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  • modern-day mutiny

    Modern-day mutiny (The Telegraph, Calcutta, june 6 2007)
    SUJAN DUTTA

    New Delhi, June 5: An officer has been charged with mutiny in an army outfit in the 150th year of the 1857 rebellion.
    The 1857 revolt in the colonial Indian Army made the word “mutiny” an indispensable part of the vocabulary of Indian history, evoking images of soldiers running amok and slaughtering their superiors.
    The officer, who is to be punished on the recommendations of his superior, has done little of that order. But he has upset military protocol and angered the top brass who still follow many traditions that are a legacy of the British Indian Army.
    The army-run Border Roads Organisation’s (BRO) civilian chief engineer, who is not a uniformed officer, has allegedly appropriated for himself the rank and stature of an army general. He has also apparently asked similarly placed colleagues to do likewise.
    The chief engineer, B.B. Lal, wants to wear two stars on his epaulettes — the marks of a major general — and also wants due protocol to be accorded to him, according to the complaint.
    The BRO head, Lt Gen. K.S. Rao, has sent a report to the defence ministry on the developments that he describes as “subversive activity which may lead to mutiny”.
    According to Rao’s report, the chief engineer issued an order asking all civilian officers in the BRO to be treated on a par with army officers and authorised himself to wear ranks equivalent to a major general in the regular army.
    Rao has suspended Lal. But the sensitive nature of the allegation has prompted defence minister A.K. Antony to order an investigation.
    Lal, who heads a BRO project called Hirak that oversees road-building through central India’s Naxalite-influenced districts, has been asked by the defence ministry to explain why action should not be taken against him.
    The BRO works on some of India’s most sensitive infrastructure projects, not only in the frontiers but also in Afghanistan and Tajikistan. It has a staff strength of 51,000 with 1,400 officers, half of whom are drawn from the army. The organisation is run on army rules.
    Rao is a Madras Sapper, the regiment of engineers with its origins in the Madras Presidency of the British. Lal belongs to the civilian staff in the BRO and is part of the General Reserve Engineer Force.
    The last time the grave charge of mutiny was levelled in the military was in 1984. That year a handful of Sikh soldiers and officers rebelled. The soldiers then threw in their lot with the Khalistan movement.
    It is mere coincidence but the historical parallel in the sesquicentenary of the 1857 revolt is breathtaking.
    The word “mutiny” has so far been associated mostly with an historical event. But the development in the BRO has breathed new life into it, bringing with it an immediacy that is here and now.


    Army to try a civilian for mutiny
    Vishal Thapar
    CNN-IBN

    Posted Thursday , June 07, 2007 at 08:10

    New Delhi: An Army court may soon be trying a civilian for mutiny. A Border Roads Chief Engineer is in the dock for appropriating the rank of an army general.
    The Army-led Border Roads Organisation is hopping mad. The provocation is a civilian chief engineer not merely claiming parity with an army general but even putting on his uniform and ranks.
    "There is always an irritation. You see, the Army ranks are not given suddenly to anyone," said Ex-Border Roads Officer Brig S C Lamba.
    B B Lal, the Nagpur based Chief Engineer, jumped into a general's fatigues the moment a Government notification equated civil and army ranks in the Organisation for disciplinary purposes.
    Lal didn't stop at that. He rallied all civilian officers to put on Army ranks. The Army responded by slapping charges of inciting a mutiny on Lal.
    "It is definitely appropriate. Because if we let it go like this, other defence establishments will also start putting on the rank and the uniform," said Lamba.
    This is not the first time the military aspiration of the civilian staff has caused upheaval. In 1979, a Border Roads civilian staff attempted to unionise. The Army leadership freaked.
    "Brigadiar M S Gosain – he was the Chief Engineer Project Vatak – he said no, you can't form a union, it is unauthorised and therefore it's can't be done," said Lamba.
    It's very rare for the Army to be crying mutiny against a civilian. But it's a reflection that the civil-military marriage in the Border Roads Organisation is on the rocks.





    12 hours ago
    Defence ministry probing modern-day 'mutiny'
    Wednesday, 06 June 2007 | Defence ministry probing modern-day 'mutiny' : India | channel: India

    "The BRO is engaged in some of India's most sensitive road construction projects in the northeast and in Jammu and Kashmir, as also in Afghanistan and Tajikistan. "
    New Delhi, June 6 –IANS- The defence ministry is probing a modern-day 'mutiny' by a civilian officer of an Indian Army controlled road-building organisation - on the 150th anniversary of India's first War of Independence that had once been termed the 'sepoy mutiny'.

    'I have received a complaint. I have asked my officers to find out more,' Defence Minister A.K. Antony told reporters here Wednesday.

    He was responding to questions, on the sidelines of a military awards function here, on a media report stating that B.B. Lal, a chief engineer with the Border Roads Organisation (BRO), had appropriated to himself the rank and status of a major general and had asked his other civilian colleagues to take up military ranks.

    Stating that the BRO 'is strictly speaking not under me', Indian Army chief Gen. J.J. Singh added, 'The BRO has been designed for working in frontier regions, sometimes with the army.

    'They have the ethos of the army. We have to have safeguards to ensure that they function according to the military ethos.'

    Kolkata-based The Telegraph said Wednesday that BRO chief Lt. Gen. K.S. Rao had sent a report to the defence ministry on the Lal episode that he described as 'subversive activity which may lead to mutiny'.

    According to Rao's report, Lal had asked all civilian officers in the BRO to be treated on a par with army officers and authorised himself to wear the rank of a major general.

    Rao, who has suspended Lal, is said to have used the word 'mutiny' as Lal is believed to have been speaking for a clutch of BRO civilian officers.

    Civilian officers in the BRO wear a uniform that is different from that of the Indian Army and carry civilian designations like executive engineer, superintending engineer and chief engineer.

    The BRO is engaged in some of India's most sensitive road construction projects in the northeast and in Jammu and Kashmir, as also in Afghanistan and Tajikistan.

    It has a strength of 51,000 with 1,400 officers, half of whom are from the army.
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