Soon after the Election Commission (EC) gave the Government the go ahead to appoint the next Army chief, the Defence Ministry on Monday recommended the name of Vice Chief of Army Staff lt-General Dalbir Singh Suhag for the top job to the Appointments Committee of Cabinet (ACC). This panel headed by the Prime Minister will take the final call on the appointment.
The BJP questioned the “political propriety” of the outgoing Government appointing the new Army chief. BJP leader Ravi Shankar Prasad said the Manmohan Singh Government has “only 90 hours” left and “I leave it to their judgement of political propriety whether to appoint the new Army chief or not when the vacancy is occurring at the end of July.”As per tradition, the name of the next Army chief is announced at least two months before the incumbent is due to retire. However, the BJP had earlier questioned the Government’s decision to start the process nearly a month back during the ongoing electoral exercise and the Defence Ministry decided to seek the Election Commission’s view.
Army chief General Bikram Singh retires on July 31 and abiding with the seniority principle, the Defence Ministry selected Suhag, the senior-most officer, for the Army chief’s post, sources said. The EC on Monday gave the green signal to the Defence Ministry and said its March 27 order clearly stated that appointments, selections, tenders and procurement of weapons for Defence forces were exempt from the Model Code of Conduct. Moreover, this directive is applicable to all future elections, the EC said.
Criticising the Government’s move to appoint the Army chief and some other key appointments, Prasad said the “great rush” in filling the crucial vacancies hours before it is to demit office is against “democratic propriety and political probity”. Alleging that the Manmohan Singh Government was showing alacrity in making certain key appointments in the departments of Commerce and Finance merely 90 hours before the formation of new Government, the BJP expressed its “deep distress”.
“We are deeply distressed to note that when an imminent departure of the Manmohan Singh Government is going to happen in 89 to 90 hours, why this great rush to fill the vacancies of crucial appointments in the Commerce and Finance departmentsIJ” Prasad said.He said why the Government was showing “haste” in making crucial appointments adding, “this is completely against democratic propriety and political probity”. When asked, the BJP leader, however, did not spell out the appointments being made in the Finance and Commerce Ministries.
The main Opposition party had last month submitted a memorandum to the EC protesting against the process of appointment and said there should be no “hurry” and the matter should be left to the next Government. Incidentally, Bikram Singh’s name was announced nearly three months before then Army chief General VK Singh’s retirement. Also, VK Singh, who is now contesting the lok Sabha polls as a BJP candidate from Ghaziabad constituency, was also appointed more than two months before incumbent General Deepak Kapoor’s tenured was to end.
Significantly, during the last days of his tenure as Army chief, VK Singh had initiated a ‘discipline and vigilance ban’ on lt-General Dalbir Suhag, then 3 Corps Commander, for the “failure of command and control” as an Intelligence unit under him had allegedly carried out dacoity in Jorhat in Assam outside the jurisdiction of the Corps. The ban was lifted soon after Bikram Singh took over as Army chief in 2012 and appointed Suhag as the Eastern Army Commander.