Army commissions in-house study on `running amok’ cases

As the applicants dwindled, he adds, “selection standards went down so as to make up the numbers. So what we now have is a large number of officers who are inefficient. And so there are cases of fragging.”

Added to this is the stress on the job. For its sheer drudgery, COIN-Ops has no parallel and while some revel in the challenge, there are many who just cannot handle the uncertainty. Says a recently decorated officer: “Don’t get them wrong, but there are officers and jawans who cannot cope with the demands of COIN-Ops. Put them in a conventional war and they will be tigers.

But this is an entirely different game; guile is the answer. Which is not part of our training.” Units may go for months without any encounters with militants. The regimen of patrolling, ambushes, cordon and search, however, is repeated day in and day out, building up frustration. Some end up problem cases, like the jawan who shot Colonel Attawar and three others. The slightest incident then is a provocation. And most commonly, this is refusal of leave. As “units have to maintain a minimum 25 per cent strength at all times”, explains a company commander, there are some disgruntled men at any given time. “However much you juggle their leave, there is always somebody who is resentful,” he says. “This builds up inside,” according to a defence psychologist, “fermented by the exigencies and the sorrowful letters from home.”

The latter, in fact, is believed to be a major reason behind the breakdowns. Deployed in places like the Siachen or the Line of Control, the jawans get distressing letters from home but can do little about them. “How does he feel?” asks the psychologist. “He has problems at home, is not achieving much in operations; and what is he getting from the nation to fight the enemy? Just Rs 2,500. Self-esteem is bound to suffer, and one day he just loses it.”