Amid questions raised by the BJP on the competence of the UPA government to choose the next Army Chief in the middle of election process, the Defence Minister A.K. Antony has said that the matter has been referred to the Election Commission for its advice.
For some days now the principal opposition party has been questioning the propriety of the government to make new appointments including that of the new Army Chief on the plea that it would be against the letter and spirit of the Election Commission’s Model Code of Conduct (MCC) in operation since the announcement of the General Election scheduled on March 5.
However in a communication to the Defence Secretary on March 27 the Commission had said that the Code is not applicable to any matter pertaining directly to the defence forces, be it the recruitments/promotions for defence forces, all service matters pertaining to them, defence purchases of all kinds, tenders relating to the matter of the defence forces and consequently no reference need be sent to the Commission pertaining to model code in these matters.
“These instructions shall be treated as standing instructions of the Commission and will be applicable for all elections in future. This may be brought to the notice of all concerned for future guidance”.
Despite the EC communication, on April 19 the BJP Legal Affairs Cell wrote a letter to the Election Commission asking the poll body to direct the government to refrain from making `major appointments’ including those related to armed forces.
“This is to seek your intervention in the tendency that seems to be on the increase in the government to make major appointments during the election process itself. You are aware of the undue haste with which the naval Chief was appointed. We learn that something similar is cooking in respect of the Army Chief where the present incumbent is due to superannuate in July 2014. We also hear that there is some hurried activity in hastening the selection process of the Lok Pal. It may be recalled the process of selection got aborted by the exit of the eminent jurists and as such the whole selection process currently stands vitiated”, the BJP letter had said.
The Defence Minister suggested that the government had sought counsel of the Commission as it wanted to strictly follow all the procedures before taking any final decision on the issue.
The present Army Chief Gen. Bikram Singh is due to retire on July 31 after the retirement of present Army chief Gen Bikram Singh. Traditionally, the appointment of chief of services has been made two months before the retirement of the incumbent.
However, in the case of Gen Bikram Singh, the appointment was done three months before the retirement of Gen V K Singh, who was engaged in a > long-drawn battle with the government over his age issue.
