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Reuters General/ - Article, Qua, 04 de Abril de 2012
CLIPPING INTERNACIONAL (Supreme Court)
India army units' unusual movements
spooked government: paper
(Reuters) - Two Indian army units that moved towards
New Delhi on a January night without notifying the
government raised alarm in the capital, the Indian
Express newspaper reported on Wednesday, but the
Defense Ministry and army quickly denied the report.
The infantry unit of the 33rd Armored Division based
150 km (90 miles) from Delhi and a unit of the airborne
50 Para brigade based in Agra to the south reached
the outskirts of Delhi before being ordered back, the
newspaper said.
The army and Defense Ministry said the units were
engaged in routine exercises to test mobility in fog and
did not need to warn the government in advance.
Ministry spokesman Sitanshu Kar told Reuters it was
not true the maneuvers had caused alarm.
Defense Minister A.K. Antony said the exercises were
normal and he was fully confident the armed forces
would not do anything to undermine India's
democracy.
"This is baseless. In the ministry, with the minister,
there is no communication gap. There is no trust
deficit. I have full faith in them. They are working
together," he told reporters after a ceremony to launch
a nuclear submarine.
The troop movements happened at a time of friction
between the army chief, General Vijay Kumar Singh,
and the government. The newspaper said the
accepted view is there was a breakdown in
communication rather than a plot of any kind.
The military in India, the world's largest democracy,
has traditionally stayed out of politics and is not known
for conspiring against governments in a region plagued
by instability.
On the night in question, lookouts confirmed the two
units were travelling towards New Delhi, the
newspaper said.
Antony was informed and the government ordered
police to check all vehicles on roads to Delhi as a way
of slowing traffic. The Defense secretary, the ministry's
top civil servant, cut short a trip to Malaysia to handle
the situation, the newspaper said.
The report highlights deep rifts and a tension in recent
months between the world's second largest standing
army and the government.
On January 16, the day the exercises took place, army
chief Singh took a case against the government to the
Supreme Court in a row about whether he could serve
another year before retiring. He later lost the case.
Last week, Singh said he was offered a $2.8 million
bribe and accused the Defense minister of not acting
on information about corruption in the forces. He also
wrote a letter to the prime minister in March saying the
army was not in proper shape to defend the country.
The letter was leaked.
(Reporting by Anurag Kotoky, Annie Banerji and Frank
Jack Daniel; Editing by Robert Birsel)
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