'Jo uchit samjho, woh karo’: Why ex-Army chief General M M Naravane’s 'unpublished memoir' triggered a storm in Parliament?

Rahul Gandhi was repeatedly stopped in the Lok Sabha from reading an article based on excerpts on 2020 India-China conflict in Ladakh from the unpublished book

A major political row erupted on Monday as Leader of the Opposition Rahul Gandhi sought to quote in the Lok Sabha from an article based on an unpublished "memoir" of the former Army chief General M M Naravane (retd) on the 2020 India-China conflict to attack Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, evoking a backlash from the BJP which accused him of misleading the House and belittling the armed forces.

Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla disallowed Gandhi from raising the issue, but he did not relent and several Opposition members rallied behind him. The House was adjourned twice and later for the day amid uproar as heated exchanges took place between the treasury and Opposition benches.

While Gandhi said the government was "afraid" of a line that he wanted to quote from the book and asserted that he would state that line in the Lower House, the BJP alleged that the Congress leader undermined the dignity of Parliament and hurt the morale of Indian soldiers with his "false accusations", in defiance of the Speaker ruling.

The book referred to by Gandhi is Gen Naravane's unpublished memoir, Four Stars of Destiny. The Caravan has published a cover story on the book, which was supposed to be brought out by Penguin Random House India.

The book, which was supposed to go to press in April 2024, has been delayed as it is still undergoing review by the Ministry of Defence (MoD).

"Naravane ji has written about the Prime Minister and Rajnath Singh ji clearly in his book, which has appeared in an article, and I am quoting from that article. They are scared because if it comes out, the reality of Narendra Modi ji and Rajnath Singh ji will be revealed. What happened to the 56-inch chest when China was before us and advancing?" Gandhi said outside Parliament.

General Naravane was the head of the Army when Indian and Chinese troops clashed at Galwan in Eastern Ladakh in 2020. Twenty Indian soldiers, including a Colonel, were killed in violent clashes with Chinese troops on the night of June 15-16, 2020 along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in Ladakh.

The casualties on the Chinese side have not been officially revealed.

'Going to wars can never be a purely military decision'

"Going to wars can never be a purely military decision. It is taken by democratically elected political leadership..." The Caravan posted on X, sharing the link to the article.

According to the article, Gen Naravane describes in the book his interaction with Rajnath Singh on August 31, 2020, amid escalating tensions with China on the LAC.

Gen Naravane first received a call from Northern Command chief Lt Gen Y K Joshi. “At 2015 hours on the evening of 31 August, Jo (Lt Gen Joshi) rang me up, quite worried. He reported that four tanks supported by infantry had slowly started moving up the track towards Rechin La … They had fired an illuminating round but this had had no effect. I had clear orders not to open fire, 'till cleared from the very top’,” he writes.

Gen Naravane says he then called up the Defence Minister, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar, National Security Advisor Ajit Doval, and Chief of Defence Staff Gen Bipin Rawat. “To each and every one my question was, ‘What are my orders?’ At 2110 hours, Northern Command again rang up, the tanks had continued moving ahead and were now less than a km from the top.”

At 9.25 pm, Naravane called Rajnath again, asking “for clear directions”. None came, according to the article quoting the unpublished memoir.

Naravane made yet another call to the Defence Minister, who promised to
call back. Rajnath then called back at 10.30 pm and said he had spoken to
Modi, whose instructions consisted of a single sentence: “Jo uchit samjho, woh karo” (do whatever you deem appropriate), according to the article.

This was to be “purely a military decision”. Modi had been consulted. He
had been briefed. But he had declined to make the call. “I had been handed a hot potato,” Gen Naravane recalls. “With this carte blanche, the onus was now totally on me,” he says in the book.

According to Gandhi's remarks and the Congress' posts on 'X', the Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha was trying to use the book to show that the political leadership was "indecisive" during a tense situation.