A GREAT MAN INDEED....

If you have to die, do so around Delhi or Mumbai

The passing away of the only Indian to be appointed Field Marshal when in active service has been remarkable for the warmth of the ordinary men and women, who queued up to pay their last respects to the gentleman-soldier (you do not see people like him nowadays, not even in our Armed Forces) who put his life on the line for them.

It has also been remarkable for the complete lack of grace and gratitude, civility and courtesy, decency and decorum on the part of the bold-faced names rapaciously grazing the lawns of power in Delhi and elsewhere, for the brain behind India's only decisive military victory.

Sam, the Bahadur, had been unwell for a while now. From about 1000 hours on June 26, reports of his being critically ill had appeared in the media. Yet, when the "expected tocsin" sounded at 0030 hours till the guns were fired in salute around 1500 hours on June 27, "civil society" chose to show its incivility.

• Pratibha Patil , the unworthy commander-in- chief of the armed forces with all the time in the world- probably she did not get her trip cleared by Sonia, her "Italian' boss: Absent

• Hamid Ansari: Vice-president releasing books and writing reviews of books by fellow-travellers: Absent

• Manmohan Singh , the prime minister who could do with a bit of the field marshal's charisma and heroism: Absent

• Sonia Gandhi : the Italian daughter-in- law of the woman the Field Marshal called "sweetie": Absent

• L K Advani: prime minister in waiting of the party which would like to do to Pakistan what Manekshaw did: Absent

• M Karunanidhi and Surjit Singh Barnala: Chief minister and Governor of the state which Manekshaw had made his home for 35 years (They were too busy scratching each other's back): Absent

Politicians may have their reasons. They always do. Maybe, there are issues like protocol. Maybe, this is one way in which 'civil India' shows the armed forces its place. Maybe, this is why we are not as militaristic as Pakistan. Maybe, the knees are just too old to climb the hills.

But what about the armed forces itself?

• A K Antony: the former failed Chief Minister of Kerala often derisively called Resignation Antony for his inclination to throw in his papers are the slightest provocation and now the non-functioning Defence Minister 'now behaving like the chairman of the confederation of the armed forces' trade unions: absent '

• The chief of army staff: absent (away in Russia )

• The chief of navy staff- absent

• The chief of air staff- absent

The fact that the defence minister was represented by his deputy Pallam Raju, the fact that the navy and air staff sent two-star general rank officers, shows that however high or mighty, however rich or powerful, civilian or military, if you should die as you must, you should do so somewhere in the vicinity of New Delhi -- or Bombay.

Or else, they must have some use for you even if you are dead. Imagine Sonia kicks the bucket tomorrow and every Johnny in the Congress Party would rush to show his or her head for Rahul and his sister Priyanka to note. No other party has deteriorated in its standards like the Congress under the corrupt daughter of a former Mafia chieftain in Italy. But then a shameless party needs to depend on her for its own reasons.

As Field Marshal Manekshaw rightly surmised once: "I wonder whether those of our political masters who have been put in charge of the defence of the country can distinguish a mortar from a motor; a gun from a howitzer; a guerrilla from a gorilla -- although a great many of them in the past have resembled the latter."

The contrast couldn't be starker

• When Amitabh Bachchan was ill after being socked in the stomach during the shooting of Coolie, Indira Gandhi flew down to Bombay to show her concern.

• When Dhirubhai Ambani died, L K Advani cut short his Gujarat tour to pay his respects to an 'embodiment of initiative, enterprise and determination'. The man was the creation of the most manipulative and corrupts Babu-License Raj system spawned by a generation of Nehru-ites. Today, his two sons can 'afford' to go legitimate.

• When Pramod Mahajan was shot dead by his brother, Vice President Bhairon Singh Shekawat had the time to attend the funeral.

Our VIPs and VVIPs have time for dead and dying celebrities, charlatans, fixers, brokers, pimps, etc. Not for a Field Marshal and the only one in this country?

In his biography, K M Cariappa, the only other field marshal India has had (and who too died at age 94), writes of his father's cremation in May 1993:

"Honoring him in death as they did in life were Field Marshal Manekshaw, the three service chiefs all of whom belonged to the same course and at whose passing out parade from the joint services wing father had presided, the gracious chief minister M Veerappa Moily and C K Jaffer Sharief, Minister for Railways representing the President as the supreme commanded of the armed forces."

Somebody should have told the geniuses in Delhi that Sam, the Bahadur, passed away in Wellington, Ooty, not Wellington, New Zealand. The nearest civil airport is Coimbatore, just 80 km away. Perhaps the clowns in Delhi would have rushed if they received confirmation that the Field Marshal passed away in Wellington, New Zealand. Nothing excites them as being free-booters!


If this is how we say goodbye to Field Marshal Sam Manekshaw, no wonder why today's politics and politicians are not able to successfully tap into the angst of an entire generation? Probably that is the reason why the best and the brightest are today well settled in the US and Canada where I have run into a large number of them at every academic institution I visited. What a terrible loss for our country that could ill-afford to lose them?