Sarvadaman
With the appointment of Gen. Bipan Rawat as Chief of Defence Staff, the decks have been cleared by Govt. for the amalgation as well as consolidation of assets of defence establishment/sector in a co-ordinated and well planned manner. It was a long over pending issue which had been resolved by Narendra Modi and this decision is likely to benefit India in the defence and strategic planning in a huge way. Ever since India’s debacle against China in 1962 in Sino-Indo war, there is a pressing demand to augment the capabilities of Army, Air Force and Navy in a calibrated manner. Various committees had been set up and accordingly, a number of suggestions/recommendations had been made in this regard. But the successive previous Government’s had paid least attention towards these suggestions/recommendations, thereby, impacting the defence preparedness in a better manner. After 1971 Indo-Pak war, Government did take some measures to strengthen the defence mechanism. But still a lot remains to be done to achieve the level of defence preparedness. As a matter of fact, India shares long borders with Pakistan, Bangladesh, China, Nepal, Burma etc. However, our western neighbour viz; Pakistan has become a major source of headache due to the adoption of sponsoring cross border terrorism. Ever managing the borders with China have become a source of tension as the latter is oftenly engaged in exploring ways to pin-prick India. Number of incidents of China’s Army entering illegally into India’s borders had been reported in the past. The Doklam incident and subsequent, Indo-Sino stand off in the eastern sector for a long period threatened the peace and tranquillity in the region. Due to hard stand taken by India at Doklam, China was forced to push back her troops and ultimately, peace was restored on the borders. China and Pakistan are the two main hostile neighbours of India and they have joined hands with each other to harm the interests of India. Despite India’s best efforts to have friendly ties with these hostile countries, nothing perceptible and tangible has happened. However, Sino-Indo summits did take place to evolve a mechanism to resolve their long pending border issues. Even Sino-Indian armies had exchanged pleasantries in Ladakh sector and also in other areas as a part of confidence building measures. But it is Pakistan which is not toeing the line of peace rather fomenting trouble in India by way of proxy war. The past year has witnessed innumerable incidents of cease fire violations by Pakistan on LoC, thereby, prompting the Indian Army to respond effectively to the unnecessary provocations of that country. The rogue actions of Pakistan and China have sent alarm bells to the Indian defence establishment, therein, compelling the Govt. as well as top Military brass to ponder over the issue of long term strategic defence preparedness to safeguard the borders of India from inimical forces.
After assuming power, Narendra Modi initiated number of measures to give boost to indigenous defence industry, thereby, curtailing India’s dependence on imported military hardware. With this objective, leading private companies were given projects to manufacture various types of armaments for the defence forces. Further, India had also inked a defence deal of Rs.40, 000 crore with Russia for the procurement of S-400 Air Defence system. China had already procured and installed S-400 system to protect its borders. Likewise, number of steps have been undertaken to meet the shortfall of critical ammunitions which the Indian Army has been facing since long. The Raphael fighter jets have started arriving in India. Even the naval version of Tejas-MKI LCA has been tested. The Dhanush guns also called as Desi Bofors have been inducted into the Indian Army to enhance its fire power capability. Moreover, the range of Multi-barrel rocket launcher system (MBRL) has been effectively enhanced upto 70-75 kms to counter the threats posed by hostile neighbours viz; Pakistan and China. The ‘Project-75’ of the Indian Government is aimed at boosting the naval power of the Indian Navy to counter rapid growing threat from China in the Bay Of Bengal. The unholy Pak-China nexus and permission to China to access Gawadar Port on the Arabian Sea is clearly aimed at destabilising India. Likewise, the Chinese are trying to encircle India by enhancing their naval power. The rapid modernisation of armed forces by China sent a clear cut message to the Indian Defence managers to chalkout their strategies to meet out futuristic defence challenges of insurmountable magnitude. The US-Iranian tensions too have a deep impact on peace and stability in the region.
No doubt, Gen. Bipin Rawat’s appointment as CDS is considered to be a welcome step because with his appointment as India’s first Chief of Defence Staff, an era of big reforms in defence management has ushered. With the Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) in place heading the newly created Department Of Military affairs (DMA) as well as the Integrated Defence staff, the thrust has been now laid on joint theatre commands. The CDS has a clear mandate to create joint theatre commands. It is therefore, a high time for the new CDS to come up with a detailed road map or a vision plan for effective reforms within a span of few months in order to set the agenda into force and push for desirable reform initiatives in a time bound manner.
The fact of the matter is that the Military effectiveness, in literary terms, is difficult to define or measure purely owing to varied reasons. But it is imperative to add here that six factors closely associated with military effectiveness are thrust on procurement of weapons, ensuring jointness of commands, qualitative professional military education, better promotion avenues for officers, creating indomitable leadership qualities and also better defence as well as strategic planning.
It is to mention here that Gen. Rawat had already stated in unequivocal terms that India would have its own model of joint theatre commands to achieve a better level of jointness which eventually would act as a force multiplier in days to come. But there are many bottlenecks which are yet to be removed as the mindsets of years cannot be overcome overnight. Therefore, Gen. Rawat needs to work out various modalities with patience and perseverance to overcome the obstacles in order to push for the changes which have been considered taboo in the military establishment for all these long years.
Some political leaders especially from congress do not like the appointment of Gen. Rawat as CDS as they believed that CDS can pose a danger to their future. However, with the active support of Narendra Modi, Prime Minister (PM) and Ajit Doval, the present National Security Advisor, Gen. Rawat is in a position to push the necessary changes as well as reforms to attain the kind of synergy and jointness of theatre commands to effectively tackle the various kinds of security challenges being confronted by India. Apart from it there is also a dire need to make Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), as well as DRDO effective and potent organisations to co-ordinate with various defence projects to make Indian defence mechanism more lethal, effective and robust so that none would cast evil eyes on India. Another need of the hour is to enhance the range of inter-continental ballistic missile (ICBM) and the existing surface to Air (SAM) missiles to achieve a credible level of deterrence. Let us hope that after proper restructuring, the things would start unfolding for robust defence mechanism in the coming days.
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