In an article in ThePrint, a retired additional director general of the Border Security Force, Sanjiv Krishan Sood, parroted a line he has been saying ever since he hung up his boots. In his view, IPS officers are unfit to lead the Central Armed Police Forces.
This time, he used the controversy surrounding the remarks allegedly made by the inspector general of police (IGP) Kashmir Zone Vijay Kumar at a closed door meeting about the working of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) in the Kashmir Valley. With a self-righteous indignation that barely disguises his ignorance of the larger perspective, Sood continues to push his agenda of running down the Indian Police Service (IPS), questioning it not just for its leadership role in the Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF), but in other police organisations too.
Malicious campaign
It is not just Sood. Ever since a signal communication dated 29 April by a CRPF commanding officer was leaked on 8 May, ahead of a crucial meeting on Kashmir chaired by the National Security Adviser Ajit Doval on 9 May, a section of serving and retired CAPF officers have taken to social media, under real and assumed names, to heap abuse and indignation against the IPS leadership.
Some of their remarks are downright obnoxious and reveal the extremely poor levels of discipline and decorum that prevail among this disgruntled section of the CAPF cadre. Given that IGP Kashmir Vijay Kumar has won all his gallantry medals during his service with J&K Police, and not with the CRPF, the demand by Sood that he return his medals, reveals an ignorant mindset.
A section of serving and ex-CAPF cadre officers have been writing against the IPS presence in CAPFs for a while now. Their aim is clear: to totally oust the IPS from the CAPFs through a sustained negative campaign in the media.
This group has created a huge corpus through donations by CAPF officers that is being funnelled through NGOs into litigation against the IPS? They are also lobbying the government for their cause, and wherever possible, creating controversies involving IPS officers and the CAPFs that are completely at variance with the facts. The latest controversy involving Vijay Kumar and the CRPF is a part of that game.
Also read: New twist in tussle as CRPF withdraws cooks, drivers posted with retired IPS officers
Why IGP Kashmir is not at fault
We need to understand the architecture of the security grid in Kashmir. The 15 Corps of the Indian Army has overall responsibility for the Line of Control and the BSF works under its operational control. In the hinterland, the Jammu Kashmir Police, represented by the Kashmir Zonal IG is the nodal agency for all counter-terrorist operations. While the Rashtriya Rifles of the Indian Army and the CRPF do have the mandate to carry out independent operations, in practice they work in close cooperation with the J&K Police, and the IG Kashmir is the officer responsible for coordinating operations.
Given this framework, if in a closed door meeting on 29 April, the IG Kashmir pointed out some operational lapses—3 soldiers of CRPF’s 179 Battalion were killed in Sopore on 18 April–he was not only exercising his lawful authority, but also doing his duty.
Strangely enough, the CO of 53 Battalion, which had nothing to do with the incident, sent a letter, complaining about this reprimand to his superiors in the CRPF.
On 4 May, the 92nd Battalion of the CRPF lost three men and two weapons in another gunbattle with the millitants in Handwara.
This saga of wounded pride would be more credible if any of the honourable COs of the CRPF had protested at the meeting before DGP J&K Dilbag Singh, or shown the courage and the ingenuity to identify the militants who killed CRPF personnel, and brought them to justice. But, their wounded pride is too busy attacking IGP Kashmir and the IPS.
Also read: Delhi, UP show IPS officers can’t even manage states but want to control CAPFs: Ex-BSF ADG
An outrageous claim
It is an outrageous lie to claim, as Sood does, that the J&K Police does not appreciate the contributions of the CRPF and other CAPFs. Last year, of the 125-odd medals that the CRPF was awarded for gallantry, 95 were won in J&K. And more than 75 of these were in joint operations with the J&K Police. In contrast, the largest deployment of the CRPF continues to be in the Left Wing Extremism affected theatre, where both operational achievements and gallantry medals are in short supply. So to accuse IG Kashmir and J&K Police of being biased against the CRPF, is both full of malice and demonstrably false. Instead of mounting a vicious campaign against a decorated IPS officer, the disgruntled elements in the CAPF cadre, and especially the CRPF, must indulge in some serious introspection.
Sood has taken an isolated episode and twisted it to suit his anti-IPS agenda. It is not an innocent act. In the context of Kashmir, it amounts to inciting disaffection in the forces, and I do hope that he faces the legal consequences of his disgraceful action.
Serving DGs of the CAPFs must decide if they want to continue being indifferent to this naked display of insubordination and self-interest and thus embolden these unscrupulous elements abusing the IPS and the government on social media, or take decisive action against them. Their continued silence will have damaging consequences for the discipline and morale of all these forces.
Also read: IPS officers defending hegemony over CAPFs is like British justifying their rule over India
Understanding the rot within
Once we understand the bizarre and totally false sense of outrage built around this non-issue, we can appreciate this episode in the larger context of the declared aims of Sood and his band of disgruntled brothers.
This behaviour by the dissatisfied elements in the CAPF cadre is guided by the belief that the interests of the CAPFs and their organisational objectives in the service of the nation should only be guided by the career aspirations of their cadre. Nothing else matters to them. The constitutional imperatives of federalism do not matter. The design of the All India Services that dictates the recruitment and deputation profile of the IPS, does not matter. The demonstrably superior quality of the candidates that qualify for the Civil Services does not matter. Their own history–all of them have been created and nurtured by generations of distinguished IP/IPS officers–does not matter.
Instead, Sood and his ilk are peddling a narrative based on outright, self-serving lies. Their claim equating the calibre and training of the CAPF with the IPS, is demonstrably false. This is reflected in the stance of the Union Public Service Commission and the Ministry of Home Affairs in various court cases and in successive pay commissions where the primacy of the IPS has been reiterated.
Also read: If CAPF cadre wants to be treated as civil servants, it must develop citizen-centric values
An agenda of a small group
The likes of Sood want us to believe that the interests of the directly-recruited officer cadre is the same as the organisational interest, and the national interest. The CAPFs exist to serve the public interest, not the other way around.
Of the nearly 1.1 million sanctioned strength of the CAPFs, less than 20,000 posts are sanctioned for the officer cadre. So are we to believe that the career aspirations of less than 2 per cent personnel should guide all policies vis a vis the CAPFs? This is both an extraordinary and rather absurd expectation.
It will be far better to focus on the career aspirations of nearly 80,000 Inspectors and Sub Inspectors who constitute the functional backbone of the CAPFs and who are no less heroic or committed when compared to the officer cadre. If the government really wants to make a lasting change in improving the general morale and performance of the CAPFs, addressing the stagnation in the Subordinate Officer cadre, and the constabulary, would be a more appropriate intervention.
This is not to suggest that all is well with the All India Services and the IPS. There also, reform is desirable and must be part of a continuous process of improving our quality of governance. However, to think that the need for reform must be guided by the naked self-interest of a cynical and shrill class, like Sood and his disgruntled supporters in the CAPF cadre, would be a mistake. They may protest and heap indignation on the IPS, but they are not making an argument against privilege. Theirs is an argument against merit. And no tissue of lies in their support can disguise this bitter truth.
Abhinav Kumar is IG, Provisioning and Modernization, Uttarakhand Police. Views are personal.
CAPF should be headed by their own cadre officers and not by some IPS. CAPF cadres know the strength & weakness of their mother organizations and grow a sense of belonging towards their force because they spent their whole career working in same agency where as IPS keep on jumping from one agency to other being it a military or non military role. An IPS cadre officer will never understand the requirement of a force like BSF whose area operation spans from hot Thar desert to the jungles of North East or te operational requirement for ITBP personnel posted at icy glacial as an IPS has never served under such extreme condition during his entire career. So please keep IPS out of CAPFs.
Excellent articulation Sir ! ….Silences of people like you have been and are detrimental to the required reforms Sir ….I acquiesce to your sacred and dignified silence and respect for the uniform and organisation you once served with pride despite all limitations and rightful deprivations ……. but now dont hold back your thoughts and logic to get the MHA mandarins to focus on the ‘writing on the wall’ about the pent up scorn of the citizens against hyped IPS and IAS hot air aura vid a vis their ‘service to the citizens of India’ ! …. All the Best !