Son, roll down this nalla

On the occasion of the Kargil Vijay Day, I re-post my  interview with Param Vir Chakra, Jogender Singh Yadav entitled, Independence Day Special: The Hero of Tiger Hill is posted on Rediff.com.

Click here to read...

Yogender Singh Yadav survived 15 bullets while capturing Tiger Hill in the Kargil War and was awarded the Param Vir Chakra, India's highest award for gallantry.
On the eve of Independence Day, the 32-year-old soldier relives that night when he and his fellow commandos won one of India's most historic military victories.
Yogender Singh Yadav of the 18 Grenadiers believes that every deadly bullet has a name engraved on it. Yadav knows what he speaks about; after all he survived some 15 bullets while capturing Tiger Hill during the Kargil conflict and was awarded the highest award for gallantry: The Param Vir Chakra.
Yadav was a member of the 'ghatak' (assault) commando platoon which captured three strategic bunkers on Tiger Hill overlooking the Drass-Kargil road on the night of July 3-4, 1999.
Twenty-two highly-trained men approached the Pakistan-occupied peak via a vertical cliff at an altitude of 16,500 feet.
The Param Vir Chakra citation said Yadav 'Unmindful of the danger involved, volunteered to lead and fix the rope for his team to climb up. On seeing the team, the enemy opened intense automatic, grenade, rocket and artillery fire, killing the commander and two of his colleagues and the platoon was stalled. Realising the gravity of the situation, Grenadier Yogender Singh Yadav crawled up to the enemy position to silence it and in the process sustained multiple bullet injuries. Unmindful of his injuries and in the hail of enemy bullets, Grenadier Yogender Singh Yadav continued climbing towards the enemy positions, lobbed grenades, continued firing from his weapons and killed four enemy soldiers in close combat and silenced the automatic fire.'
Claude Arpi met the hero recently. Interestingly, the long list of prepared questions was soon set aside as the commando, now 32 years old, started to 're-live' his experience. It is only towards the end of the encounter that Claude could ask him a few clarifications.

Claude Arpi (CA): Some thirteen years ago, on July 3, you and your team was given the task of capturing Tiger Hill. What do you remember of these difficult days?
What were your feelings then? How do you recall the events today?

Yogender Singh Yadav (YSY): Even though 13 years have passed, I still feel that the Kargil war happened just yesterday. I will never be able to forget through my whole life the memories of Kargil.
During this war, I do not know how many comrades I lost; comrades who were even dearer than my own brothers.
Inside me live their memories and it will thus continue to be.
I do not know how many hundreds of my comrades were injured; today some among them cannot even walk or move.
Those are 13 years of memories... it is still as if it all just happened to me yesterday.
I remember, 13 years ago, on the night of July 3-4, my battalion was ordered to capture Tiger Hill top.
Tiger Hill was the highest peak in the Drass sector. To take control of it was very difficult; a height of 16,500 feet, with sheer, precipitous sides of ice and snow.
Before that we had won mastery over many hills (particularly Tololing), but our success could turn into failure, if the dominating feature of Tiger Hill was not won, all other victories could be nullified.
The senior commanders concluded that only after Tiger Hill is captured would our other gains bring a complete success.
Our battalion was then ordered to capture the top of Tiger Hill; attack plans were made. A 'ghatak' (assault) platoon was formed, with Lieutenant Balwan Singh as commander.
This 'ghatak' platoon, under the battalion, was to attack the top of Tiger Hill first. The path that we decided to take was such that the Pakistani forces could not envisage that the Indian Army would be using this path to reach the top.
The path to the Pakistani positions had sheer, vertical peaks.
We made plans on how to accomplish our task and finally on July 2, we set out to accomplish our goal. The whole battalion moved together. The attack could only happen at night as the enemy, from their heights, could observe us from afar.
If we had attacked during the day, they would have shot down our jawans; hence we could only attack in the dead of night, that too, when the moon was hidden.
After an arduous climb for two days, during the night of July 3-4, we went through a tremendously difficult path, a very small path. But hearing the stones sliding under our feet, the enemy surmised that the Indian Army has reached this area. They opened fire on us.
When the firing started, there were only seven jawans who were ahead; the others were slowly reaching up from below in a line. A bit of path was blocked and only those seven jawans had been able to reach this higher spot.
We reached up to a 8 to 10 feet level with Pakistani bunkers; 4 to 5 soldiers opened fire at us. All seven of us went on firing and sent several Pakistani soldiers into the valley of death.
We obtained victory on that ledge. But the top of Tiger Hill was still 30 to 35 metres higher. From there the enemy could see where the Indian soldiers had reached. They started firing at us so heavily that neither were we able to move higher, nor could we could come out from behind the rocks.

For five hours, the exchange of fire continued, however they were unable to estimate how many jawans were present below them.
At about 10.30 am, the Pakistanis sent some 10, 12 soldiers to check. When the enemy came close to us, we fired at them and killed them all, excepting one or two.
But by then our positions had been marked by the Pakistanis and they knew how many we were; they returned to the top to report to their commanders that there were only 8, 10 Indian soldiers below.
Within 30 minutes of getting this information, the Pakistani troops launched a counter attack on us; such a powerful attack, using several supporting weapons, throwing big boulders down on us.
As they slowly came closer and closer, they managed to damage our LMG (Light Machine Gun), our supporting weapon.
Then they got still closer and launched a hand to hand battle, during which six of my companions were martyred.
I still remember that moment, those preceding instants when we seven mates were discussing and talking together about what to do next and what was going to happen, and the instant later when all my comrades had been martyred.
I was bereft by this loss, but also glad that before losing their lives they had killed 10, 12 enemy soldiers. I too was severely wounded and was taken for dead by the enemy.
Two, three times, they returned to shoot some bullets into all the dead bodies and checked that no one was alive.
The enemy also shot bullets into my body, I was shot in the arm and leg, but had firmly resolved that unless I got a bullet in my heart or head, I would remain alive, even if they cut off my arms and legs.
It is due to that resolve and will that I am alive today.
Some 500 metres below was our MMG (Medium Machine Gun) post, the enemy then made plans to destroy it. Next to Tiger Hill was the Mushkoh valley, where their base camp was located. It is from there that the orders to destroy the MMG post came.
I heard this order; I knew that some 10, 12 of my fellow soldiers were manning the MMG post.
In my heart, a voice spoke to me and said that I must save my companions. It is true that if one remembers Ishwar (the Lord) with full faith, then Ishwar-shakti (the Lord's power) aids you. It can even appear before you.I prayed to Ishwar to keep me alive long enough to save my comrades.
Perhaps He heard my prayer.

When the Pakistani soldiers again shot at us and tried to take our weapons, I attacked them with a grenade. One of their soldiers was killed.
Another turned his muzzle at me and fired at my chest. In my breast pocket was my purse which contained some five rupee coins. The bullet hit the coins and ricocheted away; I felt that I had died.
But the next instant, when he bent to take my weapon, my eyes opened and I realised that I was still alive. Within a moment, I turned and grabbing a rifle, opened fire on them.
During the firing, four Pakistani soldiers were killed. I fired from one boulder, then rolled behind another to fire again and then a third.
They thought that some Indian reinforcements had reached from below and they ran away. I returned to my companions to check if any of them were alive, but to my deep sorrow, no one was.
I tried to see how to descend, when Devi-shakti appeared before me and told me how to go down.
My broken arm was useless at my side, I tried to tie it, I even tried to break it off with a jerk, but I could not manage. Finally, I fixed it into my belt behind my back and rolled downhill towards my companions.
I gave my mates the warning about the impending attack and told my team commander, Lieutenant Balwan Sahib the entire story.
He, in turn reported to our battalion commander that our leading section had been entirely destroyed, only one jawan had returned (Yogender Singh Yadav) and he is giving this information.
Battalion Commanding Officer Colonel Khushal Chand Thakur told them to get this jawan down to him as quickly as possible so that he could hear the information first hand.
At that time it must have been 1:30, 2 in the afternoon (of July 4). Blood was flowing from my wounds like water. Though my comrades gave me first aid, the bleeding would not stop. They brought me back to the CO and by the time we reached, it was completely dark, and I was unable to see.
The CO asked, "Son, do you recognise me?" but I could see nothing. He had me laid in his personal tent, and had 2, 3 stoves lit around me. When my body gradually got warmer, the RMO (Regiment Medical Officer) Sahib came and gave me again some first aid and made me drink some glucose.
I got some sort of energy back in my body and then the CO asked again, "Tell me now, son, what happened with you all?"
I told him the whole story and concluded that "Now Sir, they are going to attack the MMG post. Sir, you see, beyond this helipad there are stones, behind which are the living tents of the enemy, they have support weapons deployed there, and ammunition has been dumped there."
After I gave this information, RMO Sahib gave me an injection to put me to sleep.

When I woke up three days later, I was at the Srinagar base hospital. I learned that the same night, our reserve company had attacked the top of Tiger Hill, and without any casualties, had succeeded in capturing the top.
I was then shifted to the army hospital, New Delhi, and after 16 months of treatment, I could serve the army again.
It is the dream of every soldier to fight for his country and with his own blood to anoint this motherland. To be able to do this is his great fortune.
I consider myself fortunate to have taken birth on Mother India's soil and to be part of this great Indian Army, which is today considered to be one of the best in the world.
I am proud of my country and of our army and I would tell the youth of this country that we can be devoted to our nation from anywhere, but the real progress, the inner and outer protection only comes when we all come together, when we try to progress in every realm and each one tries to grow in our own sphere.
I would appeal to our youth that no matter which area you chose, you should work with honesty, straightforwardness and work hard and you should keep their devotion to their country awake, alive. Jai Hind!
You said that the Devi Ma's Shakti came to you. You had earlier already had a vision, telling you that you would be injured, but would not die. Please can you elaborate?
When, with full faith, a man surrenders everything he has to accomplish a certain task, and this, without reserve, (ulterior) motive or calculation, certainly then, an inner strength, a shakti, arises in him.
He becomes conscious of what is going to happen to him today or tomorrow or whenever.
This happened to me, I was given the awareness that I would be injured; my arms and legs would become useless, but that I would remain alive.
It is a fact that in Kargil we had surrendered ourselves fully to our task (to recover Tiger Hill from the Pakistanis), we were fully aware that we could lose our lives, but we still surrendered ourselves to the task ahead with complete faith in the Lord... then there is no question of thinking that one could fail in one's work.
The task has to be completed -- the Lord himself tests man, He tests how much a person can take, how much pain he can bear; only when one can bear the most intolerable pain does the divine strength comes (to accomplish the task).

CA: You had the certitude that you would not die, tell us more about this vision of 'Devi Ma' who showed you the way down to the MMG post?

YSY: At that time, I knew that I had to reach my comrades; it was a selfless wish, to try to save the lives of my mates, my brothers.
I had no desire to try to save my own life, in fact having witnessed my six companions sacrifice their lives, I was proud that I was now being given another opportunity to serve my motherland and follow in their footsteps.
This is the dream of every soldier, his glorious journey to fulfil the prime duty of his life.
When he returns home wrapped in the national Tricolour, his family, his country and even the whole world rejoices with tears at his self-sacrifice.
I was given that strength and She showed me the way down.

CA: The 'vision' told you which way you must take?

YSY: Yes, absolutely, in front was a being in white who said, "Son, roll down this nalla (gully)."

CA: Have you seen LOC Kargil, the Hindi movie made about your action?
They did not interview me for that. But the movie, LOC Kargil has my role played by Manoj Bajpai.
Did you see the movie? How did you find it?

YSY: I liked it. They have highlighted the task that I and my companions performed; our sacrifice for the good. The world could see this. It made the general public aware of the difficulties a soldier has to endure to do his duty successfully. I liked it very much.

CA: Thirteen years later, would you do it again?

YSY: Yes. Many citizens wants to join the army, (not all are selected), but those who are, feel they are blessed that out of so many aspirants they are the chosen few who will serve to protect their country.
A soldier's ultimate wish is that he should be allowed to do this job of protecting his country, and even if he has to lay down his life to do it, that is not too big a sacrifice.
I have merely shed some of my blood for my motherland, only put a tilak with my blood on her land, but I am still alive. But if I were given the chance, I would put down this life for her.

CA: Since that time, there have been a lot of changes in the army?

YSY: The Army is the Army.
At that time, there were many shortages in the army, lack of equipment, ammunitions, adequate clothing, etc. Has the situation improved?
At that time (in 1999), the war was declared all of a sudden. In those areas (Kargil-Drass sectors), there was little army deployment. The units which had to be called in from other parts of India, from the plains and they did not have the right clothing.
But the main need of the hour (during the war(, was neither adequate clothing nor right equipment available, but to accomplish the task at hand, and this, with whatever means we had.
It is a matter of pride that the Indian Army jawan has a dedication, a patriotism not present in any other army of the world.
It is only because of this that we were able to vanquish the enemy at those impenetrable mountain heights.

CA: It is said that a soldier believes that every bullet carries someone's name on it. Do you believe that too?

YSY: Of course. See, I am a soldier, and so is the man fighting against me, we are not bothered by which bullet carries whose name.
Definitely each bullet carries a name, just as we say that every morsel of food bears the name of the person who must eat it.
Similarly, for a soldier, he has a bullet with his name on it, the one which will kill him; perhaps the bullet with my name was not made and as a result, I am still alive.

Though not mentioned in this interview, one of the motivations of the jawans and officers during the Kargil conflict was the barbarian behaviour of the Pakistanis.
On May 15, 1999, India sent a patrol to ascertain if some parts of her territory were occupied by intruders.
The patrol was ambushed on the Indian side of the LoC and the patrol leader, Lieutenant Saurabh Kalia and five of his jawans were captured and tortured.
Their mutilated bodies were returned on June 9. Yogender and his companions knew this. It motivated them further to recapture Tiger Hill.
Before the attack on Tiger Hill, Yogender Singh Yadav's battalion had been involved in the battle for Tololing, another peak occupied by Pakistan. They fought for 22 days.
Many Indian jawans and officers lost their lives in the battle. Yogender who was just married and could only reach his battalion a few days after the battle had started was given the task of supplying ammunition to the forward troops.
The 19-year-old Grenadier managed to climb the peak twice a day to supply his companions.
In a booklet on his life, he stated: 'It was gruelling and back-breaking work. My officers noted that I had tremendous stamina and could climb these treacherous steep and snow-covered slippery slopes almost constantly for 2 days carrying heavy loads. Please see: Our Heroes: Param Vir Chakra, Grenadier Yogender Singh Yadav, Shyam Kumari, Vraja Trust, Pondicherry, 2011.
It is why he was selected to lead the final assault on Tiger Hill.

Claude Arpi gratefully acknowledges the help of Mrs Shyam Kumari, Lieutenant Colonel Uma Tewari (AMC, Retd) and Abha. The interview was conducted in Hindi.

Kitne sundar! Kitna dukh?

Reading about Joshimath 'sinking' thought of this old interview of Malika Virdi...

Munsyari in Pithoragarh district of Uttarakhand was recently in the news for a sad reason: 43 residents of three villages — Chetla, Mati and Balagaon were buried alive after a seasonal landslide destroyed their village.
This event did not garner the same amount of ink as the swine flu did; it is not as thrilling. The tragedy attracted a few lines in the media and this for a day only.
It is in this last small town, the last one before the Nepal-Tibet border, that Claude Arpi and Abha Tewari met Malika Virdi, one of the most renowned Indian mountaineers, a social worker and sarpanch, who has chosen to live the ordinary life of local folks. Her endeavour is to find herself and eventually also be a catalyst to help ease the harshness of their lives.
It needs courage, character and idealism to decide to spend one’s life in such a beautiful, but harsh place. This is evident in the answers of Malika which justify her choices and point to the issues faced by mountain populations, especially women.
At a time when eco-tourism is fast becomes a fashion, Malika tells us of an incident which occurred during the All-Women Himalayan Traverse in 1997: as she walked with a Nepali porter carrying 100kg on his back, she remarked pointing at the gorgeous mountains around, “Kitne sundar!” (How beautiful they are!), his reply was immediate, “Kitna dukh!” (So much suffering!). This summarizes the hard life in these mountainous areas.
The backdrop of this free discussion with Malika is the gorgeous Panchachuli range where the Five Pandavas are supposed to have cooked their last meal before leaving this world. But even here, at the gateway to Heaven, it is said that there was a sixth chula (stove) for Draupadi to cook for her husbands!!

Claude Arpi: Malika, you wear several caps: you are a sarpanch (elected village head person), you are a mountaineer, you are working on women’s issues. But before going into this, tell us about your background. Where do you come from, where were you educated?

Malika: For me, it is a question of identity. It means who am I? My identity as a woman was easy enough to discover early. Having grown up in an urban area, for a long time it was not clear. My cultural roots were in rural Punjab; but it was not obvious. We lived in Delhi, we traveled around. The first assertion of my identity came in 1984 when I realized that I belong to the Sikh community, a minority community. It was quite different from having a free-floating identity as an urban woman or just a Punjabi woman.
In 1984, after Indira Gandhi’s assassination, when the Sikh carnage took place, it became very clear to me. I came face to face with my roots.

CA: You were a student at that time?

MV: No, I was working in the resettlement slums in Delhi. Many Sikhs got massacred at that time. I lived close to the area in East Delhi [where the massacre took place] and I spent 3 nights waiting with my father and my mother. I thought: “They [the mobs looking for Sikhs] will come”. We had just moved 6 months earlier [to this area]; we could see houses burning, people with broken legs or arms being carried away. We were just waiting and not sure [what will happen to us]. At that time, I clearly realized that I belonged to a minority community. I am a Sikh and it has a meaning. It is not just a surname that I carry around in life.
Apart from that, I always lived in an urban area, my parents lived in Delhi, but grand-parents were farmers [in Punjab]. I was twice removed from the land. I did my schooling and college in Delhi, started working in Delhi after my MA in Social Sciences. I did my MPhil and wanted to do a PhD. But I wanted to ‘work’. I was interested more by action than research. I stopped my studies, went into activism. It is how I can describe myself.

CA: Tell us how did you decided to leave Delhi and come to Munsyari, this remote part of Uttarakhand?

MV: I was working in Rajasthan on a Women’s Development Program. It was interesting. Theo [Malika’s partner] and I had been together for many years, but we lived our own lives. He was in Anand in Gujarat [with the National Dairy Development Board] and I was in Rajasthan. We decided to set up a home together; it made sense to do so in the mountains. We came here in 1992. He had a project and I came to settle here and be a farmer and a mother. I had never done farming before, but I thought that it was the right thing to do. It was not really significant that this place was very remote. We thought if we can find a piece of land, ‘fine, we can settle here’. There was a lot of romanticism involved. . In 1993, we bought a piece of land and in 1994 we built a small room.

CA: How did you get involved in local politics? Today you are a sarpanch (head person of the village forest council or Van Panchayat). What does it mean to be a sarpanch?

MV: Sarmoli is a remote mountain village. The subsistence economy is such that you need a forest to support it. It is the way agriculture has been going on in the Himalayas for a long, long time. After a struggle during the British Raj, the people managed to get community forests legally notified: this is called the Van Panchayat. This happened in 1931, and our village Van Panchayat was notified in 1949. Each village community has a support forest area (in our case 34 hectares) and it is governed in a democratic way. We have elections every five years. A council is elected and the head of the council is called a sarpanch.

CA: How many members do you have in the council?

MV: We have nine because it is a large Panchayat with two revenue villages, Jainti and Sarmoli. I have just completed my five-year term.
Already when I worked in Rajasthan, I did not want to do my work as a ‘job’. As an activist, if it is your [earning] ‘job’, you first think of securing your job and it may be at variance with your beliefs. It happened to us a couple of times, when either our project was closed down or we had to quit. [In these cases] you have then to decide if you want to stick to your beliefs or secure your job.
I like to work with communities and take up causes as they come, but as a citizen, not someone who is getting paid.
I work more on the political level, though on the same [social] issues. I am on my own and not part of any large institution or political party]. It is the same for women’s issues and keeping your autonomy has been central to my beliefs
When I came here, I did not join any organization. It was hard, I had no work. I took up farming. I basically wanted to be part of the community. I was a persona non grata for five years. I did not belong to the urban area, I did not belong here. It took time for me to get really accepted. After 5-7 years of checking me out, [they realized] that I did stand by what I professed. It is always easy to talk principles, but is more difficult to stand by them. The community looks at actions, not talks. The reason why they made me sarpanch, besides the fact that by that time I had been accepted by the community, is that nobody wanted to be sarpanch.

CA: Why?

MV: It is interesting. When there is money coming in for development in the Gram or Village Panchayat, you can not only make a ‘political’ career, but you can also ‘earn’ something [out of it]. In contrast, the Van Panchayat has no money, we are working for the common property and we are not getting state funding. There is no money allocated from anywhere. So nobody is eager to be sarpanch.
In our village, because we are close to the town of Munsyari, people prefer to be where they stand a better chance [to make money].
The Van Panchayat is (or was) a losing proposition. Not only do we not have [development] money, but people usually do not want to work together. It is an eroding culture. When I became sarpanch, the community said: “you are talking so much, now show us”. [Personally] I was very excited. Because I did not have ‘political’ ambitions, I was able to mobilize the community, first the women and the youth of the region.

CA: Do you think that women can do better than men to bring people together?

MV: I wouldn’t say that, but women are more dependent on the forest, so it made sense to respond to me [as a sarpanch]. [In our area] economy has not been monetized that much, there is still the remnants of the concept of shared labour.

CA: Is it disappearing?

MV: Yes, it is, but women are still ready to share labour and they are more dependant on the forest. As a woman, I was also ready to give them space, not just the rhetoric. Still women were cynical [at the beginning], “the village won’t change, there will be no turn around”. What we managed in 5 years is that a third (or perhaps half) of the village has really changed.
CA: In which way?
MV: Today, there is hope. People want to keep the Van Panchayat going. Some will still say [cynically], “Go ahead, since you are so keen!”. But there is a change.

CA: Is there still an exodus towards the cities and the plains?

MV: Yes, agriculture is only subsistence agriculture, you can’t make cash. It is a problem.

CA: What about tourism?

MV: It is one of the experiments of our Van Panchayat. To be meaningful, one should get something back from the forest. It is too small to meet all the subsistence needs of all our right holders of fuel-wood and fodder; too many people depend on a too small land.
We had to find some [environmentally] non-extractive way to get benefits to as many people as possible. Tourism was a good option. We have organized it involving the community of right holders. It means that benefit comes to the community at large. Some 50 families out of the 300 are benefiting directly. We have a home-stay program with 25 families on the roster. We have also 25 families where young men or women work as porters and guides. They are trained. They can also plan logistics for different types of treks.
These are two aspects: the home-stay where visitors share food, house, skills, crafts, etc. with the host family and the second one is the logistic for treks.

CA: The Uttarakhand Government is planning to develop tourism on a much larger scale. What are your views? Is it not destructive?

MV: As the Government created SEZs [Special Economic Zones], the State today speaks of STZ (for tourism). This is typical top-down model of planning and development. It is the wrong way to go. All the benefits are kept at the top and little ‘trickles’ down to the bottom. Only the crumbs only reach the communities; and s what the Uttarakhand state government is trying to do. But the Government also knows that eco-tourism has potential. We find some support with the Forest Department, perhaps because eco-tourism is fashionable. We have received some money for a community center. [In a way] it has validated our endeavor, but it is too small. The main thrust is with the big tourism industry which is based in Nainital or Dehra Dun.

CA: Could the Government make Munsyari, a Nainital?

MV: Well, many people are turning their houses into lodges or hotels. One can’t imagine that there is a recession in India when one sees the amount of [new] buildings under construction. If one does not watch, the same thing will happen in Munsyari as elsewhere. But it will be an overkill. The [tourist] capacity in a place like Munsyari is limited.

CA: In which way?

MV: Take water, we had never heard of water shortage until 5 years ago. Whether it is because of global warming or other problems, it is becoming an issue.

CA: What are the main women issues in Munsyari?

MV: Broadly the same issues as anywhere else [in India]. It is why women’s groups will never be out of work, I am speaking of slog work. Violence does not seem to end. Deep patriarchal perspectives [in the villages] legitimize any degree of violence against woman. When I first came, during the first six years, I observed that there were 6 brutal murders, and the police did nothing. [At that time], I had no credibility as I was a newcomer to this community. When I would raise the issue of speaking out against the violence, I was ignored. People would say, “what is the big deal”.

CA: What was the motivation of the murderers?

MV: Mainly for marital affairs. The man had another woman and wanted to marry again. The first time, I got involved is when there was a brutal murder in the bazaar; everybody was horrified; people had seen the woman's dead body, but nobody wanted to say anything. There was a complicity of silence. I had the same question, should I speak? I felt it was time to speak up. I noticed that people need a catalyst; there is some cynicism which believes people do not want to speak, but they do. Someone has to start. In no time, we were 40 women going to the police station asking for a post-mortem; what was the State doing? etc… Since then, we never looked back. We have a small organization, not yet registered called Mahila Sangathan.
We are thinking of registering it, because we now have a public profile and there is antipathy to what we stand for in some quarters. For our own safety, we need to be registered; our accounts have to be [officially] audited. Even if we generate very little money, we need to be able to show where we are getting funds from.
So, the first issue is violence against women. The second issue is liquor.
In the mountains, people have always brewed their own liquor). . It is part of the culture of the Bhotias a local tribe that is a Scheduled Tribe. It makes sense when it is cold, life is tough, but the now the growing problem is the commercialization of liquor.

When there is already poverty, when the minimum wage is so small, when people are in a general state of hopelessness, then take to drink- it often results in violence against women, and then there is a problem. It is not just a women’s issue, though women take the brunt of it. It is an economic and political issue.
I am a feminist, but I believe that it is not only gender which traps people. It is as much the caste, the class, and poverty related. We have to look at life in a multidimensional way.
Many women's groups like ours in Munsyari work first to liberate ourselves, we invest our energies [on our issues and problems]; and society will change only when we have a critical mass. We have to change the way society sanctions things. If you stand up and say, “I don’t agree”, after sometime, you find that there are 10 people who do not agree, and after a while many others begin to stand up. Then there is a cultural shift. Times are changing. That is what we are fighting for!

CA: Do you see any change with the spreading of education?

MV: Definitely. It has been a very important factor, even though our educational system is not in a good shape, even though we don’t have enough teachers.

CA: Nobody wants to come to such a remote place?

MV: Yes, this is a genuine problem. But, just the fact that girls can now step out, that they are no longer restricted to private spheres [of the household]; the fact that schools are for them as well, this has brought a big big change. They are not fully educated, but they have stepped out. Amongst them, the more assertive can move ahead. That is good, though the quality of education in general is bad, but there is now an opportunity for them.

CA: What brought you to mountaineering?

MV: I grew up with my grand-mother in Dehra Dun. I was always close to the land. We had some land; we did a bit of agriculture. I liked to walk in the forests. I realized that it had a special meaning in my life. In school, I started rock climbing, then I pushed ahead, did my mountaineering courses. At that time in India, it was hard to be a woman mountaineer. It still is!

CA: Can you explain?

MV: Either you are part of a club and a club culture where everything is laid out for you. [In this set up], women have their place and remain at their place. If you don’t belong to a club, if you are not patronized by an institution or the Army, you are left to your own strength. Though mountaineering is about physical ability, but it is not the reason why you are usually selected for an expedition]. You are called, because you are someone’s partner or daughter, or for a funding purpose: a woman is needed on the team to secure sponsorships. If you want to do mountaineering for the pleasure of it or the adventure, it is hard to find a group where you will be valued for what you are, not just for your ‘label’. I did my basic and advanced mountaineering courses, a few expeditions, but I was choosy. I was not ready to do anything to get on an expedition. I like to do it the way I believe it should be done.

CA: Can you elaborate?

MV: Some people take to mountaineering not to challenge themselves, but to ‘vanquish’ the mountain. They say they have ‘conquered’ a peak. Sometimes even, ‘a virgin peak’! This is patriarchal; it is like ‘conquest’ during a war. I look at it the other way around: there is only yourself to ‘conquer’. You vanquish your own fears, your own limits. It is for the challenge of conquering yourself that you are there. Then I feel physically alive.
Styles are also different: you have the ‘siege’ type or ‘military’ type, where you rope up the mountain and there is the ‘alpine’ style, you pull your own weight. The first is OK when you want to ‘win’. For example, the Everest was a race between the British and the Swiss. The Karakoram was a ‘German’ goal.

CA: Annapurna is ‘French’?

MV: Yes! It became a symbol of nationalistic prowess instead of being a pleasure to be with the mountain. I am not necessarily negating [the first type], but it is not my style.

CA: A few words on your trans-himalayan venture, the `Indian Women's First Trans-Himalayan Journey '97?

MV: Being a mountaineer, you usually want to go to the top. There is a peak attraction; there is the name to be earned, the recognition at the end of the tunnel. Ours was different; the Traverse [trans-Himalayan trek] was more an expedition of endurance. It was a physical expedition as well as an emotional one. It took us some 6 and half months to walk from Arunachal Pradesh [the eastern most part of Himalay in India] to the Karakoram Pass in Ladakh [at the border of Chinese ]. We walked 205 days in high altitude. Of these just 19 days was spent replenishing our stocks or having a bath, but the rest of the time, we trekked. It was the first all-women expedition. There were 9 of us. Earlier only 8 expeditions worldwide had attempted and completed the Himalayan Traverse.
We were fortunate to do it in one push, some of the earlier expeditions with foreigners had to it in several stages (to get their visas for example). Being Indians, it was easier for this. We were State guests in Bhutan and with Nepal, India has special arrangements.
It was a good challenge for me. First because we were all women.
Politically, it was important that we succeeded. But power [equation between individuals] is not different, just because we were women. [Between ourselves], we had different styles of working. The leader of the expedition was Bachendri Pal, the first Indian woman to climb the Everest. She put this expedition together, and her style was more a military style. She was not from the Army, but she had climbed the Everest with the Army.
After 4 months of trekking, we had a split. We had crossed Arunachal, Bhutan, Sikkim and Nepal. [We separated] and three of us completed it and went to Karakoram Pass, the others went to the Siachen Glacier [located nearby].
The essential thing is that all of us started and all of us completed it. Nobody went home crying. Before we left, the media had said: “Oh, nine women, they will certainly have a fight and go home crying”. Typical [macho media]! “They can’t make it without a male presence”.
But it is true, we had different styles of climbing and these got thrown up in sharp contradictions during the traverse.

CA: Which is your best souvenir after 17 years?

MV: The trek confirmed certain things that I always believed in. Emotionally and physically, it was extremely hard in parts, but at the same time, affirming. The sheer joy of having gone to places I would not have gone to without this expedition; to have seen how people live there. From outside as a short tourist trip, mountains are always beautiful, but while trekking you see another side of it. I won’t say poverty, it would be patronizing, but the hardship of life in this rugged and demanding terrain becomes a living reality; though people are [usually] coping well. It is a life style that is meaningful, sustainable — quite like here in Munsyari. The problem is that now people feel, “it is not good enough; we have to go to the cities”. That is perceived as ‘progress’. The expedition was the occasion to see so many mountains communities, so many different people and how life in these mountains can sustain and be meaningful.

CA: Is there a link between all these communities?

MV: Yes, essentially yes. The terrain decides. But Bhutan is different in a way. It is a monarchy. It is good that they decided to limit the number of tourists [allowed in Bhutan]. It was also depressing to see the divide between the urban rich and rural areas of Bhutan. It was quite shocking.
In Nepal, it was still a monarchy, but the Maoist revolution was picking up in 1997. In remote areas, you could understand why people became Maoists. I remember once walking in one of these beautiful places around the Annapurna region with a Nepali porter. He was my size, but he was carrying a pack of 100 kg (mainly beer bottles for some tourists). I said your country is so beautiful (“kitna sundar hai”), he replied: “kitna dukh hai” (so much suffering). It struck me! Two people are walking the same mountain path. One is here to see the world and to experience beauty; the other sees suffering. We had a real conversation, he said that if he fell sick, he would die, but if a rich man's sheep fell sick, he would be flown out of the valley in an aircraft. I think that without democracy, poor people remain in a much more difficult position.
What has bound us together is the challenge to be in a mountain area.

CA: How did your partner and son take it?

MV: They were very supportive. When I embarked on the expedition my son was five years old. Though I had chosen to be a home maker, I had become very restless. I feared that the world had passed me by. I was 37 and I believed that my time was over and I had finished my active physically challenging life in this remote mountain area. I asked Zanskar [Malika’s son]: “I want so much to go for this expedition, what do you say?” He first said: “No, Amma, please don’t go!”
I told him: “To be a happy mother, I have first to be a happy woman”. He said: “Ok, but we should meet every Sunday?” I said: “Just give me 6 months”. When 6 months were over, I spoke to him from Ladakh and said to him “ Another 20 days and I will be home”. He got emotional and told me: “But, Amma, you have told me 6 months”. Before this, I had never heard him missing me- he must have adjusted.
With Theo [Malika’s life partner], there was a lot of support in another way. When there was a crisis between us in the expedition team it was very difficult. For example in Nepal, they would not tell us the next destination; they would not give us enough food. It was a way to say: “Well, if you don’t want to fall in line… It is your problem, you handle it”. It was hard and emotionally trying. When I spoke to Theo, he said: “It is the trek of your lifetime, let us do it on our own. .” When we reached Dharchula [Indo-Nepal border] after 4 months of trekking together with the original team, I had made up my mind and said to the leader of the expedition: “You do it your way, I do it mine.” So after entering India, from there on, till the Karakorum Pass, we continued the through the next 3 months expedition as a new team. All my friends rallied around; all those who think the same way about mountaineering as I do. Even people that I did not know, came forward and sent money, support for the remaining 3 months of the expedition.

AT: Theo joined you in the trek?

MV: After splitting from the main expedition team, we first came home in Munsyari [it was not far from Dharchula] and it took 5 days to reorganize the next phase of our expedition. With the 2 other women who left the group, we reequipped ourselves. Theo, our colleague Ram and some others joined us as the support team. One would walk with us while the other would prepare the logistic waiting for us at the next stage. They had taken leave from their respective jobs to join the expedition. Ram trekked with us from here Munsyari to Leh. Theo trekked till Himachal.

AT: What about Zanskar?

MV: He was too small; he stayed with Theo and then with my parents, but came wherever he could to meet us.

CA: In India, there are many ‘nouveau riches’. Do you think that they are happier than mountain folk?
MV: I would say: it depends what you are looking for. What makes you happy?

CA: The problem is: do the people here have a choice?

MV: If you asked them, they would like to be better off. The confusion comes when happiness is equated to material well-being only. But material well-being is also critical. That is the crux. If you have no money, you are struggling and it is an unhappy situation. One could romanticize poverty and say: “They are happy with so little!”
One is not happy with too little, but to get what people get in Delhi and still wanting more, does not provide happiness either. If you are looking for money only, you are in big trouble, like the ‘nouveaux riches’ Punjabis in Delhi. Because there is no end to what they want.

CA: There is a Resort in Uttarakhand that is running a Rural Home Stay Programme and part of its package and the rate is 625 $ a night to see ‘rustic life’- what do you think of it in light of your Community Based Nature Tourism Programme?.

MV: When I first saw it, I thought the rate was in Rupees. When I realized it was in dollars, I could not believe it. It is insane. But it works; they can’t cope with the demand. We are not in that league as we run a programme that is inclusive of the different sections of the village community and at the same time is affordable to the discerning traveler. We continue to grow in our enterprise, but the high end tourism companies have started suffering with the recession. We believe that the benefits of tourism must flow to the mountain communities that conserve the beauty and ecological integrity of places like Munsyari and that the endeavour be sustainable in the long run.

The legend who inspired 3 Idiots

My interview The legend who inspired 3 Idiots appeared in Rediff.com

Magsaysay Award winner and teacher extraordinaire Sonam Wangchuk tells Claude Arpi about his journey, his fights, his hopes and how he became an inspiration for the Bollywood blockbuster.
A Teacher's Day Special.

Here is the link...

Ladakh has recently been in the news after the government decided to abrogate Article 370 of the Constitution and create a Union Territory for Ladakh.
This seems to have rattled Beijing no end.
Today Ladakh is euphoric; its 70-year-old demand has finally been fulfilled by Delhi.
Over the last decades, while waiting for the Great Day, some individuals have slowly changed the face of the region. One of the most prominent among them is Sonam Wangchuk (not to be mixed with his homonym, the Maha Vir Chakra awardee).
In 2018, Sonam was awarded the Ramon Magsaysay Award, an annual award established 'to perpetuate former Philippine President Ramon Magsaysay's integrity in governance, courageous service to the people, and pragmatic idealism within a democratic society'.
Over the years, Sonam has been instrumental in changing the education scene and bringing a deeper environmental consciousness in the mountainous region.
Sonam's lastest project is in higher education; he is in the process of setting up the Himalayan Institute of Alternatives, Ladakh (HIAL).
The project will be unique in several ways.
First, it will deal with the issues of the mountain context. Secondly, the university will combine academics with entrepreneurship in which the students will learn by doing and will be earning as they learn.

The two legendary Sonams. Left: Magsaysay Award winner Sonam Wangchuk
right: Colonel Sonam Wangchuk (retd), Mahavir Chakra,
'The Lion of Ladakh' (photo: Abha Tewari)

Claude Arpi: Sonam, you are wearing different hats; you are an educationalist, an environmentalist, a social reformer, a Magsaysay Awardee. Tell us how your adventure started.

Sonam Wangchuk: My journey has mainly been driven by empathy towards people who I thought were suffering.
When I started my engineering, I had to support my education expenses; I was then studying in what is now the National Institute of Technology in Srinagar.
As I had to finance my education, I decided to teach students.
Not that I did not have any other skills, but I loved teaching students, sharing with them my knowledge in sciences, maths or languages.
So during vacations, I started teaching students in Ladakh.
It is where I learnt about the current educational system.
At the beginning, my main purpose was to finance myself; in a way, I did it too well.
I thought that I would need one year to finance my studies, but it was so successful that in just two months I made enough money to finance my three years in Srinagar by teaching a number of Ladakhis.
This experience changed my life.
Firstly because I earned so much money, I got rid of my craze for money.
I thought that money could be made any time, if required.
I also realised that there were more important things to do than make money.
It was a blessing for me, because most young people, especially engineers at that age, are crazy about money.
Luckily, I got relieved of (this craving).
The second thing that I realise was that there was a challenge, right in front of me: the students that I taught during this winter were very bright, they could understand everything, and yet 95% of these students failed in their exams.

Claude Arpi: Why was the level of education so low?

Sonam Wangchuk: Degrees were like your passport for higher education and still 95% of the students regularly failed.
At that time, everybody would blame the students, whether it was the teachers, the parents or the bureaucracy.
I immediately realised that it was not the fault of the students, there was nothing wrong with them; in fact, they were really eager to learn.
There was something wrong with the system.
In a mountainous place like Ladakh, the text books were in Urdu.
The mother tongue was completely disregarded; after 8 years of teachings in Urdu, they would switch to English.

Claude Arpi: Do you mean to say that Ladakhi language was never taught.

Sonam Wangchuk: Yes, no Ladakhi language.
Another problem was that the teachers were totally untrained and text-books were completely irrelevant to the region.

Claude Arpi: The text books were the same as used in the Kashmir Valley?

Sonam Wangchuk: Yes, books were about tigers, elephants, there was nothing about snow leopards or apricots.
The children did not relate to them; so, I discovered that it was the system which had failed.

Claude Arpi: That was the seed for SECMOL (The Students Educational and Cultural Movement of Ladakh).

Sonam Wangchuk: Yes, though trained as an engineer, I shifted to education as I realized that the system needed to be changed; I saw so many of the bright minds caged.
Empathy for the students drove me to try to reform the system.

Claude Arpi: Did you face a lot of hurdles, obstacles from the administration, the establishment in general?

Sonam Wangchuk: Though we should have, initially I did not.
We used a strategic approach.
I found like-minded people and we started SECMOL.
We knew that as 21-year-old youth we could not go to the office of the commissioner or to a minister and tell them 'your system is not working'.
They would have just said: 'Get lost!'

Claude Arpi: At that time there was no Ladakh Hill Council representing the Ladakhis?

Sonam Wangchuk: Yes, it was before the creation of the LAHDC.
Initially, we started SECMOL in 1989, we were so naïve that we just tried to help the students to pass their exams, we were just teaching maths and sciences.
But soon we realized that it was not the solution, we could teach maths and sciences for 50 years, it was just repairing a broken system again and again.
Then we saw that the root of the problem should be addressed, that is the rural, the village schools.
It is where the foundations were built and these foundations were weak.
We had to work with the government to bring about changes in primarily schools.

Claude Arpi: You had to work with the government in Srinagar?

Sonam Wangchuk: No, we just said: 'let us work in one school'.
We thought that if we show some results in one school, we could advocate some larger changes.
We couldn't just say that we will perform miracles.
We chose a school called Saskpol; it was the first prototype where we experimented; we changed what is taught, the way it was taught, we trained the teachers and organized the villagers.
When this worked, we went to the government.
Luckily at that time, there was governor's rule.
More sense usually prevails during governor's rule in J&K in terms of devolution, at least for Ladakh.
The advisor to the governor who came to see our work was very impressed and he adopted our text books for government schools.
This text book is still used today.
It is how the movement for education reforms started.

Claude Arpi: Tell us about 3 Idiots. How did you become an inspiration for one of the legendary roles in a Bollywood film?

Sonam Wangchuk: Well, it is a very interesting story.
You asked me if we got problems from the establishment; I said initially not.
After a few years, our program became very very popular; it was a household name in every village in Ladakh.
Everyone was talking of Education, Education, Education.
We helped the Ladakh Hill Council to do well in the education field.
It was good, but the politicians got insecure; they thought: 'We are supposed to be the leaders, these people (SECMOL) are more popular than us.'
Similarly the bureaucrats became very upset; newspapers were writing too much about us.
They felt that we had become the masters of the government schools.
They were more jealous of our popularity.
At a point in time, they came together and gave us a hard time to the extent that I branded as anti-national with Chinese connections.
One district commissioner accused me to be anti-national.
Their idea was to scare me and get me to my knees, and that I will fall in line.
But I am not of this material.
I stood against them, I took the bull by the horns; I went to court against the government; I also went to the media about the high-handedness of the bureaucracy.
I called a press conference in Jammu to show the attitude of the bureaucrats.
I refused to just submit; I took up arms.
The press conference was attended by many media persons.
Some got interested in our work.
The correspondent of CNN-IBN studied my work and a few months later, I was chosen for their 'Real Hero Award'.
On one hand, it was alleged that I was an anti-national element with connections with China, and on the other, I received the Real Hero Award.
It was in 2008.
I went to Delhi to collect the award; there was a big function in Delhi where I met Aamir Khan.
We talked, he asked me about my work, my background; he saw the documentary that the channel had made about me, it was about an engineer who had gone to Ladakh to change the education system.
But about the film (3 Idiots) it was never disclosed to me.
I had just shared some interesting ideas with Aamir Khan.
One was about the Siachen glacier, where we spend one million dollar a day for a piece of ice; I suggested that the people on both sides of the glacier, in Nubra and Baltistan, should come on the road and stop both armies to get in that zone, they may get upset initially, but they would realize that it was a man-made issue; one side is there because the other side is there.
People from both the regions could defuse the issue and part of the money spent on the glacier could be used for education of the children who are living in pathetic conditions.
I told Aamir Khan, can you inspire people by doing a film on that.
We exchanged such ideas and a few months later, I left to France to study architecture.
One year later, I suddenly got many e-mails and phone calls, people saying the film about you is super, great, etc.
I had no idea.
It was not a biopic.
They just used my story as an inspiration and changed the script which they have been working on.

Claude Arpi: How did you shift from being an educationist to an environmentalist?

Sonam Wangchuk: It was not a shift.
I believe that today, education should be mostly about environment.
Education is about solving people's problems.
Environment is today the biggest problem in the world.
Not only here in Ladakh, but everywhere in the world; our education system shouldn't be centered on consumption ad production, which caused the present mess.
It should about solving the mess.
Education is a great medium to prepare young people to deal these problems.

Claude Arpi: In Ladakh, tourism has developed extremely fast.
In one way it is good as it brings good revenue to many, but it also endangers the environment.
What is the way out of this dichotomy?

Sonam Wangchuk: Tourism itself is not the main problem.
The main problem is management of tourism, we have really mismanaged it.
What is happening today in the name of tourism in Ladakh?
Three lakhs of people descend on an area of 5 sq km, i.e. Leh in a 5 month-time.
That is a very concentrated dose for any place!
It is where the problem starts, such a large number of people, in such a small area, in such a short time.
My solution is to spread it out and increase the carrying capacity both of space and time.
In space means out of Leh, in rural areas, so that rural people do not have to come in Leh to benefit from tourism.
Make home-stay, farm-stay in rural villages, make these places more attractive for the young people to live.
Tourism benefits should come to the doorsteps of rural Ladakh; they can sell their milk, handicrafts etc, to visitors from all-over the world; people should not be uprooted to the cities.

Claude Arpi: Do you have large scale migration in Ladakh like in Uttarakhand?

Sonam Wangchuk: It is different.
In Uttarakhand, they migrate out of the State, here they come to Leh, they remain within Ladakh.
It is slightly better, but not good.
Leh is exploding being over-populated, in the villages it is the opposite, it is an implosion.
We should spread tourism in geography (space).
Make the villages in Kargil, Zanskar, etc attractive for the young Ladakhis to live.
Supplement agriculture with tourism in the villages.
Then in time, spread tourism through the whole year, don't make it a toxic concentration during five months.
Promote winter tourism, ice tourism, ice sports, ice art, many things are possible; Spring tourism about apricots blossoming, wild roses etc.; then Autumn tourism, all year round there should be a moderate number of tourists.
Not only in Leh, but all-over Ladakh, then it won't be such a problem.
It will be good to the people; remote areas will benefit from it too; it is what I call a better management.

Claude Arpi: How did the Magsaysay Award change your life?

Sonam Wangchuk: I never thought much about awards.
There are good aspects and bad ones.
On one hand it gives you recognition, on the other hand, people who also had worked hard, are left out.
On the positive side, the Magsaysay Award is highly respected in our country, it opens many doors.
It makes things less difficult to deal with the government.
You don't have to spend so much time convincing people of a good idea, with this recognition.
It is also a great responsibility.
One should not misuse it.

Claude Arpi: A word about your ice stupas.

Sonam Wangchuk: It is an effort of the mountain people to not give up, when faced with climate change.
It is still at an early stage of development, it is not at the stage of solving problems, but it has great promises.
Apart from being an attempt to solve the water issue, it is also the symbol of an SOS from the people of the Himalaya.
It is not something we want to brag about, but it is something that we are forced to do.
We have to do our own glaciers, because the life-style in big cities is melting our glaciers.
It is a message to the people in the big cities: 'If you live simply in the big cities, we will live better in our mountains! In the cities, you have to be caring about other people. We are the first victims of your behavour, but it will soon catch up with you too.'

Claude Arpi: A last question about, about the strategic location of Ladakh, with two neighbours, Pakistan and China, at your doorstep. Do you think that opening the borders could help?

Sonam Wangchuk: There are small border disputes for few kilometres here and there; it should become smaller and hopefully completely go one day.
The countries involved should settle for something mutually agreed and then remove the military build-up.

What I want to say to the world is that India and China fighting with each other is like two neighbours fighting when an avalanche is coming.
The environmental threat is so big for both sides, that instead of getting involved in conventional disputes (and this is valid for all countries of the world), the two countries should spend their budget for mitigating, if not stopping, the effects of climate change.
We all have to work towards solving climate change.

It is the challenge of the 21st century.

Interview Capt. Bharat Verma

My dear friend Bharat Verma is no more.
He left us yesterday morning.
I am republishing an interview which appeared in Sify.com in 2009.

Here is the original link...

Fault Lines is the title of the latest book by Capt. Bharat Verma, the outspoken editor of The Indian Defence Review, the country's most prestigious defence publication.

The book, a collection of the Review's editorial pieces, demonstrates the depth and consistency of his vision over the last decade.

At a time when very few in the country think of India as a unified whole, and vote banks are the only preoccupation of politicians, Capt. Verma speaks to Claude Arpi about the fault lines, not only in the defence sector but also in the nation's psyche. Excerpts:

Could you explain what the fault lines you have discussed in your book are?

It is said that a long time back, a king with an excellent military machine at his disposal could not stomach the violence involved in winning wars. So he renounced war. This led to the rise of the pacifist philosophies, which created an 'extreme'-where the state either refused to defend itself or neglected the instruments that could defend it.

Pacifist philosophies may be good for the individual's soul, but are suicidal for the nation's security.

Any 'extreme' is dangerous, as it tends to create imbalance in statecraft. We saw that in the unjust unilateral aggression in Iraq. It diminished the American aura.

Pakistan's over-aggressive agenda in the name of jihad haunts it now to the point of fragmentation of the state.

China's compulsory one-child policy seems to be landing it in an extreme position where it will have 15 million young males who cannot find brides. This unnatural tilt in the male population could lead to war with its neighbours!

Similarly, pacifism is the other extreme. If it infects policymaking, then 26/11s will occur on a regular basis. Or a 'Tibet' will happen.

Would you say there is ONE original fault line [the Partition based on a faulty two-nation theory]?

Any thought process with an extreme edge would naturally create multiple fault lines in the subsystems of governance. Therefore, the creation of Pakistan based on an acute purity of thought process, vis-à-vis excessive pacifism of multi-cultural India, is contradictory. Such 'extremes' generate wars.

Armed with an aggressive Wahabi philosophy, Pakistan wants to destabilise a pacifist India. The latter's instruments of state-steeped in pacifism-are unable to rise to its defence!

Have you heard anything about defence matters during the present electoral campaign? If not, is it not worrying?

Mostly, it is in general terms and at a low tactical level of the spectrum. Of course, everyone promises to fight terrorism. But on the night of 26/11, if Home Affairs did not know that it could immediately request the military to activate the regular infantry battalion and the marine commandos stationed in Mumbai, then it is obvious nobody had done their homework in New Delhi!

So without a concrete road map, I doubt these leaders are capable of waging a war against terrorism. It's pure rhetoric meant for the consumption of the voter.

Similarly, exempting income tax of the defence forces or implementing one-rank-one-pension is merely vote bank politics. It does not generate a road map for securing the nation. Frankly, there are just two issues in front of the nation that need attention-the first is development and the second is security. All-round development will generate wealth that is required to be secure. The rest is peripheral!

There is an urgency to particularly ensure rapid development of states located on the international borders. Otherwise, the external actors will continue to undermine citizens' loyalty to the state with ease.

Where is 'India as a whole' in the current election campaign?

India is under major transition on two counts. First, the 'have-nots' are rising. They have been denied their fair portion of the pie for too long. Therefore, there is a major social churning taking place.

They are now fighting their way up-because the system, out of prejudices and lethargy, did not allow them space to grow. This will create a lot of turmoil and political fragmentation in the days ahead, if not handled intelligently!

Second, the change of generation taking place will witness an assertive India from 2012 onwards. The new generation is focused, self-assured, has better vision than the waffling elders of yore and is determined to see India as a strong country.

The first factor will dominate these elections and we will continue to see a fair amount of turmoil till 2012. I think as the national pie gets enlarged in years to come, social harmony will reappear.

Just take a look at America-it provides a great environment for working people. That environment propelled the Indian community to become the highest revenue earners in the United States. Such is the individual genius when given the right environment. China is scared of this Indian talent and has been trying to sabotage it with the help of its proxies!

The magic word for India, therefore, is 'governance'. If New Delhi can offer merely an average stable and secure governance for the next 10 years, India's success story will be unstoppable. In such an eventuality, India will emerge as the most influential power in Asia by 2020!

How do you see the evolution of defence preparedness over the last 10 years? Are you optimistic?

Honestly, we are in poor shape. Portions of meagre budgets that are provided are being returned to the treasury unspent every year because of cumbersome procurement procedures. The huge shortage of officers in the army is breaking down the bonding between the soldier and the officer. This, in turn, is impacting the discipline adversely and is hurting morale.

The lack of a grand strategy at New Delhi is pushing the battle-winning factor of India into a marshy land of insurgency for decades, with no end game planned. Unless we mainstream the military power by bringing it into the decision-making loop and ensuring lateral induction into the civil to keep the military young, I am afraid we will end up losing a fine war machine. The fault will be entirely ours!

Lateral induction will also help in beefing up the weak civil administration at the same time, with skills they badly need. However, I think the trend of declining military power will be reversed by 2012 with the younger generation taking over the reins of governance.

You said that Fault Lines "analyses the security issues that threaten the territorial integrity of the country due to the unstable neighbourhood", but is it not wrong to always point a finger at the neighbour, when Indian politicians and bureaucrats are not doing their own homework?

In Fault Lines, the first finger that I point is at us. I firmly believe in the Chinese proverb, "If he slaps you once, it's his fault. If he slaps you again, it's your fault!" Primarily, fault lines are highlighted to illustrate how we neglected our well-being and others took or may take advantage of our muddle-headed policies.

I am confident Sun Tzu was pointing to Indian politicians and bureaucrats when he said, "If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle!" The importance of this anthology, however, rests on the ability to pinpoint the inherent pitfalls in the strategy adopted by the various actors. Most of it appears to have come true.

That brings me to the last question. How do you view the new American policy on Afghanistan-Pakistan?

President Obama's effort to lower the social temperatures augurs well for the international community. By increasing the focus on Pakistan (where the battle really lies), rebuilding the relationship with Europe, trying to talk to Iran, increasing communications with Russia and many other countries to tackle serious problems the world faces today displays rare statesmanship.

However, it is not true when the Obama administration says that the United States, India and Pakistan face the same threat. The truth is that Pakistan is the threat that India, America, Europe, Russia and others face.

This is particularly true since the Pakistan Army, its ISI and the jihad factory recruit from the same area-Pakistan's Punjab. They also aim to achieve similar politico-religious objectives. The inter-connectivity with one brother joining the Army and the other the Jihad machine cannot be separated. Therefore, nuclear tipped Radical Islam is more dangerous than Nazi Germany.

The success will depend entirely on how honestly and decisively the world community is willing to address the problem. The problem obviously is Pakistan. Therefore, the next battlefield is Pakistan, too.

http://sify.com/news/fullstory.php?a=jevoDWecgfg&title=The_magic_word_for_India_is_governance

Why the French are getting more interested in India

My interview with the French MP (and President of the French Parliamentary Group for Friendship with India) is posted on Sify.com website under the title Why the French are getting more interested in India. 

Click here to read.

The Tibetans who fought the 1971 war

My interview of Dapon Ratuk Ngawang has been published in Rediff.com under the title: The Tibetans who fought the 1971 war. 
Click here to read

Interview with Arunachal Pradesh Governor General J J Singh

A fascinating interview, exclusively for Rediff.com. Click here to read

Why Arunachal is an 'undiscovered gold mine'
November 16, 2011
It is not well known that Arunachal Pradesh, which attained statehood in February 1987, is one of the fastest developing states of India.
Though the state went through few weeks of instability after the untimely death of former chief minister Dorjee Khandu in a helicopter crash in April, peace has now returned to the state.
Arunachal is a very sensitive state with a long international border with Bhutan (160 km), China (1,080 km) and Myanmar (440 km). It bore the brunt of the Chinese attack during the 1962 Sino-Indian War.
Claude Arpi meets General J J Singh, former army chief and now the Governor of Arunachal Pradesh, who spells out the priorities and his vision for this border state. The governor also revisits the 1962 war and shares his perceptions for the future.

The Tawang monastery in Arunachal Pradesh

Could you tell us a few words about your state?

Arunachal Pradesh is the eastern most state of India. It is one of the few states in India which has a boundary with three countries (China, Bhutan and Myanmar). Therefore its position is geo-strategically important.
It is also our gateway to South-East Asia. It could be a hub for trade, commerce and India's 'Look East policy'. This shows the importance of this region.


Arunachal is an undiscovered gold mine

The beautiful Sela Pass near Tawang in Arunachal

It is also a resource-rich region. It has natural resources in abundance, not yet fully discovered. In fact, it is an undiscovered gold mine.
It has oil, coal and other resources like forests and fresh water. Arunachal has the most luxuriant flora and the fauna. We grow all sorts of fruits such as kiwis, walnuts, apples, pineapples, bananas, litchis and also oranges. The state could supply the entire region with high quality oranges.
It has an amazing variety of flora and fauna and is one the biodiversity hotspots of the planet; perhaps one of the few remaining. Sometimes for miles, there is no habitation, only forest covered mountains. There are places which have never been visited by men. It is one of the few 'as God made it' places left on the planet.
But because of its remoteness, the mountainous terrain and the densely forested areas, development, till recently, lagged behind in many other parts of the country.
Since 2008, development has been the focus of the state government. With an immense development package and unflinching support of central government, Arunachal is going through a historic phase.

No part of the world is being developed at this pace

Construction work in progress on a road near Tawang

Kindly elucidate on the visit of Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh.

The prime minister came in January 2008 and offered a package of Rs. 24,000 crore to be utilised during the next six to eight years.
Since then, one can say that no part of the world is being developed at this pace. To give you two examples: there will be a four-way lane from Itanagar to Guwahati (in Assam) as well as a Trans-Arunachal highway of 1,600 kms, connecting the western part of the state to the easternmost part, running through and connecting eleven district headquarters en-route.
Today to go from one valley to another, one has to come down to Assam and go up the next valley. Once the trans-Arunachal highway is completed, we need not come down the feeder roads to Assam.
The new trans-Arunachal road will thus benefit the people of the state. The work on this project is being started from various points, simultaneously.
We have already connected the 16 districts headquarters and now we are going forward to various areas and settlements not connected as yet.

The priority will be the people of Arunachal Pradesh 

An airport has been sanctioned for Itanagar by the prime minister during his visit in 2008. Itanagar is one of the only two state capitals of the country today which do not have an airport.
As this may take some time, in the interim phase, we are thinking of developing short taking off/landing airports. I would call these new airfields, 'subsidiary airfields', though they are usually known as Advanced Landing Grounds.
There are eight ALGs under development in the state. I prefer to use the term 'subsidiary airfields', because ALG is a military term and we want to use these airfields for the benefit of the people. The priority will be the civilian use. 

Will stress on eco-tourism in Arunachal

Buddhist pilgrims in Tawang monastery

Are you thinking in terms of eco-tourism?

In five or ten years, most of our people will perhaps prefer to come to Arunachal rather than go to Switzerland. We have such a variety of landscapes: glaciers, alpine climate, and then the tropical and the rain forests. In Arunachal Pradesh, you can come down from 20,000 feet to 1,000 feet over a distance of 150 to 200 km.
Such gradients are very rare anywhere in the world and have led to development of immense varieties of flora and fauna and natural vegetation.
We are thinking along many dimensions. We are thinking in terms of adventure tourism (the state has the longest stretch of the Himalayas), mountaineering, white-water rafting; we are also thinking of religious tourism as the state not only has Tawang, one of the largest Buddhist monasteries after Lhasa, but also Parasuram Kund, a very famous Hindu pilgrimage near Tezu and several other religious sites.
We will of course lay increased stress on eco-tourism. In last three years we discovered one new species of bird, one of a fish, one of a mammal called 'Black Pica' as well as a rare butterfly.
Four new species have been discovered in three years and this has been documented. This is why I call it 'an undiscovered gold mine'.

Arunachalis are the most patriotic Indians

An Arunachali women busy making cane baskets

In some places, development and tourism have spoiled the original beauty of the place. Would you like to say something on this?
We are trying to make sure that this development does not happen overnight; people should not be overwhelmed by development. Development should be paced so that it can be absorbed. Most important of all, the Arunachalis should be the first beneficiaries.
If a dam is planned, a social commitment to improve the life of the local people (by creating a school, a hospital, providing jobs, etc.) is the first priority. Social commitment cannot be forgotten. As a governor I always emphasise this: 'Arunachalis first'.
In 10 years time, the Arunachalis may be the richest Indians by per capita income standards. The population is small and between tourism and power projects, Arunachalis have a bright future. We can sell the surplus power produced by hydropower plants and get handsome revenues for the state.
The projects being undertaken have a long gestation period, some may take upto eight or ten years to concretise. In the meanwhile, tourism is something that we can make a livelihood from and provide jobs to many young people.
Besides this, handicraft development like in the Poma village (a pet project of the governor and his wife to create beautiful crafts using bamboo) can help. Today 60 or 70 families are surviving in this village without having to come to the town.
One point should be remembered: Arunachalis are the most patriotic Indians. They feel so strongly for the country. For example, they went to Jantar Mantar and told the Chinese clearly and loudly: "We are part of India". They are the ones who first protested against the stapled visas.

Why the crime rate is so low in the state

Do you still have the traditional village councils?

Yes, many of the civil cases and local disputes over land or water are settled by these village councils. Additionally, family and community disputes are settled by the councils. However, criminal aspects are progressively going to the judiciary which is now being separated from the executive.
The decisions of the councils have been traditionally accepted by the community. It is probably why the crime rate is very low in Arunachal.

Would you kindly refer to the infiltration of Naga rebels in two districts of Arunachal?

The districts of Tirap and Changlang are affected by a spill-over of the Naga problem. However, tackling the issue is not very easy as the underground cadres of banned organisations simply cross-over the international border and find safe havens when pursued by our security forces.
Fencing the entire border in this area is also not a viable option because of the very tough and undulating physical terrain.
The central government is well on the way to resolve the larger Naga problem and I am sure the case of Arunachal will be resolved alongside.
 
The situation should not get out of control

A beautiful lake near Tawang

You mentioned to the media that the army could help?

The situation should not get out of control. It is basically a social, political and military problem. Talks are going on and people basically want peace; they are fed up of violence, they want to get along with their lives.

The problem, I would say is in a declining phase. In the past year more than hundred boys have already surrendered and joined the mainstream in Tirap district alone. Our army has been playing a very positive and constructive role in all these developments and also providing a sense of security to the residents.

Could tell us about the creation of the Arunachal Scouts?

The 1st battalion of Arunachal Scouts was successfully raised in November last year after persistent efforts from both the Raj Bhavan and the state government.
We have now requested the central government to sanction at least three more battalions over a period of three to five years, including a dedicated training centre. The 'Scouts' will be a force multiplier for the regular army units in the days to come.
They can live off the land, can speak local language and need no acclimatisation. The Arunachali youth will get a chance to serve their motherland as well. This will pay us rich future dividends.  

Relationship with China is only growing

The market in Tawang

India still has the scars of the conflict with China which occurred some 50 years ago. Could this happen again?
I am a soldier. I have served in the entire north-eastern region. I can tell you that fighting a war is a very difficult job.
During my last interview in Kolkata as army chief, I told the media: "I want to assure you that 1962 will not be repeated". It was in 2007. Today, we are even better prepared; it cannot be repeated.
In 1962, we did not have even a chance to fight. It was not expected, we were not prepared, we were not trained properly and most intelligence assessments were not satisfactory.
In 2007, I visited China as the Chief of Army Staff. I got a warm welcome and we discussed counter-insurgency exercises. It is something which was unconceivable in the 1980's or 1990's.
Since then, these exercises have been conducted a few times. Further, today we have many high-level exchanges. The Chinese are coming to the National Defence College we are going to their National Defence University.
Yes, there is a dispute on the border, but by and large there is tranquility along the Line of Actual Control. We have continued high level dialogues to sort out the issue.
Today, China is India's largest trading partner. Our relationship is only growing in strength rather than in discord.