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Ashok Malik is a columnist and writer living in Delhi)
"[The Henderson Brooks report] is a top-secret document and has not been declassified so far. Release of this report, fully or partially, or disclosure of any information related to this report, would not be in national interest."The quote above is from a written reply given by Defence Minister Arun Jaitley in the Rajya Sabha a few days ago in response to an MP's question. Almost certainly drafted by a civil servant, in its wording and tone it is no different from many similar statements issued by several previous defence ministers.
As is well-known, the Henderson Brooks report has been a state secret for the past 50 years. It has never been officially released. It is named for Lieutenant General T.B. Henderson Brooks, who was commissioned by the then army chief, General J.N. Chaudhuri, to do an operational review of what went wrong during the India-China war of 1962.
Very few people have had access to the very few copies of the report. It has long been speculated that General Chaudhuri, who became Army Chief after the debacle of 1962 and gave Henderson Brooks the task for which he (the latter) is most remembered, leaked a substantial part to the journalist Neville Maxwell.
In 1970, Maxwell wrote a book, India's China War. He is believed to have used, quoted or paraphrased portions of the Henderson Brooks report. Earlier this year, Maxwell, now an old man living in Australia, published part of the report or what was purported to be part of the report on his website. Maxwell has claimed he was shown volume one of the report, but not volume two.
Maxwell's release of the Henderson Brooks report took place as the election season was heating up in India. Predictably, it added to campaign rhetoric. Since the 1962 war is seen as Jawaharlal Nehru's biggest failure, the leak was highlighted by the BJP to embarrass the Congress. Among the strongest voices in the BJP was that of Arun Jaitley, who demanded the report be declassified.
This is what makes Jaitley's about-turn that much more problematic and embarrassing. In effect, he has echoed the words of his predecessor, A.K. Antony, who declined to release the Henderson Brooks report in 2010, arguing it was "sensitive" and of "current operational value". This, even though the war had been over for half a century.
Opacity is the mother of conspiracy theories. The chief conspiracy theory surrounding the Henderson Brooks findings has been that by keeping them under cover, the Congress is protecting Nehru.
This may or may not be true. Nehru's failure on the China front, his dependence on a reckless defence minister such as V.K. Krishna Menon and the circumstances of the 1962 war, including the decision to push Indian soldiers into aggressive positions in disputed territory and that the hapless soldiers did not have the weapons or logistical support to defend have all come out. Many of the participants in the tragedy of 1962 have written their own accounts.
That apart, Henderson Brooks was a professional solider. He was asked to scrutinise where the army erred. He is very unlikely to have commented on the politicisation of the army brass; or that individual generals were currying favour with certain politicians and ministers and feeding them a mythology they (the politicians) wanted to hear. This was an important element of 1962, but could not possibly have been part of Henderson Brooks' mandate.
So where does the opposition to the release of the report come from? There are four sources. First, 1962 was a national tragedy that sections of the Indian establishment would rather forget and pretend never happened. Second, 1962 was a political disaster that the Congress establishment would rather forget and pretend never happened.
Third, the bureaucratic inertia in the Defence Ministry would prefer to keep the report sealed. It would rather use this secrecy as a carrot or stick (depending on the situation) in the ongoing and never-ending battle between Defence Ministry civil servants and army generals. Fourth, the army would not want critical details revealed - presuming Antony was right in 2010 and the report has operational minutiae that is still of use - and would not want it to be known that the Army Headquarters and tin-pot, Bonapartist generals flagrantly and unconscionably let down the gallant jawan.
So persuasive and stubborn has been this coalition that it thwarted even George Fernandes. Defence Minister in the Vajpayee years, Fernandes, like Jaitley, came from an entirely non-Congress political tradition. On taking office, he spoke with clarity on the Chinese strategic challenge. In 1998, he was instrumental in pushing Penguin to reissue D.R. Mankekar's The Guilty Men of 1962. Yet, Fernandes too failed the Henderson Brooks test.
This makes Jaitley's bland response in Parliament that much more difficult to accept. What is there in the report that causes a politician who forcefully asked for its declassification only a few weeks ago, and who has built a legal and political career by fighting governmental overreach, promoting transparency and stripping away the assumed privileges of the state, to take what would seem to be an indefensible position? What mysteries are contained in the report that a confident nation and a confident army can't address before release or can't face up to?
The defence minister cannot declassify the Henderson Brooks report on his own. There is a cabinet decision that will have to be revoked. It is also feasible that the report is only made public with a few paragraphs or sentences blacked out in the interests of "national security". While not ideal, this situation can be lived with. A blanket refusal to release the report cannot be lived with.
India's democracy and its people deserve better. The memory of Major Shaitan Singh and of Subedar Joginder Singh and of all those valiant men who died for us - for India - on those icy heights 52 years ago deserves better. Jaitley and the government will have to make amends.
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