Read this and weep..

From Prof M D Nalapat’s blog (emphasis added):

*** Excerpts from Gen V K Singh uncovers Armsgate Scam by Prof Nalapat ***

Delhi is the nest of no fewer than six dozen international arms dealers, and they are the most desirable of friends to have in the national capital of what is effectively the world’s fourth-largest economy. Every week, each of them throws at least one if not more parties, at which liquor flows in the same profusion was water into bathtubs. The pot-bellied, ageing politicians and civil servants – now joined by a smattering of those in uniform – in attendance do not bring their wives along, for in such gatherings, there are numerous charming young ladies who attach themselves to the powerful attendees throughout the evening. What they whisper into the ancient, unsightly ears of the senior civil servants, select military brass and politician is not known, but whatever it be, the honeyed tone is effective.

Contract after contract gets awarded in profusion to the lucky hosts, who are usually called upon to design tender specifications in such a way that only their chosen candidate will get selected. The name of the game is to frame the rules and the conditions in such a way that the rest of the pack gets eliminated.

Thus, in the selection of the $11 billion contract for the MMRCA (Medium Multi-role Combat Aircraft) ,the single-engined Saab Gripen was excluded “because it has a single engine and is therefore less safe than twin-engined aircraft”. The reality, of course, is that statistics show that twin-engined combat aircraft are no safer than those with single engines. Saab being bankrupt, the entire company could have been bought over for the price of the 126-aircraft deal, thereby enabling India to gain access to advanced technology as well as providing it with a platform that can enable Delhi to enter the field of sale of defense aircraft, the way China is already doing.

In contrast, the Dassault Rafaele (which key circles in Delhi had told this columnist was the chosen craft, nine months before the selection was made public) involves no significant transfer of technology.  The company remains French, and has indeed been saved from financial collapse by the huge Indian order, although no other country in the world has bought the Rafaele, save its captive market, France. Even the GCC countries, who are normally very obliging in such matters, have not touched the Rafaele, despite strenous efforts by the Sarkozy government to get them to buy the aircraft. However,the French President has succeeded in India, perhaps because of the persuasive abilities of his Italian-born wife Carla, who shares such roots with the all-powerful Congress President, Sonia (Maino) Gandhi France is indeed experiencing a bonanza from India…

Although there have been numerous corruption allegations against key French companies such as Thales, this has not prevented them from landing juicy contracts in India…The common link in all that is that the money for such expenditure comes from the Indian taxpayer. Clearly a case of the poor feeding the rich, in that India could have had a flourishing defense production industry, if its policymakers had not been determined to acquire only foreign platforms and systems. For more than three decades, successive governments have talked of “indigenisation”, but in 2012,more than 81% of critical defense equipment is sourced from foreign suppliers, even trucks, of which the private sector in India is an international supplier. You will find Tata or Leyland or Mahindra vehicles in much greater profusion in foreign countries than in the Indian military, which wears a distinctly foreign look.

…Indeed, the lifestyles of some of the retired senior brass of the three services is such as would rival that of a prince, complete with multiple airconditioners and Audi and BMW cars littering the garages. Of course, nobody from the Income-tax department asks just how a retired military officer can afford such luxuries on his pension…The lifestyles of some retired super-senior military officers is clearly too opulent for them to have made the money they spend ethically, and yet no action gets taken against them.

After all, they are just joining a very populous club, that of crooked officers and politicians, that include some of the biggest names in Delhi.

…what is likely is that the CBI…will doctor and destroy the tapes given to them, so as to enable well-connected fixers and lobbyists to escape. The CBI is unlikely to undertake a genuine probe into what may be called India’s Armsgate scam, for fear of angering politicians at the very top of national life.

…General Singh is under attack not only by the ruling parties but by the Opposition. After all, when they were in power, they too fed at the same filthy trough as those on the ruling side are now doing. However, the tide seems to be turning against them.

Read it in full here. Also read this excerpt from Gen VK Singh is a hero for fighting the Enemy Within (emphasis added)

…The political establishment in its entirety is equally appalled. The General has become a guerilla warrior, they thunder. He ought to abide by the code, yield to civilian supremacy, and either stay silent or be sacked. In the same way that they rubbished Team Anna’s campaign against corruption last year and continued with their rollicking party in Parliament, they have ganged up against Gen VK Singh. In words eerily reminiscent of last year (in the context of Anna Hazare’s campaign), Lalu Prasad Yadav wonders if Gen VK Singh is angling for a career in politics….

It’s a bizarre, perverted world if we are asked to tolerate the status quo, even when we know it to be venal, merely because the alternative – of shaking things up — makes us queasy. Because it violates Section 2, Subsection 3(a) of the club rules….

Any self-respecting civilian government or military force or civil society ought to be celebrating Gen VK Singh for being a true warrior and taking on the Enemy Within. The problems that he highlights are our collective problems. Those problems have turned us into a banana republic…If what it takes to get us to even talk about the colossal mess we are in is for Gen Singh to shake the government and our civil society out of our stupor, more power to him!

Additional Links: Sh Jaswant Singh on “Governance, please” and the less-known fact that not just AK Antony but Madam-ji too was aware of the scam.  And finally, this bit: “Congress loyalists working overtime to ensure CBI limits its inquiry & Rajiv Gandhi’s name does not crop up“. Read and weep…

P.S.: Read comment #20 here to understand why Prof Nalapat was hounded out of journalism and forced into academia. Also read the truly shocking 2-part series on EVMs and some Unanswered Questions. As I said before, read and weep…or start preparing for the long war..