TRUTH BE TOLD

P M Ravindran, raviforjustice@gmail.com

Shortly after independence a one-man commission had been constituted to report on the
extent of corruption in government offices then. After submitting his report, when
journalists sought his views on the subject, he summed it up in one sentence: I have started
believing in God. He elaborated that there was so much corruption, but people still seemed
so happy that there had to be somebody like God to make it happen.

Things haven’t changed much in the last 70 plus years, except perhaps that after Narendra
Modi came to power in 2014, not any of his ministers seems to have got embroiled in any
scams. And that is certainly a great thing to happen given the abysmal depths to which
governance had been reduced to in the preceding years, since Independence.

Incidentally, one of the first ever scams reported in the country was the Jeep Scandal, in
1948. In the multiple deals involved, two facts stand out- one, there had been a scam in the
purchase of those jeeps for the armed forces and, two, not only nobody involved had been
punished for it, but V K Krishna Menon rose to be Nehru’s confidante and the nation’s
Defense Minister.

The Rafael deal with France was sought to be raked up by those who had lost power due to
the scams that they had tried to dismiss as a compulsion of coalition dharma. But thanks to
their own failed effort to use the judiciary to taint the incumbents, it ended up as a
whimper.

But defense preparedness had always been sacrificed at the altar of political expediency. It
seems to have got some worthwhile attention only after the Chinese debacle of 1962 and
till the Bangladesh victory of 1971; but continued to languish as usual, thereafter. It went
from bad to worse after the Mother of all Scams, Bofors, hit the headlines in the 1980s.

There is a truism that those who do not learn from history are bound to repeat its mistakes.

So, as in 1962, we were again caught with our pants down by the same Chinese Peoples’
Liberation Army. But the damage control exercise has paid off for the time being; at least
after 20 valiant soldiers paid for with their lives at Galwan.

The anti-China flavor of the season, due to Covid, working in India’s favor at the
international level, also factored in.

A CAG Report had indicted the government on the lack of even snow goggles, snow boots
and high-altitude ration for troops in Siachin.

Now, there is reportedly a rush to buy many essential items for the armed forces, starting
with winter clothing and personal weapons.

The Prime Minister made an impromptu visit to the border areas to take personal stock of
the ground realities. While he had done everything to pep up the morale of the troops, a
third page, two-column centimeter media report also informed us that he had given a piece
of his mind to the former Chief of Army Staff, who is currently the Chief of Defense Staff
(CDS), for blinking.
At this point of time, at least as an aside, one is tempted to ask: when it is the Defense
Secretary who is legally responsible for the defense of the country, what it the responsibility
of the CDS in his role as the ‘one-point reference’ on military matters.

Also need to be asked are the following questions: what the expert opinion sought had
been, when had it been sought, who had sought it and what was the opinion given, in the
current imbroglio.

This issue of the Defense Secretary being responsible for the defense of the nation has to do
with the system followed by our colonial masters. Both in the UK and the US of A, the
Secretaries of Defense are the equivalent of our Defense Minister and not mere
bureaucrats. For the record, most of these office bearers are veteran soldiers themselves.

So, while we borrowed the term from their constitutional lexicon we merely superimposed
an elected representative as a Minister, with clearly no responsibilities except to read out
answers prepared by bureaucrats, on some questions related to defense raised in the
Parliament.

This is also a sore point in Civil-Military relations in our country. When, in the aftermath of
the 1962 debacle, the then Defense Minister had to resign, and many military heads rolled,
nothing has been known on what happened to the then Defense Secretary.

Surely a case of ‘heads, I win, tails, you lose’ in favor of the bureaucrats.

Is this corruption? To my mind, it is. Anything done without rationale, logic or public (read
national) interest in mind is corruption, if not treason itself.

From the Jeep scam of 1948 to the smuggling of gold in diplomatic bags is in keeping with
the dictum that criminals are always a few steps ahead of those enforcing law.

But has anyone thought of the reasons why the operators had to resort to these extreme
steps? Demonetization, rigorous actions as per Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act and
Prevention of Money Laundering Act, cancellation of registration of dubious NGOs,
confiscation of property of absconding criminals, push for digital transactions etc have
indeed played their roles in driving these mafia groups to desperation.

Has the alleged involvement of the office of the Chief Minister of Kerala come as any
surprise to anybody? I, for one, am convinced that Pinarayi Vijayan as the Chief Minister has
done nothing correct or good and worse, done everything wrong or bad.

The only thing that serious citizens of God’s own Country must be remembering of Pinarayi
Vijayan’s earlier avatar as the State’s Electricity Minister is the Lavlin Scam. The essence of
the scam is that a contract for repairing some generators had been renegotiated by hiking
the cost and about 50 percent of the hiked cost was to be spend by Lavlin, a Canadian firm,
for constructing a cancer hospital in the State. Well, for an onlooker it constitutes a scam
right away. But the worse thing was the investment in the hospital did not even take place.
And the question raised is ‘where did that money go?’

In the current scam, Principal Private Secretary to the Chief Minister, Sivasankaran, is,
reportedly, an accused. He is also the IT Secretary to the Government of Kerala. To douse
the fire that was rapidly engulfing him, Sivasankaran has been sent on compulsory leave for
one year.
Just recollect how Dr Jacob Thomas, IPS, the senior most member of the IPS had been
suspended for over 18 months on flimsy grounds like writing a book without permission or
commenting that the relief works that were carried out after a natural calamity was
inadequate and flawed. (Please see ‘Kollunna Raajaavinu Thinnunna Manthri’ at
http://www.vijayvaani.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?aid=5396)

Vijayan is clinging to his office by declaring ignorance of whatever has reportedly happened.
But thanks to technology, a video clip of Pinarayi Vijayan is viral on social media. It shows
him criticizing the then CM, Ommen Chandy, and demanding his resignation when Solar
scam had hit the headlines, less than 10 years back.

It is pertinent to recollect what a bench of S. B. Sinha and Markandeya Katju of the apex
court had commented once: The only solution for this menace (corruption) is to hang some
people in the public so that it acts as a deterrent on others."

The gold smuggling case is not merely of corruption but has security ramifications also for
the country. Reports suggest that the gold or its proceeds were intended for a terrorist
organization operating from Hyderabad.

And my personal favorite quip: I have not killed anybody, but a smile had crossed my lips on
seeing many obituaries.

16 Jul 2020