Recent events suggest that General V.K. Singh (Retd), the former Army Chief who is now a minister holding a sensitive portfolio in the Modi government, botched it while serving as the head of the Army. His entire term was consumed by the unseemly controversy over his date of birth, rather than matters of military policy. Now, by attacking the incoming Army Chief, Lieutenant General Dalbir Singh Suhag, for reasons of personal pique, the same man has conducted himself with recklessness while occupying a constitutional position.
This raises questions of the advisability of his continuing as a minister without casting the government he serves in less than favourable light. It is evident that if the former Army Chief gets away with his unbecoming ways, it is because the Modi government is still in its “honeymoon” period, traditionally the first 100 days when an indulgent view is taken of a government’s mistakes.
Earlier this month, when the defence ministry in an affidavit told the Supreme Court that Gen. V.K. Singh’s action of slapping a disciplinary and vigilance ban on (then) Major General Dalbir Singh Suhag, who will soon be Army Chief, was “illegal”, and “premeditated”, the former Army Chief should have asked himself if he should continue as minister if constitutional propriety and institutional honour mean anything to him.
This question has troubled neither the Gen. V.K. Singh nor the government he serves. This is not a good sign at all.
