INDIA-PAKISTAN : ARMED TO A POINT
By A. Hariharan
New Delhi : The Armed forces of India and Pakistan are fully geared for war. “From alert to scramble should not take more than two minutes”, said India’s minister for Defence Production last week. And sabre-rattling goes on all the time. Car strikers proclaiming “Crush India” and “Conquer India” are out in force in Lathor, Karachi and other Pakistan cities. Indian Defence Minister Jagjivan Ram said a new war would be fought on Pakistani soil and India would not only take the cities of Lahore and Sialkot in Punjab but keep them for good.
Ram was obviously referring to the 1965 war when the Indian army marched up to the outskirts of Lahore but did not take the city, following the Tashkent agreement, India had to withdraw from the area and also give up the strategic heights of Kargil and Haji Pir in Kashmir which had been gained at great cost.
There are conflicting versions about the “2-day war” of 1965. Political leaders maintain India did not take Lahore because of the problems involved in feeding the civilian population. However, General Harbaksh Singh who was Commander of the Western Sector at the time, has said the corps commander after having established a bridgehead across the Lechogil canal in Lahore, got cold feet and failed to consolidate his gaims. There must be some truth in this for the corps commander was subsequently fired.
What may prevent war this time is the extermely difficult military situation Pakistan faces. In 1965 both countries refrained from opening a front on the East Pakistan border. Today, with the Bengali population ranged as one man against Pakistan Government there, 80,000 troops in the Province wil be bottled up and perhaps annihilated in the first hours of the War.
There are reports Pakistan already has withdrawn one infantry division from the East to strengthen defences in the Western Wing. Can it afford to write off the rest? Pakistani military Aircraft and Naval Ships will be unable to make use of Ceylon and any attempt to hold East Pakistan in a shooting war likely to prove helpless.
The military rulers might well see virtue in witi:drawing troops from the East and concentrating on the Western Sector with the aim of capturing some Indian territory in Kashmir, Rajasthan or Gujrat, that would be the only way to save face, given the certain loss of East Pakistan.
In terms of military balance, both sides have strengthened their positions since •
- Pakistan has reportedly taken on loan 75 military Aircraft from Saudi Arabia. I also maintain airforce training missions in various West Asian countries, which, in the event of a war, may be expected to assist Pakistan.
India’s policy of achieving self-sufficiency in military hardware gives it decided advantage over Pakistan. Several new types of arms and ammunition are being manufactured in Indian Ordnance Factories. A major break-through was the Vijayanta tank, considered more manoeuerable than Centurian which was India’s mainstay in 1965. The first Vijayanta rolled out in December 1965 and an informed guess is that between 350 and 400 hundred of these medium tanks equipped with 105 m.m. guns have been put into service.
India makes aircraft and ships as well. The Hindustan Aeronautics is currently making the Jet ground-attack fighter HF-24, the supersonic interceptor MIG-21, the jet fighter Gnat, the Jet-trainer HJT-16, the transport aircraft, HS-748 and Alouette helicopters. The Mazagoan Docks in Bombay produces Leander class frigates.
Meanwhile, Indian citizens have already been hit by the financial burden of the Bengali refugees and of war preparations. Although the finance minister, Y.B. Chavan, had assured parliament and the people that he had no intention of introducing a supplementary Budget this year on the eve of Mrs. Gandhi’s departure on her foreign tour the Government announced more tax measures to raise Rs. 700 million.
New levies are being imposed on railways travel, postal services, bills of exchange. The Government also is imposing an excise duty of two paisa on each copy of newspapers, all new measures taken effect from November 15. They were announced through a Presidential Ordinance- the first time taxes have been collected in this manner. Parliament is to meet by the middle of November for a brief winter session, and as the tax measures are effective only from November 15 the ordinance came as surprise. In addition to the measures proposed by the Centre the States will have to imposed additional duties on certain items falling under their jurisdiction.
The new measures are : 5% surcharge on railway tickets costing one rupee or more; 5% surcharge on air travel within India (the May budget had imposed a 10% foreign travel tax on the value of tickes); a tax of Paisa 5 on all postal articles except postcards; duty of Paisa 10 on bills of exchange, bills of lading, promissory notes, insurance policies, letter of credit and proxies; and paisa 2 levy on newspapers and periodicals
The additional tax measures are being introduced to meet the mounting cost of maintaining the refugees from Bangladesh and to arrest further defficit financing. An estimate says between April and December 1971 deficit spending would have risen to the Figure of Rs. 5700 million. The budget estimate was Rs. 2,300 million And unofficial estimates say that if these levies are collected over a period of 12 months, the yield will be much more than Rs. 700 million.
Reference : Far Eastern Economic Review, 30.10.1971