Military Digest: When a Lt General’s book on the 1962 India-China war raised demands for his arrest

A similar tell-all book about the 1962 Chinese conflict had caused an uproar in Rajya Sabha in 1967. The book, The Untold Story, was written by Lieutenant General B M Kaul (retd), who was the General Commanding Officer (GOC) 4 Corps during the Sino-India war of 1962 and had to quit the Army after the debacle suffered by his Corps.

In March 1967, soon after the book was released, there were voices of anger amongst Congress Members of Parliament in Rajya Sabha regarding its contents.

Rajya Sabha archives show that Congress leader M P Bhargava along with some other MPs questioned the defence minister on whether the government’s attention had been drawn to Lt Gen Kaul’s book and whether he had sought prior permission from the government to publish it.

The MPs also wanted to know whether Lt Gen Kaul had submitted a manuscript of the book to the government before its publication.

The then defence minister Swaran Singh informed the Rajya Sabha members that Lt Gen Kaul had neither sought permission to publish the book nor had he submitted any manuscript which led to some Congress MPs seeking his arrest.

The MPs also asked whether defence personnel are free to use any material which came to their knowledge while they were in service, or whether there are any set rules under which they have to seek the government’s permission before using any of that material.

To that, Singh replied that as long as the defence personnel are in service they need to seek permission.

“But after their retirement, no permission as such is required. But the law of the land still prevails, namely the Official Secrets Act, and anything which comes within the Officials Secret Act will be an offence and as such actionable under the Officials Secrets Act,” the defence minister said.

Rajendra Pratap Sinha, another Congress MP, asked the defence minister what steps the government was taking to stop ‘retired military Generals’ from making use of the knowledge or making use of the secret information they have as a result of their service not to publish their accounts.

Swaran Singh said the government was examining various passages in the book to find out if any material or a secret or top secret character has been used and whether it falls within the Official Secrets Act.

The MPs then went on to question Singh closely on certain allegations made in the book regarding the role of former PM Jawaharlal Nehru and the former defence minister Krishna Menon in the 1962 debacle. They also asked questions quoting paragraphs from the book and why the Henderson Brooks committee report on the 1962 war had not been tabled in Parliament.

Lokanath Mishra, Congress MP from Orissa (now Odisha), demanded to know why Lt Gen Kaul had not been arrested because prima facie he had revealed the functioning of the Defence Ministry, its loopholes, and defects. “I consider him to be an informer to the enemy and is still at large and he has not been taken into custody,” said Mishra.

G Murahari, Congress MP from Uttar Pradesh, declared Lt Gen Kaul to be a “double agent”. The defence minister said whatever action has to be taken will be taken after a careful examination of the book.

However, Congress MP from Kerala G Ramachandran objected to the demands of the arrest of Lt Gen Kaul raised by his fellow MPs. He demanded an assurance from the defence minister that whatever inquiry is held and whatever the findings are, there should be no intention on the part of the government to curtail the inherent right of authorship of a citizen so long as nothing is written that militates against the security of the state.

“Sir, I need not give any assurance. The law of the land is there and courts are functioning. Every citizen has the right to authorship. At the same time he is subject to the restrictions which the law has imposed,” said then-defence minister Swaran Singh.

Eventually, no action was taken against Lt Gen Kaul and his book continued to be available for sale.