Shekhar Gupta's column: Is India really a "soft-state"?

Has India been a 'soft state'? Did it allow its enemies to take a lot of advantage? Don't we think again and again that we wish we had followed the path of Patel, Netaji, Savarkar! It is said that Nehru's pacifist foreign policy gave Gandhian Ghutti a worse look. But facts and history tell the opposite. According to India's economic and military limitations, it has been able to do more than it can handle. The image of modern India may have been overshadowed by Gandhi, it has never been a Gandhian country. In fact, the first battle that India fought, it also had the support of Gandhi. Gandhi taught the country a lesson in the tenth week after independence that if the goal is justified, then war is justified. Lionel Protip Sen (who later became a Lieutenant General) held the rank of Colonel in the Directorate of Military Intelligence on 30 October 1947. The situation in Kashmir had become very fragile. The Maharaja had signed the document of accession of Kashmir. The Indian Army was ordered to march towards Srinagar, and was shocked as soon as it reached there. The commander of the 161 Brigade was shot and withdrawn. Sen was promoted to Brigadier. He was also advised to consult politicians before leaving for Srinagar. He met Sardar Patel, who advised him to inform the Mahatma before leaving for Kashmir. He met Gandhi on the evening of 1 November 1947 at Birla House. In his memoir 'Slender Was the Thread', he wrote – He (Gandhi) listened to me carefully. Then he said: War is a curse to humanity. They are absolutely stupid. They achieve nothing but suffering and ruin. As a soldier, who was going to fight a battle a few hours later, I did not know what to say. I asked: What should I do in Kashmir? Mahatma Gandhi smiled and said: "You are going to protect innocent people, to save them from suffering and to save their property from destruction. Obviously, you must use every means at your disposal to achieve this objective." Nehru is criticized for taking the Kashmir issue to the UN. But the fact is that he kept trying to strengthen India's interests through military means as well. Nehru kept trying to bridge the gap that Pakistan was trying to gain on the basis of modern weapons and military training. In that decade, India started acquiring Hunter aircraft, Centurion tanks not as help from Britain, but as a direct purchase. During Nehru's 17-year tenure, India was not a 'soft state' in any sense. It fought Pakistan, confronted China, met the challenge of the Nizam/Razakars in Hyderabad, liberated Goa from Portuguese occupation. At the same time, the Naga rebellion had also started. Nehru did not hesitate to send troops there and implement AFSPA. AFSPA is Nehru's gift! His successor Lal Bahadur Shastri has become immortal for forever thwarting Pakistan's attempt to grab Kashmir using the army. Indira Gandhi's history is well known, including the 1971 war. I don't think anyone can accuse Indira Gandhi of making India a 'soft state'. Indira Gandhi ordered the use of the Air Force on Aizawl to break the siege of the Mizo rebels within six weeks of her swearing-in in January 1966. History will debate the morality of using the Air Force against its own citizens, but is this not exactly what the 'hard state' does? We can consider Morarji Desai as a pacifist Prime Minister, but his government, which lasted a few months, had given orders for the purchase of Jaguar aircraft, which the Indian Air Force is still flying today. In Indira Gandhi's second term, Operation Blue Star took place, and a great step was taken on the Siachen issue. Whether he should have sent the army to the Golden Temple or not, it can be debated. But he made India a 'hard state'. Rajiv Gandhi used India's military power abroad for the first time. We are talking about Sri Lanka and Maldives. No other Prime Minister has spent as much as he spent on defense. His government's defense budget broke the limit of 4% of GDP. Today, if there is a war, it will use the same equipment, whose purchase orders were given by Rajiv Gandhi. He made India not only more 'hard' but an interventionist state. In the summer of 1990, when Pakistan threatened nuclear weapons, the government of VP Singh gave a befitting reply. The way Narasimha Rao ended the insurgency in Punjab and Kashmir, improved relations with the US, he tells the story of restoring India as a 'hard state'. His successors Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Manmohan Singh made the two most risky decisions: nuclear tests in Pokhran and a nuclear treaty with the US. And finally, Narendra Modi's time. With the announcement of 'kill by entering the house', India's tough attitude came to the fore. Surgical strikes, Balakot, Operation Sindoor set a new benchmark of the new normal. Modi just made a mistake that in his first 11 years, he did not spend enough on defense and did not make additional provisions in the defense budget for 'one rank, one pension'. But under the Modi regime, which Manmohan Singh considered the biggest threat to internal security, that armed Maoism has also been eliminated. All this will be considered a sign of a 'hard state'. From Nehru-Indira to today... During Nehru's tenure, India was not a 'soft state' in any sense. He fought Pakistan, met the challenge of the Nizam/Razakars in Hyderabad, liberated Goa from Portuguese occupation. AFSPA is Nehru's gift. Shastri for the 1965 war and Indira for 1971 are immortal. (These are the author's own views)