Two Indian Army Brahmin Lieutenant Generals have raised questions over the appointment of Lieutenant General S K Hasnain as a Corps Commander and moved the Armed Forces Tribunal for not being promoted into the command stream. In their plea, Lieutenant Generals J S Bajwa and P G Kamath have contended that they were not given command postings despite being cleared for the same by the Army’s selection board and have challenged the rationale of the Defence Ministry of giving them staff postings instead of command. According to them, the Defence Ministry had taken the decision on the ground that they did not have three years of residual service left. The two officers have contended that the requirement of three years of residual service has not always been adhered to and mentioned the case of Hasnain as one of the examples.
Hasnain and the two officers were selected in the same batch for promotion but he was promoted in the Command stream whereas they got promoted in Staff stream. Bajwa is the Chief of Staff of the Eastern Army Command and Kamath is holding a similar post in the Lucknow-based Central command. After hearing the two officers, the Tribunal has asked the Defence Ministry to file its reply in the case at the next hearing. After a two-decade gap, a Muslim officer is set to command the Srinagar-based 15 Corps that is the nerve centre of the Indian Army’s Kashmir operations. Lieutenant General Syed Ata Hasnain, who is presently commanding the Bhopal-based 21 Corps, is set to take over as the 15 Corps Commander by the end of this year after the incumbent Lieutenant General N C Marwah moves on to his next posting. Hasnain, who has served several stints in the Valley including a recent one as the Divisional Commander at Baramulla, is also the senior-most serving Muslim officer of the Indian Army.
The officer, who is known for his academic leanings in military circles, is the only serving Lieutenant General in Army ranks belonging to the minority community and is a second generation Army officer. Hasnain will be the first Muslim officer to command the 15 Corps after Lieutenant General M K Zaki who was in charge of the crucial command from 1989-91. Well regarded as an outstanding officer, Hasnain has had several stints in Kashmir and has spent a bulk of his over three decades of service in the state. More recently in 2008, the officer was instrumental in maintaining the peace in Baramulla that was badly affected when Jammu and Kashmir was struck by violence over the Amarnath row.
Then a Major General commanding the Baramulla based `Dagger’ Division, Hasnain used the concept of what he described as `soft power’ to defuse tension by reaching out to the masses. The real reason for the Indian Army’s Brahmin General’s objection is that in their myopic vision, they cannot see a Muslim officer surpassing them. It is commendable that a Muslim officer has made it to the three star level however, even that is being criticized and objected to. The suppression of Muslims in India is to the extent that the Sachar Commission Report on the plight of minorities in India had shown that not even two percent India Muslims have their due rights in government jobs and the situation in the Armed Forces is much worse. This clearly shows the ugly face of “secular” India, which poses as the world’s largest democracy to be what it really is. A bigoted and constipated nation, in which there is another set of rules for the Brahmin Class and another for lower class Hindus and no rule at all for classless Muslims, who are treated as dirt and suppressed at every opportunity and massacred in the name of ethnic cleansing to satisfy the lust for blood of the extremist Brahmins – Dailymailnews
