Major General GD Bakshi (retd): 'Is it wrong to honour India's old soldiers? I wish Vistara hadn't buckled under army-hating voices'

Q. What exactly happened when you travelled by Vistara? Was it a nice experience? Were you surprised by their tweet — and then, by the backlash?

This is amazing. I had gone for a corporate lecture to Raipur and I had taken Vistara. I find them a very nice airlines. I generally prefer to go by them.

The moment I entered the aircraft, the pilot, who was the son of an army officer, came up and said, 'Welcome on board sir, you are an old soldier.'

Thank God there are airlines who do give respect to old soldiers and veterans. I was quite touched.

He then instructed the cabin crew to look after the general — those girls were so nice. At the end of the flight, they requested if they can have a snap with me, I said, most welcome. They took the snap, I didn’t know that they had posted it on Twitter on Vistara's site, saying, ‘Proud to have General Bakshi’ on board.

I understand there are some publications who have strong anti-army leanings — they miss no opportunity to demonise the Armed forces. They protested and said, this guy speaks against Mahatma Gandhi, we will not travel by this airlines. The Vistara people got worried and they took the tweet off. I didn’t even know what was happening, but a lot of my friends got very perturbed as to why they have come under a pressure from a left-wing magazine which is known for the kind of virulent reportage they have been doing against the armed forces.

Thank God there are people in the country who support the armed forces. Some of them rang me and said, ‘Sir, I hope you know what is happening on Twitter’. I said what, I generally don’t go through it too much.

Q. Do you feel the airlines was right in removing the tweet?

Vistara, the airline, is a commercial venture — I suppose they have to safeguard their business interests. It has done no fault — from their side, they were trying to be nice. It was an excellent gesture to honoure an army veteran. I hope they won't stop doing it just for a few anti–army trolls.

However, once having put it, the airlines should have stuck to their guns.

Is it wrong to honour war veterans and old soldiers? Anyone can make any type of accusation against me but then, you are required to do due diligence — check whether it’s a fact or not. By taking it off, it means you agree with the hostile comments — that is where I have felt a bit hurt. It’s ok, you got worried by the virulence of the reaction from those army-hating journalists but then, there is something called due diligence. The airline could have asked me what this is about. This means it is wrong for airlines to honour soldiers and war veterans — that hurts.

I hope the airlines will continue to honour our soldiers and war veterans.

Q. There are many people who have asked you not to travel on Vistara, what message do you want to give them?

Frankly, the airline was very nice — I will still go with them. I will only advise them that there are all shades of opinion but you take your own judgment call. What they did was honourable and right — they just honoured an old soldier and a decorated war veteran. There was no reason to abandon this principled stand. They could have said that instead of getting frightened by the virulence of the army haters.

These army-haters do not represent public opinion — on the contrary, they are quite divorced from the mainstream and have no right to foist their views on others. The ire of the people who reacted should have been directed at these anti–army trolls and not so much Vistara. I reiterate — Vistara had gone out of their way to be nice to an old soldier and I respect the ethics and values their parent company represents.

Q. Do you think people are less liberal and tolerant today?

Those who profess to be very liberal should also have the breadth of mind and vision to accept the view point of a soldier which may not agree with theirs.

I have my strong reasons for saying what I do — I have served in many battlefields and seen many good men die for their country and flag. I am absolutely a nationalist — I make no apology for being patriotic — I wear it on my sleeve and heart.

After retirement, I have made it a point to go to schools and colleges and talk to the children on the military values of Patriotism, courage and sacrifice — that’s my payback.

Q. What is your view on the Balakot air-strikes?

These strikes, we should have done 30 years ago.

For the last three decades, you have been at the receiving end of an asymmetric war launched by Pakistan. Pakistan started this ‘tamasha’ in 1980 in Punjab. As per the South Asia Counter Terrorism portal, 21,000 Indians were killed in Punjab, military, non-military, terrorists, civilians. By the end of the decade, we controlled the problem — and they simply shifted it to Jammu and Kashmir. In J&K, it is 45,000 Indians killed and still counting. Then, 1993 onwards, they spread it to bombing attacks and all to the cities of India which includes Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Varanasi — you name it. The casualty toll in these bombing attacks is 15,000. Thus, overall, over 80,000 plus Indians have been killed in these terrorists attacks by Pakistan.

This raises a very basic question — what is the cost of an ordinary Indian citizen's life? In these elections, rightfully, national security has been made an issue. What have we done to deter Pakistan from such an act of adventurism? How long will this killing of Indian citizens continue?

Q. There are many who question the Balakot strikes and ask for proof from the govt — what do you have to say to them?

The government did a damn good job in doing these strikes. I think we went wrong in managing the battle of perceptions and narratives. Nowadays, you not only have to win the battle but win the war of perceptions and narratives. We got too involved in the legalities of the whole thing. This was a military strike — 12 Mirage 2000 aircrafts, 4 Sukhoi 30s, 4 electronic warfare suppression aircrafts, one air-to-air refueler, 10 aircrafts in reserve — you call this a non-military strike?

This is what our foreign ministry called it and they went to great lengths to placate the Pakistani army. I can understand their concern for not getting into an escalatory spiral — but they started telling the Pakistani army, look, it’s not you, we have just hit the terror camps. You are strictly off-limits.

But the whole world knows that it’s the Pakistani army who is primarily behind the terror attacks. We played the whole attack down; we should have played it up.

The government should have given photographic proof of this attack in the very first briefing — once the attack is over, once your boys are home safely what is the point of obsessive secrecy? 

Q. Meanwhile, the Congress manifesto says there should be less military presence in the Valley and a review of AFSPA — do you agree?

I think that would be the biggest disaster.

We thought that the Congress after 2014 had learnt their lessons. You must sense the mood of the people — we mind being killed.

I thought it is an error of perception on their part of not judging the nationalist mood. The army does not go to J&K for tourism — it is sent where the police, paramilitary forces have all failed. We are the last resort.

Constitutional validity of AFSPA was challenged by the NAGA People’s Movement for Human Rights and the case went up to the Supreme Court. A five-member bench of the SC sat and adjudicated on the AFSPA — they held it to be valid constitutionally. It is required for extreme emergencies. Instead of reducing the powers of Indian army they enhanced it. Why should the views of the highest court in the land be questioned like this?

Q. Also, Lt Gen DS Hooda has said one or two strikes is not going to change Pakistan, what’s your view?

I totally agree with him. Pakistan needs punishment of an order which will deter it from future such terror strikes. We soldiers were delighted with the surgical strike. But it all stopped with just one — and terrorism resumed.

We struck Balakot on 26th February, in retaliation, Pakistan’s air force sent a package of 24 aircrafts the very next day. They wouldn’t have come in such numbers if they were not hurt.

In 1971, the war was started with a strike package of 32 Pakistani aircrafts who hit six of our air fields. This time, these people hit three military targets in Rajouri-Poonch, but they failed to destroy them because they were intercepted. This was in retaliation for an attack purely on the terrorist camps, thereby equating the Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammad as the arm of the Pakistani army.

That was the entire justification you needed to kick Pakistan back and hard — but instead, we deescalated.

Q. General DS Hooda has also unveiled a national security report for the Congress — your thoughts?

The party didn’t even consider it worthy enough to be included in the Congress manifesto. They didn’t wait for the report.

He is clearly on record to deny that there should be any dilution of AFSPA. Mehbooba Mufti's government has done tremendous damage to our security in Jammu and Kashmir. In South Kashmir, they raised an outcry about what the hell is the army doing in the hinterland areas, they are required to defend the border. So, the army was withdrawn and what happened there, Burhan Wani came up.

When I was serving in J&K, the terrorist movement was at its peak in 2000-2005. At that time, the number of armed terrorists in J&K was 4,500. Nobody ever said that Kashmir is going; today, we are saying it now when there are just 250 armed terrorists left.

We built the electronic wall there and we have reduced infiltration by 70%-80%. Each year, we would kill 1000-2000 terrorists and they would infiltrate the same number back. After the fence, the number of terrorists is down to 250 but the problem is that ISIS has changed the situation — they have tried to turn defeat into victory by now making it a Palestaninan-style intifada. They are using stone pelters. Today, there are 40,000 paid stone pelters in J&K — these are misguided youth who are killing people.

Q. As he now becomes one voice for national military strategy, what’s the general perception of army personnel on General Hooda?

He was the northern army commander. There are people in the army who do not agree with him and were unhappy with his somewhat soft style.

We felt that he was inordinately soft on the terrorists — he also did not stand up to the politicians enough as they went on their overdrive to support Mehbooba Mufti.

He should have taken a stand, which he did not do unfortunately. When the first surgical strikes took place, we in the military thought that now, for every one strike, like the Israelis, we will do 10 on the other side. To our surprise, after the first strike, there was a full stop — we thought that was wrong.

Similarly, after the air-strike, we should not have been in a hurry to deescalate; Pakistan did not expect you to. They were logically expecting more punishment.

And, no, this is not going to start a nuclear war.

Also read: Lt Gen DS Hooda (Retd): 'There is no harm in a retired general joining a political party. I am not joining the Congress though'