland, Finland, Sweden and Switzerland.

10 countries that do
not have an army
1.

Andorra

2.

Costa Rica

3.

Grenada

4.

Kiribati

5.

Liechtenstein

6.

Marshall Islands

7.

Federated States of Micronesia

8.

Nauru

9.

Saint Lucia

10. Saint Vincent and the


Grenadines

The most peaceful...


Europe is among the most peaceful places on Earth for the eighth year in a row,
according to the Global Peace Index. 15 of the top 20 most peaceful countries
are in Europe. North America is the second most peaceful region. The countries
highest on the list include:
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6SVHVBZt$IJMF
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t1BOBNBt#SB[JMt1PSUVHBM
Interestingly, the most peaceful countries in the world are often wealthy,
western democracies. The United States ranks 94th on the list. Canada is at
7thplace, France is 45thwhile Turkey staggers behind at no 135. Iceland tops
the index as the most peaceful country in the world, Syria is the least.

24

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vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

expected to increase, according to an


Australian research centre.
The conclusion that emerges is that
the world today is becoming a more
violent and dangerous place to live in.
It sometimes feels like the whole
world is at war. Things are getting
from bad to worse. Looking at things
in perspective, roughly 13.4 per cent
of global gross domestic product
equivalent to the combined economies of Brazil, Canada, France,
Germany, Spain and the UKis being
spent to finance military operations
and armed conflicts, according to a
report by the Institute for Economics
and Peace (IEP).
This brings us to the larger question: Would all this ultimately lead to
WW III. If the current situation is not
managed, World War III might just be
around the corner or already starting.
As King Abdullah of Jordan said
recently at a news conference, we
are facing a Third World War
against humanity. we must act fast
to tackle the response to interconnected threats.
Even Pope Francis was quoted as
saying perhaps one can speak of a
third war, one fought piecemeal, with
crimes, massacres, destruction,

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while visiting a military cemetery


in Italy.
The whole concept of World War
III cannot be dismissed as a figment
of wild imagination. The Syrian conflict itself has the potential to spark a
global war given the clash of interests
at the international level: With Russia
and Iran supporting the Bashar alAssad regime while the US leading a
coalition of over 60 countries supporting the Kurds and Syrian rebels
fights against Assads forces. On the
other side of the spectrum, France
and Russia have stepped up their own
efforts to forge a coalition against the
Islamic State. Making matters worse,
Turkey is fighting against the Kurds
while the Syrian rebels are supported
by Jordan, Turkey and the Gulf states.
The picture that emerges from this
is grim. All it would take is a slight
spark in Iran, Iraq, or Syria to trigger
a fiery conflagration in the entire
Middle East. This could lead to World
War III.
The term world war means a military conflict spanning more than two
continents, in which at least 20 major
countries participate in an attack
against a common enemy, and which

Worlds least
peaceful countries
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t4PVUI4VEBOt4PNBMJBt6LSBJOF
The Middle East and North Africa
now rank as the world's most violent
regions, overtaking South Asia which
received that ranking for 2013.

has the attention of the man-in-thestreet due to the significant loss of life
When it happened, World War I
(19141918) was regarded as the "war
to end all wars. World War II (1939
1945) proved that to be false. Today
according to World Bank estimates,
some 1.5 billion people, roughly onefifth of humanity, are affected by
some form of violence or insecurity.
The US military is involved in operations across all the five continents. It
is the worlds largest landlord, with a
significant presence in Bahrain,
Djibouti, Turkey, Qatar, Saudi Arabia,
Kuwait, Iraq, Afghanistan, Kosovo,
and Kyrgyzstan, in addition to bases
in Germany, Japan, South Korea,
Italy, and the UK. Some of these, like

Fatalities in 2014
80,000
70,000
60,000
50,000
40,000
30,000
20,000
10,000
0

Syria

Iraq

Mexico

Central
America

South
Sudan
IISS

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the Al Udeid Air Force Base in Qatar,


the forward headquarters of the
United States Central Command, can
accommodate up to 10,000 troops
and 120 aircraft.
US forces are active in 20 countries
across the Middle East and present in
Afghanistan, Bahrain, Egypt, Iran,
Iraq, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kuwait,
Kyrgyzstan, Lebanon, Oman, Pakistan,
Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Tajikistan,
Turkmenistan, UAE, Uzbekistan,
Yemen and some 54 African nations.
Some of them are also supporting US
Drug Enforcement Agency operations
in Colombia and Mexico.

HE Institute for Economics and


Peace is worried that conflicts
have grown increasingly lethal
over the last five years. While the total
number of incidents has stayed relatively steady but their death toll has
skyrocketed.
In a speech last year President
Putin was quoted as saying that World
War 3 is inevitable. He accused
NATO of surrounding Russia and
even signed a document stating that
NATO has committed violations of
international law, which is a very
serious and inflammatory charge. In
the speech delivered at the Valdai
conference in Sochi, Putin made it
clear that Russia will no longer play
games with the United States and
engage in back-room negotiations
Russia does not wish for the chaos
to spread, does not want war, and has
no intention of starting one. However,
today Russia sees the outbreak of
global war as almost inevitable, is prepared for it, and is continuing to prepare for it. Russia does not want war,
nor does she fear it he added.
I want to remind you that Russia
is one of the most powerful nuclear
nations. This is a reality, not just
words, Putin warned. g

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25

COVER STORY
world war III

Possible scenarios

Flashpoints on
the globe
by NEERAJ MAHAJAN

LBERT Einstein was once


asked what he thought the
future warsmore so World
War IIIwould look like. This is what
he had to say, I know not with what
weapons World War III will be fought,
but World War IV will be fought with
sticks and stones.
Ironically US Army Chief of Staff
Gen Omar Bradley also had a similar
comment to make in a discussion with
some bigshots about future wars and
how they would be fought.
General, the newspapers tell us
that World War III will be fought with
atomic bombs, supersonic planes and
a lot of new weapons. These are great
strides, but how about World War IV?
Is it possible to get any newer and fancier weapons than these? one of the
men asked.
I can give you the exact answer
to that question If we have World
War III, and then World War IV will
be fought with bows and arrows,
General Bradley replied.
Every war brings destruction
and needs a spark. For a conflict to
escalate into a global war, the interest
of more than a few great powers must
clash. World War I started after the
assassination of Franz Ferdinand;
the Seven Years War was sparked
by fighting between the French and
British along the Mississippi river.

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vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

Once started, religious strife has a tendency to go on and on, to become


permanent feuds. Today we see such intractable inter-religious wars in
Northern Ireland, between Jews and Muslims and Christians in Palestine,
Hindus and Muslims in South Asia and in many other places. Attempts
to bring about peace have failed again and again. Always the extremist
elements invoking past injustices, imagined or real, will succeed in
torpedoing the peace efforts and bringing about another bout of hostility.
Datuk Seri Dr Mahathir Mohamad, Prime Minister of Malaysia,
addressing the World Evangelical Fellowship in 2001.
The combatants rarely start a global
war on purpose but do not always
realise that small sparks could lead to
bigger conflagrations.
The words World War 3 trended
on social media worldwide as tension
rose over Turkey shooting down a
Russian jet over its airspace recently.
Lets look at the possible sparks which
could explode the world and cause
World War III. What might spark
such a war, and how would it escalate
into a global conflict? Here are five
potential scenarios: none likely, but
all possible.
Syria
The ever-changing battlelines in
Syria are becoming even more complex. Russian air strikes could any day
lead to a tug of war between Russia
and the US. Will it lead to a deeper
conflict, is the big question. An accidental confrontation between NATO
and Russian aircraft could lead to bad
tactical decisions. This could get ugly,
as France, Russia, and the United

States have very different views about


how the future of Syria should look.
Serious fighting between external
powers in Syria could quickly draw in
Turkey, Iran, and Saudi Arabia, and
potentially spread to other parts of
the globe.
India-Pakistan
India and Pakistan could go to war
for any number of reasons. Incidents
of unprovoked firing across the IndoPakistan border have been going on
for years. India and Pakistan have
fought three wars with each other,
still the possibility of yet another
conventional war is not ruled out. If it
is only a regional war, then its effects
might be less severe but if some
global powers step in, it could lead
to a fullscale nuclear conflict in case
Pakistan suffered a serious defeat in
conventional war.
Infiltrations and subversive activities by Pakistan-sponsored terrorist groups are a routine irritant
that India has been tolerating for

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long. Interventions in Afghanistan


by either country could be another
bone of contention. The 1971 IndoPakistani War nearly had both the
US and China involved in the conflict
on behalf of Pakistan. But over the
past few years, the US has grown
closer to India even as it continues
to sell weapons to Pakistan. It is
unclear, at this point, how the US
would respond if China intervened on
Pakistans side in a war with India.
Russian miscalculations
in Ukraine
The ongoing crisis in Ukraine
started on February 22, 2014, when
the government of then pro-Russian Ukrainian President Viktor
Yanukovich collapsed. Nearly two
years have passed since then. The
United States, Europe and Russia
have thrown the Ukrainian situation
into turmoil and caused bloodshed to
spread further in the former Soviet
state. Putin-backed rebels, supported
by Russian forces, could drive further
west in Ukraine to create a land cor-

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ridor to join up with Crimea. That


triggers deeper economic sanctions
from the US and the European Union
and forces them to accelerate military
support to the government.

HE situation is rife with opportunities for miscalculation, and


a mistake on either side could
produce a militarised confrontation.
Much depends on how NATO countries decide to respond to Russian
moves in Ukraine.
China vs Japan in
East China Sea
Both China and Japan claim to
own the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands in
the East China Sea and have deployed
military forces in its vicinity. Both
are not prepared to back off. The
islands are close to key shipping
lanes and rich fishing grounds, and
there may be oil reserves in the
area. The United States is bound by
treaty to defend Japan. If a conflict
between China and Japan erupts, the
United States may also get involved.

China might feel compelled to preempt US intervention by an attack


on American military installations
across the region. The US has already
had a number of uncomfortable
confrontations with Chinese naval
and air units in the South China Sea.
In the event of a US-China war both
Japan and India might feel the need
to intervene. Russia might or might
not stay out. This could throw the
entire Asia-Pacific into chaos.
Communist China and Russia
vs United States
If the Communist Partys official
Peoples Daily newspaper is to
be believed, a US-China war is
inevitable over rights of passage and
artificial islands built in disputed
territory. Almost 74 per cent of
Chinese think that their military would
win a war against the US, according
to a 2014 poll by the Perth US-Asia
Centre. Many Chinese officers are
believed to be suffering from peace
diseasea term for those who never
served in combat. g

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vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

27

IN CONVERSATION
shiv kunal verma 1962 war

Let down by the


leadership
In military circles, Shiv Kunal Verma first shot into
prominence in 1992 when he produced the highly acclaimed
film on 60 years of the Indian Air Force, Salt of the Earth. This
benchmark film was followed by a series of films on the Indian
Navy and the Army, culminating with his filming Kargil War
and Aakash Yodha, which again covered the aerial dimension of
the conflict with Pakistan in 1999. The Standard Bearers
(National Defence Academy) and The Making of a Warrior
(Indian Military Academy) were among the various films he
made on military training institutions in the country. Verma is
also the author of The Long Road to Siachen: The Question
Why and the highly acclaimed Northeast Trilogy
that documents the region in meticulous detail. Among his
other works are the books on the Assam Rifles while he has
also co-authored Courage & Conviction, the autobiography
of the former Chief of Army Staff, General VK Singh.
MG Devasahayam, a former Army and IAS officer, talks to
the filmmaker and author:
MGD: Generations brought up on stories of
swarming Chinese hordes and Indian troops
fighting in PT shoes to the last man, last round,
are going to be in for a shock. More than half a
century after the event, how difficult was it to put
the narrative together?
SKV: Quite honestly, I think the information has always
been there, it is just that no one really wanted to talk
about it. Those who did write about the conflict were
more concerned about exonerating themselves. Its a
great pity that not only was the truth glossed over, it was
also deliberately suppressed. This was an army that was
simply not allowed to fight by our own peopleit wasnt
so much the Chinese who ran over us in NEFA, it was our
own leadership.
MGD: The Henderson Brooks-Bhagat Report is
still under wraps, at least partially. Do you think
access to those papers would have thrown up any
additional facts?
SKV: I dont think so, simply because though the report

28

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vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

PHOTOS: DIPTI BHALLA VERMA

was asked for by General JN Chaudhury after he replaced


General Thapar as the COAS, its terms of reference were
changed within a couple of days and they were asked
to confine themselves entirely to IV Corps Operations.
Later, then Defence Minister YB Chavan used it as a major
sleight of hand in Parliament to deflect the blame from
Prime Minister Nehru and his immediate advisers to the
army leadership.
MGD: Neville Maxwell says Nehru was to blame for
the 62 conflict. Even our own history textbooks
in schools acknowledge Nehrus Forward Policy
resulted in the clash between the two Asian giants.
SKV: Buying into what Maxwell says as the gospel truth
is to do a great injustice to ourselves. As Krishna Menon
pointed out in 1968, India simply failed to realise that
Communist China was expansionist by nature. Nehrus
failure lay in his inability to avert the clash. Before 1949,
China was nowhere in the equation. The annexation of
Sinkiang in 1949 first and then Tibet in 1950 changed

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all that. Sardar Patel read the situation perfectly and his
letter to Nehru written 38 days before he died, spelt out
the changed situation at the time.
MGD: You talk of the Himmat Singh Committee
that was constituted in 1951 and the General
Kulwant Singh Report in 1953. They all seemed to
warn Nehru.
SKV: In retrospect, who didnt warn Nehru? General
Cariappa did and Sardar Patel did. Even the Kulwant
Singh Report said in 1953 that there was a major likelihood
of an armed clash between China and India in the next
nine yearsit was as specific as that. Just as the Chinese,
after having annexed Tibet, were pushing forward to
secure what they thought was the border, the Himmat
Singh Committee did much the same though the main
focus of the recommendations was on the restructuring
and deployment of the Assam Rifles. This was to lay the

ground for the Forward Policy. If these boys hadnt pushed


forward into what was then wild, hostile country, just as
the Chinese did in Aksai Chin, that was devoid of Indian
presence, they would have emerged one fine day at the
foothills. On the larger map, the Himalaya would have
been the Thagla Ridge, the Brahmaputra, the Nam Ka Chu,
the Khasi and Garo Hills, and the Tsangdhar Ridge.
MGD: Indeed. Nehru was too confident of himself
on China. He even snubbed Jayaprakash Narayan,
whom he considered his successor, for suggesting
otherwise. By the way, Exercise Lal Qila was
Thorats brainchild it also spelt out the situation
on the ground two years before the Chinese
attacked.
SKV: The Thorat Plan was what one would have expected
of any Indian army officer who was of sound mind. It was
based on pure military logic, which took into account

EXCERPT

1962: The War That Wasnt

OR the first time in twelve years,


Nehru was unsure of himself as he
rose from the prime ministers seat in
the Lok Sabha on 28 August 1959 to face
the rest of the House. Clamouring
Opposition members who were demanding a statement on the Longju incident fell
silent as attention turned to the prime
minister. Speaking in his usual clipped
style, every word that Nehru uttered
stunned the assembled MPs.
The prime minister admitted to the
people of India that serious disputes existed between China and India regarding the
India-Tibet border and that several thousand square kilometres of Indian territory
in Ladakh was under Chinese control. He
then disclosed the fact that the Chinese
had built a highway across the Aksai Chin, adding that the
government had thought it fit not to make the disputes public, as that would have made their settlement even more difficult. He then went on to talk of the border clash between the
Chinese and the Assam Rifles first at Khenzemane and then at
Longju. However, it was the last part of Nehrus statement that

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was to have far-reaching consequences:


We have in fact placed this border area of
NEFA directly under the military authorities ...The Assam Rifles will of course
remain there and such other forces as will
be necessary will be sent, but they will
function now under the army authorities
and their headquarters.
Nehrus unconsidered remark had
major national and international implications.By committing Army HQ, which had
no troops of its own in NEFA into the
existing defence structure of manning
border posts, the prime minister was
committing it to a policing role. Any plans
for the defence of the region that could
be based on a forward line held by the
police (Assam Rifles) and an inner line
held by the army evaporated.
In his office in South Block, General Thimayya was oblivious
of the drama that was being played out in the Lok Sabha less
than a kilometre away. Around noon, there was a knock on the
door and the Director Military Intelligence, Brigadier Prem
Bhagat, walked into the army chief s office. Without any pre-

gfiles inside the government

vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

29

IN CONVERSATION
shiv kunal verma 1962 war

PRESENTS

MEMORY CLOUDS
The Honble Prime Minister, Narendra
Modi, on April 21, 2015, on Civil
Services Day, gave a clarion call to
record and upload the memoirs of
senior and experienced civil servants.
Hence...
gfiles brings you a compilation of
reminiscences by senior civil servants
which were published in gfiles
between 2007 and 2015.
Dont miss the opportunity to learn
from the wealth of experience of
veteran civil servants. Pre-order the
book in advance to avail of the onetime offer of `720.
You can make the payment through
cheque, DD or RTGS in favour of gfiles.

For further information or queries: Mail us at editor@glesindia.com

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Featuring
Prabhat Kumar
BG Deshmukh
MC Gupta
Kripa Narayan Srivastava
V Selvaraj
Sushil Chandra Tripathi
Romesh Bhandari
Devi Dayal
Reva Nayyar
VP Sawhney
SK Mishra
Dr G Sundaram
KC Sivaramakrishnan
Nitish Sengupta
Vishnu Bhagwan
Gen Noble Thamburaj
Baleshwar Rai
Arun Bongirwar
Arvind S Inamdar
Madhav Godbole
Ved Marwah
Trinath Mishra
Vineeta Rai
Arun Kumar Rath
Ajit Nimbalkar
TR Kakkar
Najeeb Jung
MS Gill
Shovana Narayan
Lt Gen JFR Jacob
Brijesh Kumar
Surrinder Lal Kapur
Yogendra Narain
and many more...

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vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

31

IN CONVERSATION
shiv kunal verma 1962 war

the fighting capabilities of the Assam Rifles as well. But


once Nehru had played the resignation card and literally
destroyed Thimayya, there were no checks and balances
left to stop General Kaul who simply steamrolled everyone
and everything around him. The two men who could have
brought some sanity into the situation were Generals
Bogey Sen and Pran Thapar. But once Nehru through
Menon had begun tampering with the Armys command
structure, the men on the ground subsequently were, as
Thimayya put it, cannon fodder for the Chinese.

Unfortunately, our own IB files are not easily available.


It would be interesting to see what role BN Mullik, the
Intelligence Chief, played in building up Thimayya and
the military take-over bogey with Nehru. Its also quite
likely that most of this was never put in writing, just as
Krishna Menon ordered that no written records of all
policy meetings in Army HQ were to be maintained.

MGD: Youve almost ignored VK Krishna Menon


in the book. Yet, his is the first name that comes to
mind when we scan the pages of history.
SKV: Krishna Menon was only doing what Nehru wanted
him to do he was the cats paw who was brought in by
Nehru only when Thimayya became the Chief of Army
Staff. By then Kaul was already the man to watch within
the Army. Once the balloon went up and the Chinese got
aggressive, Krishna Menon frankly had little to contribute.

MGD: Finally, where was the IAF in all this? In


your book you virtually accuse the IB of having
lied to the Government in their appreciation of
the PLAAF.
SKV: The report given to Nehru was a joke, but then
what exactly was the Air Chief doing? He just went along
with it without a murmur I first heard of it from former
Defence Secretary HC Sarin in 1992 when we met him
in connection with our IAF film. Then Air Marshal HC
Dewan more or less confirmed it. I still remember the
shocked faces when we played the tapes from the interview
in Air HQ. Sarin told us about the letter written by Nehru

amble, Bhagat told Thimayya that the joint secretary in the


Ministry of Defence, HC Sarin, had just briefed him on the
prime ministers statement in Parliament. Nehru has finally
told Parliament the truth about the northern border. He spoke
at length about the National Highway G219 and the loss of the
Aksai Chin. He then spoke of both the Khenzemane and
Longju incident.
It had to happen... Im surprised it took so long for the press
to realize everything isnt quite bhaibhai with the Chinese, said
Thimayya, shaking his head.
Theres something else... Bhagat hesitated, not quite sure if
Thimayya was already in on the decision. The prime minister
has announced that as of today the entire border in NEFA with
China is henceforth the armys responsibility.
The usually calm and unflappable Thimayya now stared at
Bhagat, not quite sure if he had heard him correctly. He moved
back to his desk and sat down slowly. What else did Sarin say?
he asked incredulously.
Nothing more, really. From his demeanour I gathered the

Ministry of Defence had no idea this was coming. If Mr Krishna


Menon was consulted by the prime minister, he certainly did
not inform anybody else in the ministry.
In 1957, when it was becoming obvious to Nehru that his
Panchsheel policy with China was going nowhere, he had
turned to Krishna Menon As the defence minister of India,
his appointment coincided with the elevation of General
Thimayya to the top job in the Indian Army. Temperamentally
Krishna Menon was a loner, and having had no ministerial or
administrative experience, he found it necessary to dominate
the military bureaucracy by trying to make a dent in the solidarity of its senior ranks. In this he succeeded to the extent
that Bijji Kaul fell for his blandishments and for a time an
unwonted relationship was established between the minister
and the general officer.
Menon would have probably never ventured into playing
these devious mind games if the signal had not come from
Nehru himself. It was Nehru who had built a strong rapport
with Kaul; he had allowed this friendship to often overshadow

Having destroyed its combat readiness by tampering with the military hierarchy, the
Indian Army was deployed in both NEFA and Ladakh as a glorified police force. More than
half-a-century later, shorn of the myths and half-truths, this is a superbly told story that needs
to be understood by future generationsGeneral (Dr) VK Singh, Minister of State for
External Affairs & Former Army Chief

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vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

www.gfilesindia.com

The author at Kibithu in the Walong Sector of NEFA (now Arunachal Pradesh)

the official relationship, sometimes summoning him for purposes outside the call of army duty, even when Kaul was only
a lieutenant colonel. In 1953, Nehru entrusted Kaul with the
delicate task of overseeing the arrest of Sheikh Abdullah and
acting as a political troubleshooter in Kashmir.
Unlike most of the other generals who were army and corps
commanders at the time, Kaul had virtually no combat experience. After being commissioned into an infantry battalion,
Kaul had voluntarily shifted to the Army Supply Corps while he
was still a junior officer. Kaul used the term national priority
to explain the reason for this shifta somewhat dubious
explanation as no junior officer was likely to be accorded that
sort of importance. As a result, Bijji Kaul had not even commanded an infantry company, let alone a battalion, either in
war or peace. Though commissioned into the army well before
the outbreak of World War II, Bijji Kaul was assigned sundry
jobs, none of which had anything to do with combat.
After Independence, his rise had been spectacular and
completely at odds with the existing ethos of the armed forces
where each appointment in an officers career is a vital cog in

his own training that enables him to take on responsibility at


the next level. In 1947, Kaul was plucked from obscurity to
serve as Indias military attach in Washington DC while also
being a member of the quasi-political Armed Forces
Nationalisation Committee. In 1948, he was again selected to
be the military adviser to the Indian delegation to the Security
Council on the Kashmir issue, which was where he first met
Krishna Menon. Nehru then entrusted Kaul with the command of the Jammu and Kashmir Militia, but he had to be
withdrawn from this post owing to his differences with Sheikh
Abdullah, the then prime minister of Kashmir. By the early
1950s, it was fairly obvious to the rank and file that Kaul was
Nehrus trusted man.
After Independence, Kaul repeatedly served under Thorat.
Almost each and every time, despite Kauls political
connections, Thorat would diligently put down on paper
that in his opinion, Kaul had reached the limits of his
professional competence. In an army where one bad report
usually seals a mans fate, Nehrus repeated interventions kept
Kauls flag flying.

A story that needed to be told. Superbly written and brutally honestby far the
most definitive book on the subject. Removes the fig leaves and sets the record straight,
something that today's context will profit by emulatingDr YSP Thorat,
Former Chairman, NABARD

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vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

33

IN CONVERSATION
shiv kunal verma 1962 war

MGD: Post-war I served in NEFA I took a


Long Range Patrol to retrace the path that
the Chinese had taken. Even now it is hard to
believe they could have so easily brushed the
Indians aside. Could the Army have acquitted
itself better?
SKV: Almost certainly. Even on the Nam Ka Chu, it was a
complete failure of command. When 2 Rajput was attacked
on October 20, just 1,000 yards to its right 9 Punjab sat
and watched, simply because there were no instructions
from above. Without someone controlling and coordinating
the battle, there was nothing they could do. What can one

say when even after the event General Kaul writes a book
in which he confuses Se-la with Tse-la, two passes that are
quite a few miles apart. Our troops had endured a lot of
hardships and had dug in whereever they were told to go,
but in the absence of any command and control, they
frankly did not stand a chance.
A lot of officers bemoan the fact that we failed to hold
Se-la for a week I think if we had held it for three days
and the GOC had pushed forward from Dirang Dzong
instead of breaking backwards towards Bomdila, the
Chinese would have been in serious trouble. Their gamble
paid off then but they knew they were overstretched.
Thats why they quietly withdrew from NEFA. The Western
Sector was a different cup of tea: the total quantum of
Indian troops that actually clashed with the Chinese was
less than one infantry battalion. g

Subedar Dashrath Singh was dying, slipping in and out of


consciousness as the blood seeped out of his torn and horribly
mutilated body. All around him, men from No. 9 Platoon of 2
Rajputs Charlie Company lay scatteredmost of them had
been torn apart by mortar and artillery fire. The firing had died
down hours ago as the last few men, reduced to using stones
to fight, were shot through the head at point-blank range. Just
a few minutes earlier, Dashrath had fallen to the ground as a
Chinese soldier emptied his entire AK-47 magazine into his
stomach. I felt no pain, he would recall years later, just relief
that the nightmare was over. The manner in which we were
deployed, we had known for days that we stood no chance if
and when the attack came.
Just eleven days ago, on 9 October 1962, Lieutenant
General BM Bijji Kaul, camping at the Bridge 3 location on the
Nam Ka Chu, had outlined an ambitious attack plan to occupy
the Thagla Ridge across the Nam Ka Chu. Every officer and JCO
present at the briefing knew the generals plan was nonsensical.
To Dashraths experienced ears, it sounded like the general
was issuing orders for an advance the next morning across the
river and up the Thagla slopes on the assumption that the
Chinese did not exist. All the officers were sitting in stunned
silence as Kaul droned on, using impressive jargon that
included terms like positional warfare manoeuvre, something

neither Dashrath nor any of the others present had ever heard
before. Major General Niranjan Prasad, GOC 4 Division, was
staring at his shoes the entire time, while Brigadier John Dalvi,
the commander of 7 Brigade, meekly tried to point out a few
technical difficulties like limited ammunition, lack of snow
clothing, artillery support and other factors. The corps
commander, deeming them minor irritants, impatiently
brushed them aside.
Having spelt out his objectives, the corps commander
asked the assembled officers and JCOs if they had any
questions. While the officers were still recovering from the
shock of Kauls master plan, Subedar Dashrath Singh from 2
Rajput, who had seen five years of close combat with the
Japanese in Burma and had then fought in the Jammu and
Kashmir Operations in 1948, spoke up: Yeh larai to maine pehli
bar dekhi hai, saab, jisme hum nalle mein aur dushman upar
pahar par.
Yeh bhi pehli baar aapne dekha hoga ki koi general front line
mein khara ho was Kauls glib response. Aapne apni baat to keh
di, saab, lekin hamare jawaab nahi diya, said Dashrath. At this
point Kaul lost his temper and demanded that the JCO be
arrested on the spot and dismissed from service. While
Niranjan Prasad and Dalvi tried to pacify the corps commander, Dashrath was quietly asked to leave the conference.

to Kennedy, begging for US air support. He conveniently


failed to mention he had drafted the letter along with
Foreign Secretary MJ Desai.

From the beginning to the end, the book literally grabs the reader by the throat. Brutally
honest, every detail of the conflict with China half a century ago is laid bare. Sooner or later
Indians had to face the bitter reality of what actually happened in the high Himalaya. Perhaps
now we can begin to bury the ghostsSam Rajappa, former editor, The Statesman

34

gfiles inside the government


vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

www.gfilesindia.com

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gfiles inside the government

vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

35

BOOK REVIEW

by BN UNIYAL

non-fiction autobiography

Making of a mass leader


I had my first brush with
administration when I was barely
three days old, cradled in the
arms of my mother. Sharadabai
Govindrao Pawar had a meeting
to attend at the Pune Local Board,
of which she was a member, on 15
December 1940. Although she had
delivered a baby boy just three days
earlier, she was not one to miss her
call of duty.

HESE three opening sentences of the book sum up the


entire life of the man. Born to a
woman of tremendous force and fortitude, he grew up in the hustle and
bustle of a highly charged peasant
political family in an out-of-the-way
village. Early experiences of dealing
with all sorts of people and exposure
to ideological crosscurrents drive the
grown-up man at a very early age into
active politics, which becomes his
absorbing destiny.
The title of the book sounds rather
brash, though not for a Maratha,
for the Marathas take pride in the
bluntness of their tongue which they
call plain speaking. The title apart, this
is an engaging and enjoyable account
of a long and hectic life of politics
spanning over 60 eventful years from
1958 till date. It is written at that stage
in life when the performer casts away
his many masks and makes his peace
with himself and the world without any
heartache or heartbreak. It is a frank
and forthright account of the many
vicissitudes of a long political life, of
friendships ending in estrangements,
alliances breaking into feuds and
late night scheming leading to early
morning patch-ups. That is what
politics is about, and all that politics

36

gfiles inside the government

vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

Title: On My Terms: From the


Grassroots to the Corridors of Power
Author: Sharad Pawar
Publisher: Speaking Tiger
Pages: 312
Price: `699

is about is there in fair abundance


in this book. Anyone curious about
the events of the decades with
which the book deals will find many
interesting nuggets of information
and pithy observations throughout
its pages. At places, one wishes that
Pawar had gone a little deeper into
the events or elaborated on the
doings of men and women of his
time. He treats certain key events
like those of the Emergency years
in a somewhat hazy way. Sometimes
one gets the feeling as if he has
overlooked the details out of
discretion, if not caution.
However, the central theme of the
book is the making of a mass leader.
This aspect is so well dealt with in the
book that it can very well be made
standard reading for all young men
and women who wish to carve out
a place for themselves in politics.
Leadership is neither taught nor studied in India which is a pity, possibly

because it is commonly believed that


leaders are born and not created. This
is far from the truth. The fact is that
even in the past, leaders were not born
but created. Those who chose to work
in public life carefully provisioned
themselves intellectually and culturally for that. They found ways and
means to get close to leaders of their
times, associated themselves with
such leaders, modelled their conduct
and even manners and mannerisms
on those they chose for their models.
Pawar is clearly one such leader.
I must, therefore, recommend his
book to every aspiring leader irrespective of the party one may belong to or
principles one may hold. He is one of
the few living examples of a leader
who has risen from the masses by
sheer determination and dedication
and made himself equally respected
by his contemporaries of diverse ideological persuasions which was amply
proved by the line-up at the release
function of his book. Actually, it is not
just aspiring leaders but even established ones like Narendra Modi and
Nitish Kumar who can all benefit by
reading the book because it is strewn
with commonsensical wisdom that
has become so uncommon in the strident and somewhat malicious public
life of our times.
One aspect of his personality which
those of us from outside Maharashtra
may discover in him for the first time
on reading this book is the interest he
has taken in cultivating his tastes in
music and literature. And, interestingly, he also shows another aspect
of his private facea sense of ribald
humour. I must say these all make
him more of a complete man than he
would have been otherwise.

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PHOTOS: PIB

Pawar has been a successful


administrator too. Many episodes
from his long stint as chief minister
of his home state and as minister
at the Centre bear that out. Politics
is not just being clever; nor is
administration hard work alone. Both
require astuteness which is different
from merely being clever and both
are more about being creatively
innovative. Pawar describes several
remarkable instances of both in his
book. One such instance relates to
the 1993 Mumbai bomb blasts in 12
different city localities. While giving
the figure of blasts, Pawar on the spur
of the moment slipped in the name of
a 13th localitya Muslim onein his
Doordarshan broadcast. The trick
worked. The terrorists plan to spark
off Hindu-Muslim riots through
explosions did not fructify. This
reminded me of a similar extremely
astute decision of Sardar Patel when
Gandhiji was shot by Nathuram
Godse. He too feared that the incident
may cause serious Hindu-Muslim
riots because most Hindus would
speculate that Gandhijis killer must
have been a Muslim. He, therefore,
instructed All India Radio to let it be
disclosed in the days news broadcast
that the killer was a Hindu!

NOTHER really inspiring


chapter everyone must read is
the one about Pawars battle
with his mouth cancer. It must have
been extremely painful, awkward and
depressing but he has battled it successfully by sheer willpower which
he believed he has inherited from his
mother who was incapacitated in the
prime of life by an unruly bull she was
trying to help. I have just sent a copy
of the book to the wife of a journalist
friend of mine hospitalised with lung
cancer so she can read out this particular chapter to him.

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The book would have, possibly,


remained incomplete if Pawar had
wound it up without touching on some
of the charges of wrongdoing that have
been hurled at him for many years by
one and all and about which he has
all along maintained a deliberate and
studied silence. These arise from his
alleged closeness to Dawood Ibrahim
and undue favours done to his
business friends like Ajit Gulabchand
in allotment of land for developing
the hill resort of Lavasa. Pawar seems
to have decided to clear the matter
and his conscience at the last. He

has given elaborate explanation on


both counts and a couple of other
counts too. I am not competent to
pass a judgement on these, anyway.
Let the readers of the book judge for
themselves. I can only say that the
explanations are consistent with the
character of the persona portrayed in
the book. If the persona is taken to be
true to life, there is no reason why the
explanation too should not be. g
BN Uniyal covered Parliament and
national politics as a newspaper
correspondent for three decades until
the mid-1990s

gfiles inside the government

vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

37

BOOK REVIEW

by GAUTAM SEN

non-fiction memoir

Roles and responsibilities

T the Service of a Billion Plus


is a recently published, very
insightful and interesting book
on Group A Civil Services (CS), particularly for those contemplating
entering these services. The book is a
collection of 20 articles of retired officers from 19 services ranging from the
Indian Administrative Service (IAS)
to the Indian Corporate Law Service
(ICLS). Shankarganesh Karuppiah,
a serving Deputy Commissioner of
Income Tax with economics background, has done a commendable
work by editing this compilation. The
uniqueness of the book lies in the fact
that it will be very informative for the
Indian citizen at large, on the broad
role-cum-performance of the CS and
their functioning milieu, outlined
lucidly with a reasonable array of facts
and figures, apart from short narratives on experiences of superannuated officers of the IAS and other CS.
The reviewer of the book, by virtue of his advisory work with the
Union Public Service Commission
post-retirement, has observed that
many of the CS aspirants appear
before the personality test boards of
the Commission with fanciful ideas.
Many of them only have the IAS, or
the role of Collector, as mentioned by
Dr G Sundaram (IAS,62) (who has
written in great detail on the IAS), as
their beacon of attraction. Some of
them are either disdainful or uninterested or plainly ignorant on the nonIAS CSs, and even the Indian Foreign
Service, which once used to attract
only the toppers.
The book will help correct the
uninformed impression of the aspirants, their parents and well-wishers,
and the public at large. After perus-

38

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vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

Title: At the Service of a Billion Plus


Edited by: Shankarganesh
Karuppiah
Publisher: Yaavarum Kelir, Chennai
Price: `399

ing the book, the readers would have


a more realistic and holistic perception of the higher Indian bureaucracy
and different CS officers who function
within its fold on an entire range of
developmental,
non-developmental, operational and also regulatory
activities within the framework of the
Constitution, various statutes and
rules concerned.
The message which the pieces in
the book tend to convey is that no
service is uninteresting or lacking in
opportunities for self-improvement
and scope to contribute to Indias
growth story. Though there are variations in creature comforts for the
officers, each service has a range of
facilities and these have been growing. Most of the officers mention in
their own wayvariety in presentation of experience is another unique
feature of the bookthat each Service
has its own dynamics.
There are some candid references by
some officers on the vicissitudes they
faced such as an adverse service grad-

ing (through the Annual Confidential


Report) because of incompatibility
with the superiors unjustified views,
corruption within the department or
organisation they served in, staff agitations, etc. However, the system also
has its redressal mechanism. The real
issue is, as one of the contributors to
the book ponders, whether those who
have been selected, can intellectually and psychologically fit within the
service they join.
The worth of the book lies in the
transparent manner in which the
functioning of the services has been
presented by the contributors from
the different CS. Given my interactions with senior and junior colleagues of different CS, I consider
the presentations truthful and also
inspiring. Opportunities in different
CSs cannot be equal or similar. But
they are unique in their own way. The
book should thus enable prospective
CS officers to face the future with a
more realistic disposition.
The articles of Dr G Sundaram
(IAS), Nalin Surie (IFS), Navdeep Suri
(IFS), M Ravi (IPS), Dr G Alagarsamy
(IPT&AFS), S Nagalaswamy (IA&AS),
Dr Chittaranjan Satpathy (IRS
C&CE), Usha Anthony (IDAS), Vinita
Chopra (IRSIT), B Pugazhendhi
(IOFS), Saravan Annemalai (IPoS),
SM Kumar (ICAS), NM Madhusudan
Rao (IRTS), PV Vaidialingam (IRAS),
Pichai Rajan (IRPS), AG Sekaran
(RPF), AP Frank Noronha (IIS),
Agnewar Sen (ITS) and Arun Prasad
Meganathan (ICLS) have undoubtedly enriched the book. g
Gautam Sen (IDAS, 1976, Retd.) last
served the Government of India as
Additional Controller General of Defence
Accounts, and later as Adviser
(14th Finance Commission).

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FIRST STIRRINGS
madhukar gupta

Perception
and prejudice

PHOTOS: RAJEEV TYAGI

His years as a civil servant taught Madhukar Gupta


how wide the gap between reality and perception
could really be

HEN Madhukar Gupta,


an alumnus of Allahabad
University,
decided
to
appear for the civil services examination in 1970, he was only following a
norm set by his grandfather, father,
uncles and brothers.
His grandfather, Lala Prasadi
Lal, was in imperial service, an
euphemism for the civil services
under the British rule. His father,
Dr Anandswarup Gupta, had an
illustrious career as an Indian Police

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officer (1939 batch), which included


serving as the Founder-Director
of the Bureau of Police Research
and Development (BPR&D). Four
of his uncles were also in the
premier service.
Two of his elder brothers had
already joined the civil services when
Madhukar Gupta, the third among
the male siblings, joined the IAS
(Indian Administrative Service) on
July 1, 1971. Eventually, his youngest
brother also got into the IAS.

Since one of his brothers had opted


for the Foreign Service, his fathers
only request was that he serve within
the country. In those days, one would
get 10-15 days to make a choice. I
wanted to go for the Foreign Service.
But my father did not want it. I
(eventually) opted for home (Uttar
Pradesh) cadre, he recounts. He still
remembers OP Gupta, his batchmate,
who went to Tokyo in his place. He
landed up in Tehri as a Sub-Divisional
Magistrate (SDM).
Gupta says he trekked and walked
a lot, a trait he inherited from his
father, to keep a check on his government subordinates. When my father
was ASP in Banaras, he would patrol
police stations in his personal vehicle
at night. Once he found nobody in a
police station and walked away with
the daily diary and the lantern (there
was no electricity in those days) from
there. Next day, the daroga (station
officer) reported to him that there
was a dacoity in the thana. When my
father put the diary and lantern on
his table, the daroga fell at his feet. I
learnt to do supervision from him, he
recalls, parked on a sofa in his drawing
room. The plan for Tehri Dam began
during his tenure as SDM (1972-73)
and its first phase got completed
when he was the Chief Secretary in
Uttarakhand in 2001.
During the Emergency, he was
the District Magistrate (DM) in
Pratapgarh and did not like the idea
of passing on vasectomy targets to his
district staff. I didnt like the idea of
using force. My record was poor and
I had to hear reprimands from the
Chief Ministers Principal Secretary,
he reminisces. After the Janata Party
came to power in Delhi, the situation
turned on its head with the government granting too many concessions
to people, even to the detriment of
the state. So much so that a minister

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vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

39

FIRST STIRRINGS
madhukar gupta

in Uttar PradeshJamuna Prasad


Bosetold people in Banda district
publicly that their revenue levy was
waived. Gupta, who was leading a revenue collection drive in the district as
DM, did not like it. He contradicted
the minister and said the collection
would go on. You do not make such
an announcement. I told him in as
many words, he narrates. As an outcome of the conflict, Gupta got transferred to the UP Cement Corporation
in Churk (Sonbhadra district).

N August 1980, after a massive


communal riot rocked Moradabad,
the then Chief Minister of Uttar
Pradesh, Vishwanath Pratap Singh,
dispatched him there. To restore a
modicum of governance, he decided
to deal with the situation strictly. He
cancelled all curfew passes issued
in the district and two joint magistrates went door-to-door to disburse
compensation after the violence. The
Congress accused him of being antiMuslim. In October, the then Prime
Minister, Indira Gandhi, undertook a
tour of the riot-affected areas. Gupta
took her around the city and explained
how he dealt with the situation. I had
been told something else, she said,
apparently an approval of his actions.
Gupta got validation of his impartiality on his transfer a few months
later when the then head of the
panchayat in Karbala and Karula,
Muslim villages located on the outskirts of Moradabad which were the
worst-affected in the riots, gifted him
a brass idol of Goddess Durga as a
token of love. The farewell gift was
proof of how much gap could exist
between reality and perception.
Since his father, Anandswarup,
was ill and showed no signs of
improvement, he looked for a posting
near Delhi to get him treated in the
national capital. However, much to

40

gfiles inside the government


vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

Since one of his brothers


had opted for the Foreign
Service, his fathers only
request was that he serve
within the country. He
landed up in Tehri as a SubDivisional Magistrate (SDM)
his chagrin, the state administration
put him in Gorakhpur. His father
stopped him from quitting. I told
him I would like to resign. He said
duty should come first, he recalls.
Anandswarup passed away a monthand-a-half later. His next posting was
as Administrator and Vice-Chairman
of Lucknow Development Authority

(LDA). This came after Indira Gandhi


spotted garbage in the state capital
during her visit there sometime
in 1981 and the state government
wanted an efficient officer to remove
the mess.
During widening of a chowk in the
city, he wanted to demolish a small
temple. But Swaroop Kumari Bakshi,
the then home minister of the state,
opposed this and sat on a dharna.
Gupta raised the matter with CM
VP Singh, after which the latter told
Bakshi in his presence, Chowk is not
your area of responsibility.
His next posting was as Deputy
Secretary in the Planning Commission
in Delhi. During this period, his wife
developed serious health problems.

www.gfilesindia.com

He wanted to take her abroad for


treatment and requested the then
Cabinet Secretary, PK Kaul, for a
foreign posting. Within less than 72
hours, Kaul ordered his posting in
the India Investment Centre at Abu
Dhabi. Gupta initiated constitution
of an NRI (non-resident Indian)
forum, an idea which arguably later
culminated in celebration of Pravasi
Bharatiya Divas.
On October 7, 1990, Mulayam
Singh Yadav, the then Chief Minister
of Uttar Pradesh, sent him to Faizabad
as Divisional Commissioner. The
frenzy over the Ram temple was at
its peak. On October 30, lakhs of kar
sevaks succeeded in sneaking into
the division on the call of Hindutva
groups. The police had to open fire.
Gupta says there was minimal damage to life but the press incited passions by coining headlines like Saryu
turns red with blood of kar sevaks.

OR Gupta, who was considered


anti-Muslim in Moradabad, life
came a full circle in Faizabad
with the Bharatiya Janata Party and
its sister organisations portraying
him as anti-Hindu. He faced the worst
kind of ostracism. A price was put
on my head. Lawyers stopped visiting my office (in those days DMs and
Divisional Commissioners also had
judicial powers). A campaign almost
succeeded in demonising him for fulfilling his responsibility. So much so,
that a lawyer from Gonda who visited
his office expressed surprise on meeting him. You look like me, he recalls
the lawyer having told him. This was
the second instance when he realised
how wide the gap between reality and
perception could be.
Fearing harassment under the
BJP Government in Uttar Pradesh,
Gupta sought deputation with the
Centre in 1992. He got posted as Joint

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Secretary (Jammu & Kashmir and


human rights) in the home ministry.
The border state was on the boil with
militants calling the shots. Gupta had
to liaise with multiple agencies like
the police, paramilitary, intelligence,
state administration, Ministry of
External Affairs and diplomatic missions. But the real challenge came
in 1996 when India decided to hold
elections in Jammu & Kashmir. There
was requirement for 10,000 polling personnel. They were assembled
from different parts of the country
with a local Urdu-speaking person
included in every polling party. Bank
employees filed a writ against their
deployment in the state in Delhi High

For Gupta, who was


considered anti-Muslim
in Moradabad, life came
full circle in Faizabad
with the Bharatiya Janata
Party and its sister
organisations portraying
him as anti-Hindu
Court. Gupta argued the case personally in the court before the writ
was rejected. Subsequently, Gupta
was sent to the United States of
America to brief American Senators
and journalists on the situation in
Jammu & Kashmir. In 1997, the
government decided to send him
on an Elizabeth House Fellowship on
global terrorism to Oxford University.
The one year proved to be a good
sabbatical for him.
In 2000, after the creation
of Uttarakhand, Gupta was allotted the state. He served as Chief
Secretary for two years under BJP CM
Bhagat Singh Koshiyari and Congress
CM ND Tiwari. Subsequently, he
was appointed Vice-Chairman of
the Delhi Development Authority

(DDA) on deputation.
In June 2007 he was appointed the
Union Home Secretary. On November
24, he went to Islamabad for the
annual home secretary talks between
the two countries. The team was to
return on November 26. But considering the talks were conducted in a
cordial atmosphere and the Pakistani
Government wanted Gupta to call on
the then Pakistani Home (Interior)
Minister, his stay was extended for a
day. After the meetings, the team was
shifted to Murree, a hill station near
the Pakistani capital. Just when Gupta
was preparing for dinner, he got a call
from his daughter, Bhavna. Bombay
mein gangwar ho raha hai (There
is a gangwar going on in Bombay).
Soon, the Cabinet Secretary and the
Director Intelligence Bureau (DIB)
were on the phone and a special plane
was arranged for his return. When
he was about to board the plane, the
Pakistani liaison officer told him that
Deccan Mujahideen had claimed
responsibility for the attack. Gupta
angrily retorted, Do you know where
Deccan is? Dont you see the difference between Urdu and Deccan?
Surprisingly, the media hardly
reported the fact that the Home
Secretary was in Pakistan when the
26/11 attack began. The incident got
Gupta a new Home Minister, with P
Chidambaram replacing Shivraj Patil.
He was instrumental in formulating
CCTNS (crime & criminal tracking
networks and systems) and oversaw
constitution of COBRA battalions to
take on Naxalites. Gupta superannuated on June 30, 2009.
Nobody from the new generation
in the Gupta family is into the civil
services anymore. They have moved
on to professional private services.
Gupta attributes it to deterioration in
the civil services. g
As told to Narendra Kaushik

gfiles inside the government

vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

41

ECONOMY

income tax tn pandey

Futile efforts
Frequent short-term committees, with hurriedly conceived terms of
reference, have not reformed the income tax law

HE culture of constituting
short-term committees for
changing the income tax law of
the country seems to have become a
past time with finance ministers. In
the past few years, there have been
umpteen decisions to appoint committees/tax panels to amend the
income tax law. The most recent has
been the announcement by Finance
Minister Arun Jaitley, on October 27,
2015, of setting up a panel, headed
by a retired judge of the High Court
and nine members, for reviewing the
Income Tax Act, 1961. Its duration is
one year and it has to submit its first
interim report by January 31, 2016, so
that the acceptable suggestions can be
included in the Finance Act.
The objective for setting up a
new committee for changing the Act
has been explained by the Finance
Minister saying that ...time has come
to look at some provisions of the IT
Act to look at how their drafting
rafting qualder to avoid
ity can be improved in order
dy is certain
ambiguity so that everybody
as to what the Act is
However, despite so many
any committees and expert panels, thee IT law conx, litigation
tinues to remain complex,
prone, unstable, lacking in
n attributes
like neutrality, revenue elasticity
asticity and
similar qualities that tax laws
aws need to
possess. This has been because
cause of the
ad hoc nature of decisionss for
appointing such bodies
without serious homework to frame the terms of
reference and inadequatee time given

42

gfiles inside the government


ent

vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

to such bodies for completing their


work. The main responsibility for this
can be placed on PC Chidambaram,
the former Finance Minister, who
wasted nearly two decades (barring
six years of the Atal Biahari Vajpayee
government) not amending the IT
law. But his efforts backfired because
of deficiencies in his decision-making
and the bodies chosen were improperly constituted, mandates to them

Despite so many
committees and expert
panels, the IT law
continues to remain
complex, litigation prone,
unstable, lacking in
attributes like neutrality,
revenue elasticity and
similar qualities that tax
laws need to possess
p

were vague and time for submitting


the report was unduly short.
The committee appointed in 1996
by Chidambaram to amend the
income tax law and give a new code
was merely given a general mandate
to examine the existing Income Tax
Act and to suggest changes that have
become necessary, particularly in the
light of the new economic policy and
reforms. The committee (which comprised mainly IT Department officers) was given only five months (later
extended by two months) to complete
the task and give a draft of the new Act
(which too was done in another few
months). Obviously, the exercise was
impromptu, done by a body which
was not equipped with varied expertise and became a waste. In his second
term as Finance Minister from 2004,
Chidambaram did not appoint a formal body to amend the IT law and
got it done through IT Department
officers
under his guidance. They,
offi
directly,
without a report, produced
dire
DTC,
DTC 2009, which was severely critici
cised
and his successor, Pranab
Mukherjee
ordered a re-look at the
M
2009
draft, which was replaced by
20
th 2010 code, which too dragged
the
on and has ultimately been junked
by Arun Jaitley, who has chosen
to appoint a new committee, as
stated
stat earlier.
Compared
to the in-house comC
mittees
appointed by Chidambaram
mit
for DTC, the new committee
comprises
independent members
com
from different disciplines. However,

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Justice AP Shah Committee submitting its


report on MAT (Minimum Alternate Tax) to
Union Minister for Finance, Corporate
Affairs and Information & Broadcasting,
Arun Jaitley, in New Delhi.

a 10-member committee was not necessary, as it can create bottlenecks


in working. It could have comprised
five-six members. The terms of reference for the new Committee read as:
Study and identify the provisions/phrases in the Act that lead
to
litigation
due
to
different interpretations.
Study and identify the provisions
which are impacting the ease of
doing business.
Study and identify the areas and
provisions of the Act for simplification in the light of the
existing jurisprudence.
Make recommendations to bring
about predictability and certainty in tax laws without substantial impact on the tax base and
revenue collection.

VEN here, the terms of reference are not comprehensive and


cover limited areas. There are
still very many areas which need consideration to avoid another committee and piecemeal legislation.
The new attempt, though better than past decisions, still ignores
some basic aspects. Here too, proper
homework has not been done and
the basic exercise, which is necessary before initiating any exercise
for tax reformswhat is sought to
be achieved; how it is proposed to be
achieved (which would include taking care of implementational aspects
also); what would be the reaction of
the reforms in the existing social, economic and political set-uphas not
been done.
The proposals are to be balanced
in the background of four rulesRule

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PIB

Making of tax reforms


cannot be a hurried and ad
hoc exercise through inept
reform bodies of short-term
duration with general
terms of reference. It has to
be a consolidated approach
for improving the working
of tax laws for a long-term
application
of Results, Rule of Relevance, Rule of
Robustness and Rule of Resilience.
Regretfully, such aspects have not
been considered before appointing
the committee and drafting its terms
of reference.
The Minister, in appointing the
new committee, does not seem to
have benefitted from past failures. In
taking decisions regarding the new
body and terms of reference, only
some peripheral changes have been
considered, ignoring the factors that
led to past failures. The most important amongst these has been mixing of
short-term objectives with long-term
ones. Tax reforms need to be handled
with two-phased approach. For shortterm issues, needing early solutions,
short-term committees/panels can
be appointed for these on the lines of
Justice AP Shah Committee, appointed recently to review the provisions
relating to Minimum Alternate Tax
(MAT) on foreign portfolio investors. Based on the recommendations
of this panel, the government has

successfully closed the issue and the


law to implement the decision will be
amended by the Finance Act, 2016.
Long-term changes, inter-alia,
could be said to be those which affect
the basic structure of the Act, such as
bringing in new concepts not hitherto tried, inclusion in the Act of
the provisions which deviate from
the generally accepted concepts like
deeming certain receipts as income
when it is not so in common understanding, introduction of provisions
in the Act, which lead to sacrifice of
tax revenue in order to achieve some
non-tax objective such as for encouraging exports, change in law concerning searches and seizure, and so on.
For long-term changes, a separate
committee, with detailed terms of
reference with a longer period for
submitting the report, needs to be
constituted. Or, this could be referred
to the Law Commission of India for its
report as was done when the present
Act was drafted.
Making of tax reforms cannot be a
hurried and ad hoc exercise through
inept reform bodies of short-term
durations with general terms of reference. It has to be a consolidated
approach for improving the working
of tax laws for a long-term application, inter-alia, for the economy of
the country and provide finances for
achieving the governments overall
goals. For this, the prerequisites are
political will and clarity regarding
the purpose. g
The writer is former Chairman, CBDT

gfiles inside the government

vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

43

GOVERNANCE
environment mk kaw

Pollution politics

EW Delhi and Beijing are


among the most polluted
cities of the world. The quality
of response that the two political
systems have provided to the crises is
a sad commentary on the efficacy of
a democracy in the art of combatting
b
g
emergencies. When Bejing was
declared the most polluted city of
the world, it inter alia declared
d a red
alert, closed its schools, shut down
osed
the thermal plants, and imposed
el
restrictions on plying of diesel
generators and vehicles.
New Delhis response was
tepid by contrast. Even when
the Delhi High Court somewhat hysterically described
life in Delhi to living in a
gas chamber, the ongoing
fight between the Central
Government and the State
Government did not permit
the launching of a national
response with all parties on
o
high alert ready to move into
action in well-rehearsed joint
int
manoeuvres.
Internet humour
Instead we got internet humour.
mour.
Arvind Kejriwals decision to allow
vehicles with odd and even numbers
mbers
ernate
to ply on Delhi roads on alternate
days inspired the following joke:
e:
Advertisement in matrimonial
monial
column: Boy with car having
g even
number seeks an alliance with a
girl possessing an odd number.
mber.
Girls merits, qualifications, famamily background, religion, caste
etc., no consideration. Apply
with photograph of number
plate at post box number

44

gfiles inside the government


vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

Attitude of CP, Delhi


The Commissioner, Delhi Police
who reports to the Lieutenant
Governor and not to the Chief
Minister said publicly that he had
not been consulted and he was
not sure that he had the

surplus manpower in the ranks of


the police to take on this
additional responsibility.
Suggestions made by the HPC of
the LG, Delhi
Fortunately,
y, the High
g
Powered
Committee

ARUNA

www.gfilesindia.com

of the LG, Delhi took the matter


more seriously and suggested the
following measures:
i) A cess of `1 should be imposed on
each pack of cigarettes and bottle of liquor, in order to create an
urban transport fund.
ii) The police should make it mandatory for vehicles to display a
sticker showing the Pollution
Under Control certificate on
the windshield.
iii) The PUC certificate should be a
mandatory requirement for every
purchase of petrol and diesel.
iv) Vehicles that do not have a destination in Delhi should not be
allowed to enter Delhi.
v) Premium parking rates should be
charged for parking in highly congested areas.
battery-operated
vi) Only
vehicles should ply for last mile
connectivity.
vii) Metro Rail Corporation should
introduce eight coaches for all its
trains by 2016.
Decisions taken by Delhi Govt
The Delhi Government suggested
the following measures in order to
counter pollution:
a) Vehicles with odd and even

numbers would be allowed to


ply on designated alternate days.
This proposal received such an
immoderate amount of flak,
despite the clarification that the
decision was patterned after the
Beijing precedent, that the CM
was compelled to say that the
decision would not be imposed on
the public if it was seen to inflict
too much inconvenience on them.
p
The Supreme
Court,, however,,
found nothing undesirable in this
decision which has been taken
elsewhere also.
b) Special checking parties of the
Transport Department would
check
the
PUC
certificates
of vehicles.
c) There would be a sustained public
awareness campaign to indicate
the steps needed to be taken by
them, especially with regard to
reductio
ion of emissions through
reduction
constant attention to engine tuning
and maintenance.
d) The Mass Rapid Transit System
which had been introduced on
an experimental basis should be
extended. Having watched the
operational problems faced by the
system in the experimental stage,
Delhiwallahs are not exactly ecstatic about this suggestion.

e) Fiscal
incentives
will
be
provided
for
buying
new
replacement vehicles.
f) The quality of fuel supplied to Delhi
leaves much to be desired and will
be constantly monitored.
g) The latest emission standards
will be adopted for manufacture
of vehicles in the country and for
import of vehicles from abroad.
Euro II standards will be applicable
from 2017.
h) The movement of trucks will be
perm
permitted only after 11 pm.
i) As dust
d
creates particulate matter,
the government shall arrange for
vacu
vacuum cleaning of roads.
j) There
Ther shall be a massive plantation
drive along arterial roads.
k) All thermal power plants shall
be closed
c
down for some time. In
the case of the Dadri plant, the
Nati
National Green Tribunal shall be
requ
requested to pass on the orders.
Obser
Observations of Supreme Court
HE matter also went up to the
H
Su
Supreme Court. The Court
fo
found the pre-eminent position
of Delh
Delhi as the most polluted city
of the world most embarrassing.
It cal
called on the authorities to
adopt a multi-pronged approach
to the problem and come up with
short-term,
short-t
medium-term
and
long-term solutions. It hiked the
long-te
pollutio
pollution tax on commercial vehicles
entering Delhi.
enterin

Suggestions of experts
Various experts have
analysed the problem of
pollution in Delhi and suggested their own solutions.
1.
An example is the
pollution caused by the use
of pyre wood for the burning of dead bodies. It has
been suggested that CNG/

www.indianbuzz.com

gfiles inside the government

vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

45

GOVERNANCE
environment mk kaw

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

9.

electric crematoria should be


used instead. Although this may
hurt the sensibilities of orthodox
Hindu, Sikh, Jain and Buddhist
communities, it is possible to
educate the more enlightened of
them.
On the use of generators and
vehicles based on diesel oil, there
are varying points of view, ranging
from a demand for absolute ban
on use of diesel for any purpose
whatsoever to a graded system of
pricing and taxation designed to
limit its use. Some experts favour
the ban to be imposed in a gradual
manner over a period ranging
from three to five years.
It has also been suggested that
only inverter battery systems and
gas-based generators should be
permitted as new backup units.
Distribution companies should
not be permitted any unscheduled
power interruption exceeding five
minutes and should be penalised
for a break if it occurs.
Bonfires based on wood and coal
should be banned and be replaced
by electric hotspots.
Waste incineration power plants
should be installed in the vicinity
of large garbage dump sites.
All metal fabrication workshops
emitting toxic fumes should be
moved outside the city.
The municipal authorities should
formulate a Code of Conduct for
builders. During demolition and
construction of structures, the
whole area should be cordoned
off with proper covering and
provided with dust catchers to
prevent particulate emission into
the atmosphere. Building material should not be allowed to be
stacked on the streets.
All new construction should be
frozen for a certain period of

46

gfiles inside the government


vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

maximum risk.
10. Double-decker buses should be
introduced on all major routes.
11. Autorickshaws should be replaced
by compact GPS-equipped cars.
12. An intelligent, internet-based
traffic
management
system
should replace the present
manual system
13. Electric vehicles should be
introduced on a large scale.The
following components of the
strategy may be implemented:
i) Production and operation
of such vehicles should be
exempted from all taxes and
duties for seven years.
ii) A family unit should be allowed
only one conventional fuel vehicle. Additional vehicles should
all be EVs.
iii) All cabs should switch over
to battery power in a phased
manner.
iv) Import of vehicles based on
conventional fuel power should
be barred.
v) To increase the popularity of
EVs, all VIPs, super stars and
youth icons should be encouraged to use EVs.
vi) All government and companyprovided vehicles should be
EVs.
vii) All potentially important areas
like residential and commercial
buildings,
parking
areas,
etc., should be equipped with
charging stations.
Lessons from
international experience
A quick review of the international
experience in pollution control reveals
the following nuggets of wisdom:
1. Japan taught us that we should act
as fast as the natural or manmade
calamity that has befallen us.
2. China taught us that we should not

target the particular city in whose


atmosphere we are interested. We
should target the entire region.
3. Singapore taught us that draconian laws and exemplary financial punishments were effective
instruments of action.
4. Some countries have fixed a certain number as the maximum
that would be permitted for registration in that financial year.
This acts as an effective deterrent
against excessive registrations
and prevents the entry of fresh
vehicles on the road.
Conclusion
HERE is no doubt that New
Delhi is currently in the
unenviable position of being
the most polluted city of the world.
At present, it is undergoing a highly
critical phase and should in fact have
been formally notified as being in a
state of emergency. The courts have
responded admirably to the crisis
and used appropriate language to
push the authorities on the path of
speedy action and spirited response.
By saying that the court felt highly
embarrassed by the position Delhi
had earned, the Supreme Court has
goaded the Government to action. By
comparing Delhi to a gas chamber,
the Delhi High Court has revived
memories of Nazi atrocities.
Unfortunately, the politicians are
locked in a vicious battle. The BJP
has not been able to stomach the
AAPs winning of 67 out of 70 seats
in the Delhi Assembly elections. Nor
has the Bihar election improved the
situation one bit. The BJP would not
like to help out AAP in any important
challenge the latter may face in Delhi.
Therein hangs the tail! g

MK Kaw is a former Secretary, Government


of India. (The views expressed are those of
the columnist.)

www.gfilesindia.com

LEISURE

travel madhya pradesh

Close to nature in Madhav

adhav National Park is


located in close proximity to
the Shivpuri town. Madhav
National Park has been the hunting
preserve of the Maharajas of Gwalior,
and is one of the oldest protected
areas of Madhya Pradesh.
Spreading over an area of almost
355 sq km, the Madhav National
Park is fascinating mix of natural
splendors of history and architectural
wonders. It is said that Emperor
Akbar, while returning from Malwa in
1854, captured a large number of wild
elephants in its forests. However, at
present there are no elephants in this
tract. The common fauna in Madhav
National Park include leopard, wild
dog, wolf, jackal, hyena, spotted deer,
nilgai, chinkara, chowsingha and
wild pig. There are reports of tigers
straying into the area from adjoining
forests. Having a varied terrain of
wooded hills, dry, mixed deciduous
forests, and flat grasslands around
the lakes, the park offers abundant
opportunities of sighting a variety
of wildlife.
The park is unique in having both
lake and forest ecosystems. Sakhya
and Madhav Sagar are the two lakes
in the park, which are important
biodiversity support systems. These
lakes not only add to the natural
beauty of the area, but also provide
a permanent source of water to the

wildlife, and a fine wetland habitat


to the aquatic fauna including
thousands of migratory waterfowls.
Marsh Crocodiles are in abundance

GETTING HERE
The nearest airport to this National
Park is at Gwalior which is 130 km
away. Pre-paid taxi services are
available from the Gwalior airport to
Madhav National Park.
State Transport Corporation as well as
private buses connect the park to
adjoining cities of Gwalior, Indore,
Bhopal, Jhansi, and Ujjain.

STAY

Tourist Village (Shivpuri)


Tel: (07492) 223760 , 221297 ,
9977073318
Email: tvshivpuri@mptourism.com

BEST TIME

October to March

www.indianbuzz.com

in Sakhya Sagar lake. Due to this, the


lake looks like a Crocodile Safari and
attracts special attention of tourists.
The artificial lake, Chandpatha, is
the winter home of migratory geese,
pochard, pintail, teal, mallard and
gadwall. A good site for bird watching
is where the forest track crosses the
rocky stream that flows from the
waste weir.
Deep inside the Madhav National
Park, at its highest point, stands the
exquisite George Castle. Interestingly
the castle was built by Jivaji Rao
Scindia of the Gwalior royal family for
an overnight halt for tiger shooting
by the British King George V, when
he was to pass that way during his
visit to India in 1911. Ironically, it so
happened that the emperor shot a tiger
on the way itself and did not stop at
Madhav. Other attractions are Tunda
Bharka spring, Bhura-kho spring and
watch tower, and Churanchaj ancient
wall paintings. g

gfiles inside the government

vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

47

SPOTLIGHT
The Secretary, Ministry of Culture, Narendra Kumar Sinha,
inaugurating the gallery at the National Museum
Foundation Day celebrations in New Delhi.

The Minister of State for Culture (Independent Charge),


Tourism (Independent Charge) and Civil Aviation, Dr. Mahesh
Sharma, addressing a press conference on flight operations
from Chennai airport, in New Delhi. The Secretary, Ministry of
Civil Aviation, RN Choubey, is also seen.

The Minister of State for Development of North Eastern


Region (I/C), Prime Ministers Office, Personnel, Public
Grievances & Pensions, Department of Atomic Energy,
Department of Space, Dr. Jitendra Singh, addressing a press
conference on good governance initiatives in New Delhi. The
Secretary, DoPT, Sanjay Kothari, is also seen.

The Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister,


Nripendra Misra, officially handing over the first set of files
related to Netaji to the DG, NAI, in New Delhi. The Additional
Principal Secretary, PK Mishra, is also seen.

Finance Secretary Ratan P Watal addressing the concluding


session of the first Conference of State Finance Secretaries,
in New Delhi. The Secretary, Department of Economic
Affairs, Ministry of Finance, Shaktikanta Das, and other
dignitaries are also seen.

48

gfiles inside the government


vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

www.gfilesindia.com

PHOTOS: PIB

The Union Minister for Rural Development, Panchayati Raj,


Drinking Water and Sanitation, Chaudhary Birender Singh,
releasing a publication on Good Governance Initiatives
under PMGSY, in New Delhi. The Minister of State for Rural
Development, Sudarshan Bhagat, and Secretary, Ministry of
Rural Development, JK Mohapatra, are also seen.

The Minister of State for Environment, Forest and Climate


Change (Independent Charge), Prakash Javadekar,
addressing a press conference in New Delhi on December 16,
2015. The Secretary, Ministry of Environment, Forest and
Climate Change, Ashok Lavasa, and other dignitaries are also
seen.

The Minister of State (Independent Charge) for Power, Coal


and New and Renewable Energy, Piyush Goyal presented the
National Energy Conservation Awards, at the National
Energy Conservation Day function in New Delhi.
The Secretary, Ministry of Power, PK Pujari and
other dignitaries are also seen.

The Union Minister for Agriculture and Farmers Welfare,


Radha Mohan Singh, releasing an official publication Bee
World, in New Delhi on December 16, 2015. The Secretary,
Department of Agriculture and Cooperation & Farmers
Welfare, Siraj Hussain, is also seen.

The Secretary, Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion


(DIPP), Amitabh Kant, interacting with the media regarding
achievements so far and the future plans under the Make In
India scheme, in New Delhi on December 17, 2015.

The Union Minister for Finance, Corporate Affairs and


Information & Broadcasting, Arun Jaitley, releasing the
Government of India Calendar 2016, in New Delhi. The
Minister of State for Information & Broadcasting, Col.
Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore, the Secretary, Ministry of
Information and Broadcasting, Sunil Arora, and the Additional
Secretary, Ministry of Information & Broadcasting, JS Mathur,
are also seen.
Compiled by Kanika Srivastava

www.indianbuzz.com

gfiles inside the government

vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

49

PERSPECTIVE
life sadhguru

T is only a juvenile intelligence


that analyses and arrives at a
conclusion. If your intelligence is
sufficiently evolved, you realise that
the more you analyse, the further
away you are from any conclusion.
As we dissect everything, wanting
to excavate truth from physical nature,
we enter into the minute dimensions
of particle science. From protons,
neutrons and electrons to neutrinos,
bosons,
and
super-symmetric
particles, we seem to be going deeper
and deeper. But all this is still only
in the realm of physical nature. Dark
matter, we are told, comprises more
of the universe than matterand this
is not composed of atoms at all but of
particles of a still unknown type.
Pick up a glass of water and take
a look at it. What do you really
know about it? Why, for instance,
do hydrogen and oxygen combine to
become water? Or, pick up a pebble
and gaze at it long and hard. Why
does it have this particular shape,
size, grain, texture? Or, just look at
yourself: why are you the way you
are? What is the basis of this form,
this body, this individuality?
If you go deeply into any aspect
of life, you will move further and
further away from any conclusion.
Life becomes more mysterious than
ever before. The more you delve
into life, you see that it is an endless
and unfathomable process. You
cannot get it because you are it.
When you realise experientially that
every atom, every grain of sand,
every pebble, every piece of life
from the smallest to the biggest is
unfathomable, you will naturally
bow down in utmost devotion to
everything. If you simply sit here and
breathe, you will know life better than
with any deep analysis.
Traditionally in India, it was
said that one ought to bow down to

50

gfiles inside the government


vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

Mystery of creation
everything that one encountered.
Whether it was a tree or a cow or a
snake or a cloudyou just bowed
down. When you bow to everything, it
could mean that you are a fool, or that
you have looked at life in its utmost
profundity. The difference between
an idiot and an enlightened being is
thin. The two look similar, but they
are actually worlds apart. An idiot
is incapable of drawing conclusions.
A mystic is unwilling to draw
conclusions. The rest have glorified
their conclusions as knowledge. The
fool just enjoys whatever little he
knows. One who has seen life in its
utmost depth enjoys it absolutely.
The rest are the ones who constantly
struggle and suffer.
One morning a man walked into his
office and told his boss, Boss, I want
you to know, three big companies are
after me. You must give me a raise.
His boss said, What! Which
companies? Who wants you?
He said, The electric company,
the telephone company, and the
gas company.

Something is always behind the


so-called smart people, those with
confirmed conclusions about life! Or
else, they are always busy chasing
something. An idiot can sit here
quietly. A mystic can sit here quietly.
The rest cannot.
Devotion is a simple method of
dissolving all the hurdles on the path.
Bowing to everything does not seem
to be particularly good for your selfesteem. But becoming a devotee does
not mean you are a pushover. That
which knows how to bend will not
break. This is the rationale behind
hata yoga and the ancient martial art
traditions in the East. That is so with
everything within you.
Unfortunately, these days even
so-called spiritual leaders are talking
about self-esteem. Self and esteem
are both a problem. Both are very
limited entities; both are fragile,
insecure. If you have no esteem, very
good. If you have no self fabulous! g
Sadhguru, a yogi, is a visionary,
humanitarian and a prominent spiritual
leader (www.ishafoundation.org)

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birthdays
IAS officers birthdays Jan 16, 2016 Feb 15, 2016

IAS officers birthdays

Jan 16, 2016 Feb 15, 2016

Arvind Shrivastava

Ram Prakash Sisodia

Usha Titus

G Ashok Kumar

CADRE: KARNATAKA

CADRE: ANDHRA PRADESH

CADRE: KERALA

CADRE: ANDHRA PRADESH

sharvind@ias.nic.in

sisodiar@ias.nic.in

titusu@ias.nic.in

kgashok@ias.nic.in

Sucha Ram Ladhar

Sumantra Chaudhuri

Anuradha Khati Rajivan

MK Shanmuga Sundaram

CADRE: PUNJAB

CADRE: WEST BENGAL

CADRE: TAMIL NADU

CADRE: UTTAR PRADESH

ladharsr@ias.nic.in

sumantra@ias.nic.in

rajivand@ias.nic.in

sundaram97@ias.nic.in

Talitemjen Toy

Dinesh Kumar Jain

Bhupinder Kaur Aulakh

RP Watal

CADRE: NAGALAND

CADRE: MAHARASHTRA

CADRE: UTTARAKHAND

CADRE: ANDHRA PRADESH

toyt@ias.nic.in

jaindk@ias.nic.in

bkaulakh@ias.nic.in

watalrp@ias.nic.in

Krishna Kumar Nirala

Vinod Kumar

Anup K Pujari

Sanjay Kumar

CADRE: UTTARAKHAND

CADRE: ODISHA

CADRE: KARNATAKA

CADRE: MAHARASHTRA

kk.nirala@ias.nic.in

kumarv10@ias.nic.in

pujaridk@ias.nic.in

kumars13@ias.nic.in

Yogendra Tripathy

Mukesh Puri

Shyam Lal Mewara

VB Pyarelal

CADRE: KARNATAKA

CADRE: GUJARAT

CADRE: ASSAM-MEGHALAYA

CADRE: ASSAM-MEGHALAYA

tyogen@ias.nic.in

purim@ias.nic.in

slmewara@ias.nic.in

pyarelal@ias.nic.in

Roopa Roshan

Gayatri A Rathore

SK Pal

VK Sharma

CADRE: ODISHA

CADRE: RAJASTHAN

CADRE: MADHYA PRADESH

CADRE: PUNJAB

roopa.ias@ias.nic.in

rathoreg@ias.nic.in

palsk@ias.nic.in

sharma.vk@ias.nic.in

Munish Moudgil

Kishore Kumar Sinha

Jagpal Singh

Indevar Pandey

CADRE: KARNATAKA

CADRE: UTTAR PRADESH

CADRE: PUNJAB

CADRE: WEST BENGAL

moudgilm@ias.nic.in

sinhakk@ias.nic.in

sjagpal@ias.nic.in

pandeyi@ias.nic.in

Shashi Prakash Goyal

Ashok Kumar Barnwal

Akhil Arora

Sudhir Garg

CADRE: UTTAR PRADESH

CADRE: MADHYA PRADESH

CADRE: RAJASTHAN

CADRE: UTTAR PRADESH

spgoyal@ias.nic.in

barnwala@ias.nic.in

akhilaro@ias.nic.in

gargs1@ias.nic.in

Subrata Biswas

N Nagambika Devi

Manoj Kumar Parida

Rajni Sekhri Sibal

CADRE: WEST BENGAL

CADRE: KARNATAKA

CADRE: UNION TERRITORY

CADRE: HARYANA

sbiswas90@ias.nic.in

devinn@ias.nic.in

paridamk@ias.nic.in

sibalrs@ias.nic.in

Dev Raj Dev

Rajiv Nayan Choubey

Prem Kumar Taneja

Neetu Kumari Prasad

CADRE: TAMIL NADU

CADRE: TAMIL NADU

CADRE: GUJARAT

CADRE: TELANGANA

devdr@ias.nic.in

choubeyr@ias.nic.in

tanejapk@ias.nic.in

prasadn3@ias.nic.in

Lok Ranjan

Shasidhar K Srinivas

Sunil Kumar Chaturvedi

Ram Niwas

CADRE: MANIPUR-TRIPURA

CADRE: KERALA

CADRE: WEST BENGAL

CADRE: HARYANA

ranjanl@ias.nic.in

snivas6@ias.nic.in

cskumar@ias.nic.in

niwasr@ias.nic.in

Parag Gupta

Senti Yanger Imchen

Navin Verma

Naved Masood

CADRE: ODISHA

CADRE: NAGALAND

CADRE: BIHAR

CADRE: MANIPUR-TRIPURA

guptap1@ias.nic.in

imchensy@ias.nic.in

vnavin@ias.nic.in

masoodn@ias.nic.in

Avinash K Srivastava

A Vidya Sagar

Rajeev Chawla

Vikas Pratap

CADRE: UTTAR PRADESH

CADRE: ANDHRA PRADESH

CADRE: KARNATAKA

CADRE: PUNJAB

savinash@ias.nic.in

sagarav@ias.nic.in

chawlar@ias.nic.in

pratapv@ias.nic.in

16-01-1971

16-01-1959

17-01-1964

17-01-1974

18-01-1962

18-01-1980

19-01-1974

20-01-1967

20-01-1963

21-01-1973

22-01-1964

22-01-1962

23-01-1960

24-01-1968

24-01-1961

25-01-1959

25-01-1964

26-01-1964

26-01-1975

27-01-1955

27-01-1967

28-01-1962

28-01-1959

29-01-1965

29-01-1967

30-01-1956

30-01-1961

31-01-1956

31-01-1970

01-02-1956

02-02-1957

02-02-1958

03-02-1957

04-02-1969

04-02-1962

05-02-1957

05-02-1963

06-02-1959

06-02-1962

07-02-1964

07-02-1969

08-02-1956

08-02-1961

09-02-1959

10-02-1955

10-02-1964

11-02-1964

12-02-1960

13-02-1962

14-02-1959

14-02-1955

15-02-1969

For the complete list, see www.gfilesindia.com

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gfiles inside the government

vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

51

birthdays
IPS officers birthdays

Jan 16, 2016 Feb 15, 2016

IPS officers birthdays

Jan 16, 2016 Feb 15, 2016

N Sridhar Rao

Raghavendra H Auradkar

PP Pandey

Rajiv Ranjan Verma

CADRE: SIKKIM

CADRE: KARNATAKA

CADRE: GUJARAT

CADRE: BIHAR

nsridharrao@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

rhauradkar@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

pandepp@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

rrverma@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

Rajesh Kumar Arya

Bipin Bihari

Mukul Goel

Pragya Richa Srivastava

CADRE: RAJASTHAN

CADRE: MAHARASHTRA

CADRE: UTTAR PRADESH

CADRE: MADHYA PRADESH

rkarya@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

bipinbihari@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

mgoel@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

pragyaricha@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

Atul Katiyar

Amit Kumar Sinha

Md Quaiser Khalid

R Tamil Chandran

CADRE: AGMUT

CADRE: UTTARAKHAND

CADRE: MAHARASHTRA

CADRE: TAMIL NADU

atulkatiyar@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

aksinha@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

qkhalid@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

rtamilchandran@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

Om Prakash

Ashutosh Shukla

Pramod Kumar

VR Kamble

CADRE: KARNATAKA

CADRE: TAMIL NADU

CADRE: GUJARAT

CADRE: MAHARASHTRA

om_prakash@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

ashutoshshukla@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

pramod_kumar@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

vrkamble@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

MR Ajith Kumar

Kamal Saxena

Pandeya Niraj Nayan

Arun Pratap Singh

CADRE: KERALA

CADRE: UTTAR PRADESH

CADRE: WEST BENGAL

CADRE: MADHYA PRADESH

mrajith@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

ksaxena@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

pnnayan@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

ap_singh@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

A Sunder Kumar Das

Anjani Kumar

KP Maghendhran

SN Pandey

CADRE: ANDHRA PRADESH

CADRE: ANDHRA PRADESH

CADRE: TAMIL NADU

CADRE: MAHARASHTRA

askdas@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

anjanikumar@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

maghendran@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

snpandey@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

Satish Kumar Mathur

Ritesh Kumar

MR Krishna

Rajbir Singh Deswal

CADRE: UTTAR PRADESH

CADRE: MAHARASHTRA

CADRE: MADHYA PRADESH

CADRE: HARYANA

satishkm@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

riteshkumar@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

mrkrishna@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

rsdeswal@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

CV Muniraju

Parminder Rai

N Suryanarayana

SG Bhati

CADRE: MADHYA PRADESH

CADRE: HARYANA

CADRE: ANDHRA PRADESH

CADRE: GUJARAT

muniraju@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

parminder@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

nsuryanarayana@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

sgbhati@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

Pankaj Kumar Thakur

AK Atri

Anisa Husain

Raghubir Lal

CADRE: KARNATAKA

CADRE: JAMMU & KASHMIR

CADRE: TAMIL NADU

CADRE: UTTAR PRADESH

pkthakur@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

akatri@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

anisa@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

raghubirlal@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

Charu Bali

Ganesh Dutt Bhargava

Mukesh Agrawal

Aruna M Bahuguna

CADRE: HARYANA

CADRE: HIMACHAL PRADESH

CADRE: ASSAM-MEGHALAYA

CADRE: ANDHRA PRADESH

charubali@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

gdbhargava@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

mukeshagrawal@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

bahuguna@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

Nipuna Milind Torawane

Rajeev Kumar

Dayal Gangwar

Johny William

CADRE: GUJARAT

CADRE: WEST BENGAL

CADRE: ODISHA

CADRE: JAMMU &KASHMIR

nipuna@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

rajeevk@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

dayalg@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

jwilliam@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

Rakesh Kumar Gupta

Navin Kumar Singh

Vijoy Kumar

Sonal Misra

CADRE: WEST BENGAL

CADRE: JHARKHAND

CADRE: WEST BENGAL

CADRE: TAMIL NADU

rakeshkgupta@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

nksingh@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

vijoykumar@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

sverma@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

Muktesh Chander

Prem Shankar Meena

Karan Singha

Rajpal Meena

CADRE: AGMUT

CADRE: KARNATAKA

CADRE: TAMIL NADU

CADRE: PUNJAB

mukteshchander@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

psmeena@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

karansingh@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

rmeena@mail.svpnpa.gov.in

16-01-1967

16-01-1968

17-01-1970

17-01-1957

18-01-1968

18-01-1957

19-01-1964

20-01-1957

20-01-1971

21-01-1970

22-01-1974

23-01-1961

23-01-1962

24-01-1960

24-01-1961

25-01-1972

26-01-1961

26-01-1962

28-01-1966

28-01-1969

29-01-1959

29-01-1956

30-01-1957

31-01-1966

31-01-1973

01-02-1958

01-02-1957

02-02-1964

02-02-1972

03-02-1958

03-02-1962

04-02-1959

04-02-1959

05-02-1956

05-02-1976

06-02-1963

06-02-1972

07-02-1958

07-02-1962

08-02-1956

08-02-1968

09-02-1965

10-02-1956

10-02-1957

11-02-1961

11-02-1957

12-02-1958

12-02-1970

13-02-1957

14-02-1957

15-02-1974

15-02-1956

For the complete list, see www.gfilesindia.com

52

gfiles inside the government

vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

www.gfilesindia.com

Lok Sabha Members Jan 16, 2016 Feb 15, 2016

Lok Sabha Members Jan 16, 2016 Feb 15, 2016

Tariq Anwar

Manoj Kumar Tiwari

Dasrath Tirkey

Kirit Somaiya

NCP (Bihar)

BJP (NCT of Delhi)

AITC (West Bengal)

BJP (Maharashtra)

tariq.anwar@sansad.nic.in

mt7tiwari@gmail.com

dasrath.tirkey@sansad.nic.in

kiritsomaiya@gmail.com

Mamtaz Sanghamita

Sukender Reddy Gutha

Krishna Pratap Singh

Sushma Swaraj

AITC (West Bengal)

INC (Telangana)

BJP (Uttar Pradesh)

BJP (Madhya Pradesh)

mamtaz.sanghamita@sansad.nic.in

gutha.loksabha@gmail.com

kpsingh.jnp@gmail.com

sushmaswaraj@hotmail.com

Ravindra Kumar Pandey

Dharmendra Yadav

Kulamani Samal

Ram Prasad Sarmah

BJP (Jharkhand)

SP (Uttar Pradesh)

BJD (Odisha)

BJP (Assam)

rkpandey@sansad.nic.in

d.yadav@sansad.nic.in

kulamani.samal@sansad.nic.in

ramsarmah@gmail.com

R Vanaroja

Chhedi Paswan

Rao Inderjit Singh

Vincent H Pala

AIADMK (Tamil Nadu)

BJP (Bihar)

BJP (Haryana)

INC (Meghalaya)

r.vanaroja@sansad.nic.in

chhedipaswan.mp@gmail.com

rao.inderjit@sansad.nic.in

vincentpala@gmail.com

Rahul Kaswan

Krishan Pal Gurjar

Neelam Sonker

Asrarul Haque Mohammad

BJP (Rajasthan)

BJP (Haryana)

BJP (Uttar Pradesh)

INC (Bihar)

rahul.kaswan@sansad.nic.in

palkrishangurjar@gmail.com

neelam.sonkar@sansad.nic.in

mahaqqasmi@gmail.com

Darshana Vikram Jardosh

KC Venugopal

BJP (Gujarat)

INC (Kerala)

darshanajardosh@sansad.nic.in

kcvenugopal.org@gmail.com

16-01-1951

16-01-1946

20-01-1959

20-01-1959

20-01-1977

21-01-1961

01-02-1971

02-02-1954

03-02-1979

04-02-1956

04-02-1957

04-02-1963

Kanwar Singh Tanwar

Nihal Chand Chauhan

BJP (Uttar Pradesh)

BJP (Rajasthan)

ks.tanwar@sansad.nic.in

mos-mopr@nic.in

21-01-1961

04-02-1971

Srinivas Kesineni

Shrikant Eknath Shinde

TDP (Andhra Pradesh)

SS (Maharashtra)

kesineni.srinivas@sansad.nic.in

shrikantshinde87@yahoo.in

22-01-1966

04-02-1987

Kaushal Kishore

Venkateswara Rao Magantti

BJP (Uttar Pradesh)

TDP (Andhra Pradesh)

kishore.kaushal@sansad.nic.in

maganttibabu@gmail.com

25-01-1960

05-02-1960

Hari Manjhi

Santosh Kumar

BJP (Bihar)

JDU (Bihar)

manjhihari@gmail.com

santosh.kumar19@sansad.nic.in

Nishikant Dubey

Upendra Kushwaha

BJP (Jharkhand)

RLSP (Bihar)

nishikant.dubey@sansad.nic.in

upendra.kushwaha19@sansad.nic.in

28-01-1963

28-01-1969

05-02-1976

06-02-1960

Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore

Maheish Girri

BJP (Rajasthan)

BJP (NCT of Delhi)

rajyavardhan.rathore@sansad.nic.in

maheish.girri@sansad.nic.in

29-01-1970

08-02-1974

Gopal Chinayya Shetty

Balabhadra Majhi

BJP (Maharashtra)

BJD (Odisha)

gc.shetti@sansad.nic.in

bmajhi86@yahoo.co.in

31-01-1954

09-02-1961

For the complete list, see www.gfilesindia.com

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09-02-1967

09-02-1977

10-02-1949

11-02-1950

11-02-1973

12-02-1954

14-02-1952

14-02-1955

14-02-1968

15-02-1942

Rajya Sabha Members Jan 16, 2016 Feb 15, 2016


Ali Anwar Ansari

AIADMK (Tamil Nadu)

16-01-1954

vijila.sathyananth@sansad.nic.in

JD-U (Bihar)

Prem Chand Gupta

ali.anwar@sansad.nic.in

03-02-1950

Javed Akhtar

RJD (Jharkhand)

17-01-1945

pgupta@sansad.nic.in

Nominated

AW Rabi Bernard

javed.akhtar@sansad.nic.in

03-02-1959

PL Punia

AIADMK (Tamil Nadu)

23-01-1945

r.bernard@sansad.nic.in

INC (Uttar Pradesh)

Ronald Sapa Tlau

pl.punia@sansad.nic.in

04-02-1954

Pyarimohan Mohapatra

INC (Mizoram)

25-01-1940

rs.tlau@sansad.nic.in

IND. (Odisha)

Biswajit Daimary

pyarimohanap@sansad.nic.in

04-02-1971

Dilipbhai Pandya

BPF (Assam)

30-01-1944

bj.diamary@sansad.nic.in

BJP (Gujarat)

Ambeth Rajan

ds.pandya@sansad.nic.in

09-02-1956

Prakash Javadekar

BSP (Uttar Pradesh)

30-01-1951

ambethrajan@sansad.nic.in

BJP (Madhya Pradesh)

Basawaraj Patil

prakash.j@sansad.nic.in

10-02-1944

Parimal Nathwani

BJP (Karnataka)

01-02-1956

bpatil.mp@sansad.nic.in

IND. (Jharkhand)

Ahamed Hassan

parimal.nathwani@sansad.nic.in

Vijila Sathyananth
02-02-1971

14-02-1953

AITC (West Bengal)

ahmed.hassan@sansad.nic.in

gfiles inside the government

vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

53

Tracking
TIRATH SINGH THAKUR

For a complete list of appointments & retirements, see www.gfilesindia.com

The Justice has been appointed Chief Justice


of the Supreme Court of India.

cadre has been appointed Director General,


Directorate General of Supplies and
Disposals.

Bengal cadre has been appointed Chief


Executive Officer, Food Safety and
Standards Authority.

RASHMI VERMA

ASHA RAM SIHAG

CHHABILENDRA ROUL

The 1982-batch IAS officer of the Bihar


cadre has been appointed Secretary,
Ministry of Textiles.

The 1983-batch IAS officer of the Himachal


Pradesh cadre has been appointed
Secretary of the Union Public
Service Commission.

The 1985-batch IAS officer of the Punjab


cadre has been appointed Additional
Secretary, Department of Agricultural
Research and Education.

SMITA NAGRAJ

SARASWATI PRASAD

The 1984-batch IAS officer of the


Tamil Nadu cadre has been appointed
Director General (Acquisition), Ministry
of Defence.

The 1985-batch IAS officer of the AssamMeghalaya cadre has been upgraded to
Additional Secretary level in the Ministry
of Drinking Water and Sanitation.

UDAI PRATAP SINGH

SUMEET JERATH

The 1984-batch IAS officer of the Jharkhand


cadre has been appointed Additional
Secretary, Ministry of Tourism.

The 1985-batch IAS officer of the AssamMeghalaya cadre has been appointed
Additional Secretary in the Ministry of
External Affairs.

NEERAJ KUMAR GUPTA


The 1982-batch IAS officer of the Uttar
Pradesh cadre has been appointed
Secretary, Department of Disinvestment,
Ministry of Finance.

SANJAY MITRA
The 1982-batch IAS officer of the West
Bengal cadre has been appointed Secretary,
Ministry of Road Transport and Highways.

BASUDEB BANERJEE
The 1983-batch IAS officer has been
appointed the new Chief Secretary of
West Bengal.

ASHIM KHURANA

R RAJAGOPAL
The 1984-batch IAS officer of the Tamil
Nadu cadre has been appointed Adviser,
Inter State Council Secretariat.

The 1983-batch IAS officer of the Gujarat


cadre has been appointed Chairman,
Staff Selection Commission, at Additional
Secretary level.

BHUPENDRA SINGH

BINOY KUMAR

PAWAN KUMAR AGARWAL

The 1983-batch IAS officer of the Telangana

The 1985-batch IAS officer of the West

The 1985-batch IAS officer of the Uttar


Pradesh cadre has been appointed
Chairman, NPPA.

KALPANA MITTAL BARUAH


The 1985-batch IAS officer of the Punjab
cadre has been appointed Additional
Secretary, Cabinet Secretariat.

M GOPAL REDDY
The 1985-batch IAS officer of the
Madhya Pradesh cadre, Joint Secretary,
Ministry of Home Affairs, has been
upgraded to Additional Secretary level.

Moving On: IAS officers retiring in January 2016


ASSAM-MEGHALAYA

Prashant Naik (1984)


Hemanga Kishore Sharma (1992)

ANDHRA PRADESH

IYR Krishna Rao (1979)


A Vidya Sagar (1984)

JAMMU & KASHMIR

RAJASTHAN

KARNATAKA

TELANGANA

MAHARASHTRA

UTTAR PRADESH

Saleem Mohammed (2002)


Anup K Pujari (1980)

Khurshid Ahmad (1999)


Kumar B Narayan Singh (1999)

Anand B Kulkarni (1982)


Gautam Chatterjee (1982)
HK Jawale (1998)
YW Gedam (2002)

GUJARAT

MADHYA PRADESH

BIHAR

SK Nanda (1978)

HIMACHAL PRADESH
Rajender Singh (2000)

JHARKHAND

Radhey Shyam Poddar (1982)


Hans Raj Singh (1999)
Umashashi Chatarji (2001)
Jitwahan Uraon (2001)

54

gfiles inside the government


vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

Raghuveer Shrivastava (1992)


Dwarka Das Agrawal (1995)

ODISHA

SudarsanamSrinivasan (1980)
Ranglal Jamuda (1981)
Debi Prasad Panda (2001)
Harekrishna Behera (2001)

Hanuman Singh Bhati


T Radha (1983)
Jawed Usmani (1978)
Lov Verma (1978)
Kush Verma (1979)
Siraj Hussain (1979)
Net Ram (1979)
Chandra Prakash (1997)

UNION TERRITORY

Ved Prakash Rao (1999)

WEST BENGAL

Trilochan Singh (1982)


Debabrata Pal (1997)
Amal Roy Chowdhury (1997)

www.gfilesindia.com

PRADIP BHARGAVA
The 1973-batch IAS officer of the Madhya
Pradesh cadre has been appointed
Independent Director in the NMDC.

RK MATHUR
The 1977-batch IAS officer of the Tripura
cadre, former Secretary Defence has been
appointed the new Chief Information
Commissioner (CIC).

ARVIND JADHAV
The 1978-batch IAS officer of the Karnataka cadre, Chairman, Karnataka Appellate
Tribunal, has been appointed Chief Secretary to the Government of Karnataka.

SHYAMAL SARKAR
The 1979-batch retired IAS officer of the
West Bengal cadre has been appointed
Independent Director in the NMDC.

M VEERABRAHMAIAH
The 1979-batch IAS officer of the
Telangana cadre has been appointed
Commissioner for Cooperation and
Registrar of Cooperative Societies in
Telangana.

AMITABH KANT
The 1980-batch IAS officer of the Kerala
cadre has been assigned additional charge
as CEO, NITI Aayog.

ARADHANA JOHRI
The 1980-batch IAS officer of the Uttar
Pradesh cadre has been appointed
Chairperson, National Authority of
Chemical Weapons Convention (NACWC).

IS DANI
The 1981-batch IAS officer of the Madhya
Pradesh cadre has been appointed
Chairman of the Land Reforms Commission
in Madhya Pradesh.

RK CHATURVEDI
The 1987-batch IAS officer of the
Madhya Pradesh cadre has been appointed
Joint Secretary in the Implementation Cell,
Seventh Central Pay Commission.

SHUBHRA SINGH
The 1989-batch IAS officer of the Rajasthan
cadre has been appointed Executive
Director (Joint Secretary level), Indian
Trade Promotion Organisation (ITPO),
New Delhi.

BHAGWANT SINGH BISHNOI


THE FOLLOWING OFFICERS
HAVE BEEN APPOINTED JOINT
SECRETARIES IN THE GOVERNMENT
OF INDIA
DINESH KUMAR (1996-batch IAS officer of the Rajasthan cadre), Department
of Agriculture, Cooperation & Farmers
Welfare; VENKATA RAMA
SASTRYPIDAPARTHI (1989-batch IPS
officer of the Uttar Pradesh cadre),
Department of Consumer Affairs; RAJIV
BANSAL (1988-batch IAS officer of the
Nagaland cadre), Department of
Electronics & Information Technology;
AMIT YADAV (1991-batch IAS officer of
the Union Territory cadre), Department
of Telecommunications; B ANAND
(1987-batch IAS officer of the Tamil
Nadu cadre), Ministry of Urban
Development; SHRIPAL (1986-batch
IFS officer of the Kerala cadre) has
been appointed Principal
Commissioner (JS level), DDA under
the Ministry of Urban Development;
SONIA SETHI (1994-batch IAS officer of
the Maharashtra cadre), Ministry of
Culture; PRAVEEN GARG (1988-batch
IAS officer of the Madhya Pradesh
cadre), Department of Economic
Affairs; ANIL KUMAR SINGH (1995batch IAS officer of the Union Territory
cadre), Department of Justice;
RAJINDER KUMAR KASHYAP (1989batch IPoS officer), Department of
Justice; RACHNA SHAH (1991-batch
IAS officer of the Kerala cadre),
Cabinet Secretariat.

The 1983-batch IFS officer, at present


Deputy Permanent Representative of
India to New York, has been appointed
the new Ambassador of India to the
Kingdom of Thailand.

JAIDEEP SARKAR
The 1987-batch IFS officer, Ambassador
of India to Israel, has been appointed the
next Ambassador of India to the Royal
Government of Bhutan.

VINAY MOHAN KWATRA


The 1988-batch IFS officer has been
appointed Joint Secretary in the Prime
Ministers Office.

SANJIV KOHLI
The 1988-batch IFS officer has been
appointed High Commissioner of lndia to
New Zealand.

AKHILESH MISHRA
The 1989-batch lFS officer, Consul General
of lndia, Toronto, has been appointed the
next High Commissioner of India to the
Republic of Maldives.

SUSHIL KUMAR SINGHAL


The Ambassador of India to the Republic
of Angola, has been appointed the new
Ambassador of lndia to the Democratic
Republic of Sao Tome & Principe with
residence in Luanda.

SAURABH SHUKLA
The 2005-batch IA & AS officer has
been appointed Deputy Secretary in the
Department of Economic Affairs.

SHAMLA IQBAL

KN SATHIYAMURTHY

The 2002-batch IAS officer of the


Karnataka cadre has been appointed
Managing Director, Karnataka Soaps &
Detergents Limited, in Karnataka.

The 1977-batch IPS officer IG, Tiruchi, has


been appointed the new intelligence chief
in Tamil Nadu.

KILLU SIVAKUMAR NAIDU

The 1984-batch IPS officer of the Haryana


cadre has been deputed as Additional
Director General in the Sashastra Seema
Bal (SSB).

The 2011-batch IAS officer of the


Telangana cadre has been posted
as Additional Commissioner, GHMC,
Hyderabad, in Telangana.

NENGCHA L MUKHOPADHAYA
The 1980-batch IFS officer, Dean (FSl), has
been appointed the Ambassador of India
to the Republic of lndonesia.

SS DESWAL

PV RAMASASHTRY
The 1989-batch IPS officer of the
Uttar Pradesh cadre IG, NIA, has been
appointed Joint Secretary, Department of
Consumer Affairs.

gfiles inside the government

www.indianbuzz.com

vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

55

Tracking

For a complete list of appointments & retirements, see www.gfilesindia.com

PIB

PRAVEEN VASHISTA
The 1991-batch IPS officer of the Bihar
cadre has been appointed Joint Secretary
in the Ministry of Mines.

DC SRIVASTAVA
The 1995-batch IPS officer of the AGMUT
cadre has been appointed Executive
Director (Security) in the Oil and Natural
Gas Commission (ONGC) under the
Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Gas.

AMRENDRA KUMARSENGAR
The 1995-batch IPS officer of the Uttar
Pradesh cadre has been appointed the
new IG, NDRF.

MADHAV PRASAD VERMA


The 2008-batch IPS officer of the Uttar
Pradesh cadre has been appointed
Superintendent of Police, Pratapgarh, in
Uttar Pradesh.

President Pranab Mukherjee administering the oath of office of Chief Justice of India
to Justice TS Thakur at the swearing-in ceremony at Rashtrapati Bhavan

JEYA KUMAR
The IRTS officer has joined as the new
Chairman of the Goa Port Trust.

selected for the post of Director (Technical),


Steel Authority of India Limited (SAIL) at a
PESB meeting.

The 1989-batch IFS officer of the Andhra


Pradesh cadre has been appointed
Regional Director, Forest Survey of India
(FSI), Kolkata.

MOHD JAMSHED

PRAKASH KUMAR SINGH

The IRTS officer, General Manager,


Northeast Frontier Railway, has been
appointed Member Traffic, Railway Board.

The Chief Executive Officer of SAILs


Durgapur Steel Plant, has been appointed
Chairman, Steel Authority of India Limited.

PRAPHULLA CHANDRA SHARMA

SEEMA GAUR

JUSTICE VIRENDRA SINGH

The 2006-batch IFS officer has been


appointed Deputy Secretary in the Ministry
of Petroleum and Natural Gas in the
Government of India.

The 1984-batch IES officer has been


appointed Economic Adviser, Office of
EA, DIPP.

The former Judge of the Allahabad High


Court has been appointed the new
Lokayukta of Uttar Pradesh.

PRIYANKA SINGH

DEVENDER SINGH

PREETI KATIYAR

The 1986-batch IES officer has been


appointed Economic Adviser, Labour &
Employment Ministry.

The 2000-batch IRPS officer has been


appointed Director in the Department of
Biotechnology in the Government of India.

SUNIL AGRAWAL

PRABHAS KUMAR

The 1985-batch IDSE officer has been


appointed Assistant Director General at
Director level, UIDAI, Delhi.

The 1988-batch IDSE officer has been


deputed Director in the Department of
Fertilisers in Government of India.

M NAIR RAJEEVAN

SHANKAR MANOHARAN

The Director, Indian Institute of Tropical


Meteorology, Pune, has been appointed
Secretary, Ministry of Earth Sciences.

The 1998-batch IDAS officer has been


appointed Director in the Department of
Space, Bengaluru.

SAIFUDDIN FIDVI

MUKESH CHOUDHARY
The 1996-batch IoFS officer has been
appointed Director in the Ministry of Coal in
the Government of India.

ASHOK AGGARWAL

The Chief General Manager has been


selected for the post of Director (Marketing),
Rashtriya Chemicals & Fertilisers Limited
(RCF) by the Public Enterprises Selection
Board (PESB).

The IRS-IT officer has been appointed


Senior DR, ITAT, Delhi.

RAMAN

AJAYA KUMAR NAIK

The IRS-IT officer, Joint Commissioner of


Income Tax, has been appointed OSD to
the Secretary, Department of Revenue.

SURBHAI SHARMA
The IRS-IT officer has been appointed
Deputy Secretary in the Ministry of
Commerce and Industry.

SANJIV SHANKAR
The IRS-IT officer has been appointed
CIT in the office of the Principal CCIT,
Delhi region.

AK JAIN
The IRS-IT officer has been appointed
Chairman, Central Board of Direct Taxes.

The Executive Director, SAIL, has been

56

gfiles inside the government


vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

SWATI BASU
The officer has been appointed Scientific
Secretary, office of the Principal Scientific
Adviser (PSA), Government of India.

www.gfilesindia.com

...by the way


Search for foreign secy begins

Waiting for Pandoras box to open

he implementation of the Seventh Central Pay


Commission report is a Pandoras box for the states.
The babus in the state bureaucracies are a worried lot as
they may not get the benefit of the handsome package
recommended by the Pay Commission. It is a norm that
once the Central Pay Commission report is implemented
by the Centre, the states are automatically under pressure
to maintain pay parity. In the current circumstances,
the financial condition of many states is not healthy.
Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, Odisha, Tamil Nadu and
Punjab have reportedly written to the Centre to delay the
implementation of the Seventh Pay Commission report,
citing their fiscal health and inability to shoulder such a
huge financial burden. As per reports, it would imply a
total burden of `1,02,100 crore on the central exchequer,
and if the same formula is adopted by the states, there
will be a huge burden on the existing fiscal frame of the
states as well. The states have approached the Prime
Ministers Office (PMO), the Cabinet Secretary and Niti
Aayog, seeking more time for implementing the pay
panels report. The states which are nearing assembly
elections are really in a big soup. Any suggestions? g

www.indianbuzz.com

he search for the new Foreign Secretary has


begun as the incumbent, Subrahmanyam
Jaishankar, is superannuating this year. So, who
will be the new Foreign Secretary of India? There
are many competent officers in the lineup but, as
is the nature of the Prime Minister, there is no
indication till now as to who will be appointed to
this prestigious post. As the clock ticks, Navtej Singh
Sarna would have been the obvious choice but he has
been appointed High Commissioner to the United
Kingdom. Another officer who would have been
a good choice was Anil Wadhwa, but he has been
appointed Ambassador to Italy. It is learnt that a
lobby within the Ministry of External Affairs was
not on good terms with Anil Wadhwa. If the sources
are to be believed, Indias Ambassador to China,
Vijay Gokhale, is now the frontrunner for the post.
It is believed Gokhales specialisation in China is in
his favour; he also speaks fluent Chinese. A change
of guard in South Block does not, however, mean
that Jaishankar will be completely out of the ruling
set-up. Sources disclose that there might be two
security chiefs: one to look after internal security
and the other to oversee the foreign front. In the
given international scenario, security is going to be a
paramount subject of the government. Watch
this space. g

gfiles inside the government

vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

57

...by the way


Caught in Kejriwals war

Bumping out BSNL

s the government in the mood to wind up public


sector institutions? There is no formal directive
regarding this but the way some top functionaries of the
RBI are working, it appears that it has the tacit consent
of the government to ignore PSUs. Recently, there was
an important matterissue of payment banks licence
to telephone operators by the RBI. Approximately 41
operators applied for the licenceincluding BSNL.
Almost everybody got the licenceexcept BSNL.
The Reserve Bank granted in-principle approval
to 11 entities, including Reliance Industries, Aditya
Birla Nuvo, Paytm, Vodafone, and Airtel, to set up
payment banks and proposed such licences on tap
in future. The other entities which have been given
in-principle approval are the Department of Posts,
Cholamandalam Distribution Services, Tech Mahindra,
National Securities Depository Limited (NSDL), Fino
PayTech, and Sun Pharmas Dilip Shantilal Shanghvi.
Not only BSNL but Mobikwik, Oxigen, Citrus, and
Novopay Itz Cash Card also applied for the licence but
failed to get approval. Sources disclosed that BSNL
was refused on reasons of non-compliance with list
of required documents. gfiles investigated this issue
and found out that there was a strong lobby working
to keep BSNL out of the multi-crore bonanza. BSNL
partnered with Sistema, a reputed Russian company
headed by Vladimir Yevtushenkov. Insiders reported
that BSNL pleaded with RBI authorities that the noncompliance charge was false and that keeping in mind
the impeccable reputation of BSNL, the licence should
be granted in-principle. But when authorities have
their own bias, who listens. The dream to promote rural
banking by BSNL is shattered! g

evi Lal, former Chief Minister of Haryana, used to


say that whenever one is at a low ebb in politics,
he/she should start fighting with the top leadership of
the ruling party. It has a two-way advantage: if you win,
nothing better than that and if you lose, people are afraid
to fight with you as they are advised, keep away from
him, he always fights with big people. Arvind Kejriwal
hails from Haryana and he is following the same dictum
in Delhi. He is on the warpath with all the bigshots
of the nation since he has become Chief Minister of
Delhi. In this milieu, most of the civil servants in the
Delhi government do not have an idea how the Delhi
government is running especially after the CBI raid on
the office of Rajendra Kumar Sharma, PS to Kejriwal.
Chetan Bhusan Sanghi, a 1988-batch IAS officer, who
mportant
was heading many important
departments has
taken leave for
three months.
The buzz is that
when even the
CMs officer is
not safe, what
protection is there
for other officers.
vants
Most of the civil servants
are working as they have
to do their job but
their enthusiasm
for the new
government, away from
rom BJP and Congress
culture, has withered away. Whats more,
Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia has barred all
bureaucrats except heads of departments (HoDs) from
communicating with the media. Citing inordinate
delays in processing files and policy, the Aam Aadmi
Party has further decided that bureaucrats can object
to a Cabinet ministers decision only once. In a recent
Cabinet decision, the government ordered that files sent
for reconsideration, if cleared by the minister a second
time, would be binding on all officials. It is not surprising
that within the Delhi Secretariat, civil servants are saying
they have to tune up the radio and keep the TV on all
the time as our government is more seen and heard on
newspapers, TV and radio than files. g
ILLUSTRATIONS: ARUNA

58

gfiles inside the government


vol. 9, issue 10 | January 2016

www.gfilesindia.com

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.co m

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.co
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an uz
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FOLLOW US ON :

59

Regn.No.DL(C)-14/1161/2016-2018 Licence No. U(C)-03/2016-17,


Licence to post without prepayment Posted on 7th & 8th of every month at SPM SRT Nagar,
Post Office, New Delhi 110055 R.N.I. No: DELENG/2007/19719.
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60

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