FAUJI INDIA - March 2018

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Our army remained in the news for much of the past month, whether it was the decision of the J&K government to get the local police to file a FIR against members of 10 Garhwal Rifles or the designs of politicians to add a communal colour to the victims of terror attack on the Sanjwan camp near Jammu. In J&K, the designs of the state government that rules Kashmir in alliance with the BJP, were checked by the Supreme Court as it stayed the FIR against Major Aditya on the appeal of the army officer's father. The J&K state government's initiative drew a wedge between the army that fights on two fronts and the police - that has off late become a victim of several terror attacks – shattering the myth of a unified command in the state.
A dialogue from a Bollywood film that hit theatres last month, sums up the reasons why the Kashmir issue has been kept alive: “When a problem benefits too many people, it is no longer a problem. This Valley is an industry and keeping the problem of terrorism alive and burning in it, is the only solution for many of us.” This is indeed the core of the problem, and the army is caught in this cross-fire and has to deal with it itself.
But it is not just in the Valley or the borders that the Indian Army is busy battling all sorts of threats, but even in a metropolis like Mumbai, where the army took charge from the railway's engineers and completed three railway foot-over-bridges in record time. It not only proved that our civilian organisations lack the ability and resources to deliver on time, but it also drives home, once again, the message that our Armed Forces are an important part of nation building and in aiding civilian authorities other than disaster and relief aid. I wonder if this will energize the government to look into how they are treated viz-a-viz their civilian counterparts.