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R N Kao

Page 15

by Nitin A Gokhale


  Incidentally, like Banerjee was known to the Bangladeshis as Nath Babu, Kao and Nair too initially concealed their identity. While RNK was simply introduced to the members of the provisional government of Bangladesh as Mr Ram, Nair assumed the name Col Menon. In keeping with the nature of the organisation and its mandate, the R&AW officers were careful in concealing the identities of the Bangladeshi interlocutors too.

  Col M.A.G. Osmani, a former colonel in the Pakistani Army but now an elected member of the National Assembly, was appointed the commander-in-chief of the Bangladesh Liberation Army or Mukti Bahini. He was dubbed ‘Oliver’ by the R&AW. Thereafter, he was always referred to as Oliver in official communication.

  As weeks went by, RNK’s workload only increased. He had to make sure the secret training programme for the Mujib Bahini proceed without any hitch, act as a trouble shooter when egos clashed, and also advise the prime minister through Haksar.

  Often, Banerjee, who had a 360 degree view of the goings on in the Bangladeshi leadership, felt obstructed by the army, especially the GoC-in-C, Eastern Command, Lt Gen Jagjit Singh Aurora, who had his own ideas on how to treat or ignore the Bangladeshi leadership.

  For instance, in July 1971, Banerjee sent this report to RNK after spending three hours with Osmani and Tajuddin. First, Banerjee had to make some excuse for Col Menon (Sankaran Nair) not meeting them anymore.

  Banerjee wrote, ‘Oliver has a lot of complaints against … Aurora. According to him the charge of imparting training to Mukti Fauj was given to the local army authorities early in May. At the very outset Jagjit Singh desired that the EPR & EBR should be disbanded and the members of these organisations as well as other volunteers should be given training only for guerrilla warfare. This was strongly opposed by Oliver and TU [Tajuddin] as they wanted that their people should be trained both in conventional and unconventional methods of warfare and that at least 5 battalions of armed forces should be brought up in inducted into East Bengal…’5

  He went on to add, ‘Oliver feels that in view of the difficulties and the want of rapport between the Bangladesh C-in-C and the Indian army authorities, there is a lot of dissatisfaction, discontentment and misgivings in the Bangladesh army. They’ve been feeling that the C-in-C is not taking adequate care of the officers and men of the BD Army and is not pressing the Indian army to look after their needs… Certain sections are also of the opinion that the Government of India has adopted a ‘go slow’ policy and that no efforts are being made to increase the efficiency and speed of action of the Bangladesh army … from the trend of their talks I could see that there was a feeling that Lt. Gen Jagjit Singh Aurora is slighting Oliver and is not giving adequate attention to this urgent demands… Something should be done very quickly to improve the existing relations between the Eastern Command and the Bangladesh army so that the present struggle may not be impeded.’6

  The moment this input came from Banerjee, RNK apprised Manekshaw of the friction that was developing in Eastern Command and kept Haksar in the loop. Aurora was then told to take corrective action. One can only surmise that these actions were implemented by Aurora, since, in due course of time, the complaints stopped coming. On another occasion, RNK had to mollify Banerjee who felt insulted by a demand from Manekshaw.

  A perusal of the exchange of letters between RNK and Banerjee shows that ‘Nath Babu’ was not happy about Gen Manekshaw wanting the R&AW station in Calcutta to prepare and send daily war bulletins for the Bangladesh Army after receiving inputs from the Indian Army’s Eastern Command. Banerjee told Gen Manekshaw that to his knowledge no such decision was taken. ‘There was no advantage in routing such materials through the R&AW. We would certainly not like to be the courier of the Eastern Command. Besides, we cannot enter into any correspondence with the BD Government,’ Banerjee complained to RNK and requested that he take up the matter with the COAS. He had another point to make. Gen Manekshaw wanted Banerjee to share all the intelligence inputs he sent to Delhi with Eastern Command, which Banerjee refused.

  Kao, in his reply, told Banerjee that he would not discuss the matter with Gen Manekshaw. Instead, he instructed the Calcutta station chief to pass onto Gen Aurora relevant portions of the daily intelligence briefs on Pakistan issued by the R&AW. ‘No information contained in these reports about West Pakistan should be given to him [Jagjit Singh Aurora],’ Kao cautioned Banerjee.

  The Calcutta station chief was, however, not happy with RNK’s reply. Banerjee again wrote back to Kao asking for clear instructions whether he should continue to act as courier of Eastern Command for this purpose since ‘I have to personally handover these bulletins to Oliver since R&AW cannot enter into official correspondence with the BD Government.’

  Kao replied immediately saying he had a word with Manekshaw who seemed keen to follow the practice suggested by the army. RNK, therefore, instructed Banerjee to send war bulletins received from Jagjit Singh to the BD Government through the R&AW. ‘Perhaps it is not necessary for you personally to go to Oliver to deliver them. “This routine work could probably be done by Bhattacharya (perhaps Banerjee’s deputy) or even an SFO or FO, on the days when you are not likely to meet the Bangla Desh leaders”,’ Kao wrote.

  He then pointed out to Banerjee that there were advantages in doing so. Firstly, even in operational matters, the R&AW would continue to have a status and an understanding with the Bangladesh leaders, and secondly, the organisation would see the contents of the war bulletins sent by Jagjit Singh.

  This exchange is instructive. As a leader, RNK was looking at the big picture and did not want to quibble on minor issues. At the same time, he managed to make Banerjee see reason and look for positives in a potentially confrontational situation. RNK and Manekshaw maintained an excellent relationship throughout the crisis and later. In one of the exchanges, Manekshaw asked RNK to check if claims made by the Eastern Command about some sabotage operations carried out by freedom fighters inside East Pakistan were correct. Kao replied in detail giving the factual position.

  But the R&AW’s role was not limited to confirming or denying claims. Banerjee, entrusted to keep a close liaison with the Bangladesh leaders, sent a detailed report in July 1971 to Kao laying bare the divisions, fears and one-upmanship within the provisional government. Banerjee learnt that a majority of the provisional government was unhappy at the manner in which Tajuddin had got himself appointed as the prime minister. No one believed Tajuddin when he claimed that Government of India wanted him to be the prime minister. Otherwise, they (Delhi) would have indicated, he told colleagues in the provisional government. No one believed him and wanted to have a showdown. Despite the anger, Nazrul Islam, the acting President, prevailed upon other members to put aside their differences since fight for Bangladesh was important in his view.

  Banerjee then gave his own input on Tajuddin, his background and his standing (or lack thereof) in the Awami League. Tajuddin had no position in the Awami League Parliamentary Party immediately after the elections in 1970. Mujib did not trust him, Banerjee told RNK. In fact, Banerjee had information that on the night of 25 March 1971—when the crackdown happened—Tajuddin, Amirul Islam and Dr Kamal Hossain (an adviser to Mujib on Constitutional matters, who surrendered to the Pakistan Army) had a separate meeting after leaving Mujib’s residence. Tajuddin and Amirul Islam, Banerjee wrote in his report, were the first ones to reach the Indian border in the immediate aftermath of the bloodbath and rushed to Delhi to contact the Indian leadership so that Tajuddin could get himself appointed as the prime minister.

  On receiving this detailed report, Kao suggested that Nazrul Islam be recognised as the acting President and a monthly meeting between him and Banerjee be held without the knowledge of other ministers to review the situation.

  If Banerjee was RNK’s primary asset in the Bangladesh political team, Maj Gen Uban played the role of his solution provider in the field. Throughout the nine-month crisis, Uban tirelessly toured the border areas and organised training for over 8,000 men, armed them
and controlled their operations inside East Pakistan to harass and weaken the Pakistani Army ahead of the actual war.

  Apart from the coordination, supervision, liaising and advice that the R&AW provided to Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and the top leadership that handled the 1971 crisis, Kao and Sankaran Nair had not forgotten their primary responsibility—that of providing strategic, actionable intelligence at a critical juncture.

  As mentioned earlier, Nair had cultivated a high-grade contact in the Pakistani Army. In the last week of November 1971, one of his moles in Gen Yahya Khan’s office informed Nair that the Pakistani Air Force (PAF) was planning a pre-emptive strike on the forward air bases of the Indian Air Force (IAF) in the western sector on the evening of December 1. The IAF was immediately alerted by Nair, and Kao informed this to Indira Gandhi. The IAF was put on high alert and took necessary precautions to thwart the planned pre-emptive strike. Despite the warning, nothing happened on 1 and 2 December.

  Air headquarters told Nair that it was impossible for them to keep the pilots in a state of high alert any longer. However, Nair who was very confident about his source, requested the Air Force to continue the alert for another 24 hours and stand down the pilots only after that if nothing happened.

  Nair was puzzled. Normally, this source of his was very reliable and accurate. Fortunately, the Air headquarters agreed to continue with the high alert.

  Sure enough, on the evening of 3 December, PAF launched its pre-emptive strike on IAF forward bases, which turned out to be a total failure because the IAF had an advanced warning. Later, Nair checked what went wrong. It so happened that the source had sent the correct date—3 December—in his coded message but the decoders at the R&AW messed up. Fortunately, for Nair and India, this was a mistake that did not prove to be expensive.7

  A 13-day war, brilliant prosecuted by the Indian military with the help of Bengali liberation fighters IAF, liberated East Pakistan. A new nation was born. Mujib was freed by Yahya. Soon, he took over the reins of Bangladesh.

  1 Indian High Commissioner to the UK, Appa Pant’s letter to Foreign Secretary Kewal Singh.

  2 R&AW’s internal notes.

  3 B. Raman, The Kaoboys of R&AW (New Delhi: Lancer Publications, 2007).

  4 S.N. Prasad, The India-Pakistan War of 1971: A History (Dehradun: Natraj Publishers, 2014).

  5 Report of Joint Director, R&AW, Calcutta, 3 July 1971, P.N. Haksar papers, File No. 220 (IIIrd instalment), NMML, New Delhi.

  6 Ibid.

  7 B. Raman, The Kaoboys of R&AW: Down Memory Lane (New Delhi: Lancer Publications, 2007).

  THIRTEEN

  Shepherding Sikkim’s Merger

  The liberation of Bangladesh was a high point in Indira Gandhi’s political career. The success of the operation also sowed the seeds of increased hostility towards India by the US and China. President Richard Nixon and his Secretary of State, Henry Kissinger, were particularly peeved because the 1971 war interfered with their outreach to Communist China via Yahya Khan. China too was annoyed since Pakistan was fragmented and faced a humiliating military defeat.

  As Mujib got down to the difficult task of retrieving Bangladesh from the horrors of genocide by the Pakistani Army, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and her advisers had to be careful to not let the triumph of the 1971 campaign go to their head. There were many challenges to overcome at home. One was staring at them in the face for some years but had been postponed because of the emerging situation in East Pakistan.

  That problem arose because of the growing restlessness of the ruler of Sikkim, a protectorate strategically located along the border with Tibet and Bhutan. The Chogyal or the King of Sikkim was increasingly pressurising India to revise the Indo-Sikkim Treaty of 1950, which had granted the tiny Himalayan kingdom the status of a protectorate. Palden Thondup Namgyal, the Chogyal since 1965, mistook India’s policy of indulgence towards him as a sign of weakness and started demanding a status for Sikkim on the lines of neighbouring Bhutan.

  A bit of background is necessary here to understand Sikkim’s history since 1947. Sikkim was one the 600-odd princely states on the eve of India’s Independence in 1947. Of these 600, 566 were in the Indian territory, the rest inside Pakistan. Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, India’s first home minister, was the man entrusted with the task convincing the princely states to accede to the newly independent India. Sikkim—like Hyderabad, Junagadh and Jammu and Kashmir—was resisting signing of the instrument of accession that the other 562 princely states had done by 15 August 1947. Patel and his Constitutional advisers were convinced that Sikkim had the same status as the other 562 princely states and should rightly accede to India.

  But Jawaharlal Nehru had other ideas. He wanted to grant Sikkim a special status, almost at par with that of Bhutan. Retired Special Secretary of the R&AW and author of a recent book on Sikkim, G.B.S. Sidhu, points out, ‘As Sikkim fulfilled the basic criterion of signing the instrument of accession with India, Sardar Patel and BN Rau—Constitutional adviser to the Constituent Assembly—were in favour of treating it on par with the other princely states… Nehru, on the other hand, due to his idealism, Pan Asian Vision and sensitivity to the Chinese concerns in the region, wanted Sikkim to be treated as a special case.’1

  Nehru moved a separate resolution with respect to Bhutan and Sikkim in the Constituent Assembly to form a separate committee to examine their status with a remark, ‘Bhutan is in a sense an independent state under the protection of India. Sikkim is in a sense an India state but different from others.’2

  That decision, resented by Sikkim’s pro-democracy parties, defined India policy towards Sikkim over the next quarter of a century. Sidhu observes, ‘This policy, which continued to be followed by the MEA till the end of 1972, revolved around one cornerstone … that if India wanted to protect its strategic interests in Sikkim, the Maharaja had to be supported under all circumstances to allow him to maintain a firm hold over the administration.’3 Sidhu, who, as R&AW’s points man in Sikkim in the crucial period between 1973 and 1975, describes the policy as a ‘mix of apparent appeasement and cautious containment’—appeasement of the Chogyal and containment of the pro-democracy, anti-Chogyal political parties.

  By 1972, Indira Gandhi, fresh from her firm handling of the Bangladesh crisis, her political stock as high as it could ever have been, turned her attention to Sikkim. She was frank in admitting, in private, her father’s mistake in granting Sikkim the special status. The Principal Secretary, P.N. Dhar—who succeeded Haksar in that crucial post—has noted, ‘She [Indira Gandhi] told me in clear terms that her father had made a mistake in not heeding the Sikkimese demand for accession to India in 1947 … her guess was that he [Nehru] had assumed that the Chinese would leave Tibet Tibet’s autonomy undisturbed and, in anticipation of this, he had perhaps thought it fit to do nothing in Sikkim that would provoke them. She had no hesitation in admitting that in retrospect Sardar Patel’s instinctive reaction seemed correct. The short point that emerged was that we should undo our earlier mistake and support the people of Sikkim in their struggle against the Chogyal…’4

  The Chogyal had been emboldened in his new desire to acquire a status similar to Bhutan after a clash between Indian Army and Chinese PLA troops at Nathula, one of the many passes on the border between Sikkim and Tibet in September 1967. Coming as it did, five years after the 1962 debacle, the Chinese probably expected an easy walk-over at the pass. The Indian troops, however, gave a bloody nose to the Chinese and in fact killed many PLA soldiers. The clash nevertheless was a reminder that the border was still vulnerable to misunderstanding and skirmishes and India needed to be on constant guard.

  Despite its small size (a population of less than 1,30,000), politics and intrigue were very much part of Sikkim throughout the 1950s and the 1960s. While the Chogyal (and his father before him) used their exalted status as the royal family to keep their primacy intact, political parties and leaders opposed to the Chogyal were no less active. The most prominent among the local leaders i
n the 1960s was Kazi Lendhup Dorji, more popularly known as Kazi or Kazi Sahib, who as leader of the Sikkim National Congress (SNC) fought all his life for a democratic Sikkim.

  Added to the mix were two women, both foreigners. Kazi met Eliza-Maria Langford-Rae in New Delhi sometime in the late 1950s. Born in Scotland, raised in Belgium and married to an Anglo-Burmese named Longford-Rae, spent time in Burma (now Myanmar) before surfacing in Delhi’s high society circles. Eliza-Maria married Kazi after a brief courtship in 1958. She came to live in Kalimpong thereafter. Both were in their mid-fifties. Kazi’s new wife soon took centre stage among Kalimpong’s elite. Now called Kazini Sahiba, she was to drive Kazi’s political ambitions over the next decade and a half and played a significant part in Sikkim’s politically turbulent times.

  Hope Cooke, an American, on the other hand, was a young 23-year-old woman who married Thondup, the Choygal in 1963, after a four-year courtship and stayed mostly in Darjeeling’s Windamere Hotel where they first met in 1963. The Chogyal’s first wife, a local, had died in 1957, leaving behind two sons and a daughter. The Choygal also had a sister, Coocola, who was to also play a significant role in the political developments of the state in the late 1960s and the early 1970s.

  Sidhu says the arrival of the women, on either side of the divide, brought a major change in Sikkim’s politics and its status in international arena. Hope Cooke started attracting attention in the West. The Kazini too gave the cause of democratisation of Sikkim a greater visibility in Delhi’s power circles. As a consequence, Sikkim’s status became a topic of animated discussion at a much higher level in diplomatic and political circles. The Choygal’s demand for revision of the treaty now became more pronounced.

 

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