Look at our neighbors
China’s architect Chairman Mao said “Power flows from the barrel of the gun”.
Pakistan for more than half of its independent history has been under one dictator or another.
Myanmar is still under military junta.
Neighbors like Afghanistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka still have strong influence of army in the daily matters of the state.
India itself also had a dictator, who almost successfully legitimized herself.
Yet Indian army simply minds its own business. It has no political ambition and its preferences never shape the policies of the nation. WHY?
What is there in the country that is preventing them to do it?
My first response would be size and complexity. India is too large for a coop to be successful. To stage a military uprising, you would have to arrest 700 members of parliament, another 25 Chief ministers, have the support of atleast 100 military garrisons (army, airforce, paramilitary and navy) All this in a country where the 3 dense chiefs can’t even talk to each other informally over a phone (unless the defense minister is present) would sound like a remarkable feat. But then military chiefs have ruled over China and Russia.
Then I thought maybe politics is not what they want. But then I could find 3 well publicized instances where the Army Chiefs said a few words against their incompetent political masters and were dealt with.
1) Kodandera Madappa Cariappa, a war hero and the first army chief of independent India, said a few words against politicians. Nehru, could not ask him to resign, so he had him exiled in a golden cage. Nehru promoted him to High Commissioner to Australia in 1953.
2) In 1959, K. S. Thimayya was forced to resign when he bad mouthed his Defense Minister V.K. Krishna Menon
3) Sam Hormusji Framji Jamshedji Manekshaw, after liberating Bangladesh, stupidly said that he had an offer to join the Pak army and if he had did, Indians would have been defeated. Indira Gandhi made sure that this was his last public appearance.
So what do you think is the reason?
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