Date of birth battle not yet over: General VK Singh

  NEW DELHI: The Army chief's defiant battle against the government to get his "honour and integrity" restored is far from over. With General VK Singh not ruling out resigning before his term, the senior-most serving Lt-General Shankar Ghosh also seems to have thrown his hat into the ring, muddying the succession battle further. 

Gen Singh himself was quite combative, albeit a little hurt by "reprehensible" campaigns directed against him, during the annual Army Day press conference on Thursday.  Usual questions on Pakistan, China, J&K, the Army's "transformation" drive, modernization delays and the like were hurled at him, but were repeatedly interspersed by ones on the festering controversy over his date of birth (DoB). "The (DoB) issue has always been of integrity and honour right from the time it came to the forefront. It has always been tackled by me in organizational interest," he said.  Asked point-blank whether he was contemplating resignation, Gen Singh said, "Please leave it to my judgement about what I should do. I may decide on some action after I find time to think about myself."  With Gen Singh keeping all his options open, sources say Western Command chief Lt-Gen Ghosh, the senior-most among the eight Army commander-rank officers in the 1.13-million force, got his "medical category" upgraded barely10 days ago in a surprising move. This after first getting it downgraded last year on account of "osteoarthritis of the right hip joint" to get a higher disability pension.  Perhaps, Lt-Gen Ghosh fancies his chances to become the Army chief since he will be the senior-most general if the Army chief resigns before his tenure ends on May 31. Lt-Gen Ghosh is also slated to retire on May 31.  Even though it's a political call, successive governments have almost always followed the seniority principle to anoint a new military chief, except in extremely rare instances like Lt-Gen SK Sinha's supersession by Gen A S Vaidya as the Army chief by Indira Gandhi in the early 1980s.  As of now, Eastern Army commander Lt-Gen Bikram Singh is the frontrunner for the coveted post when Gen VK Singh retires on May 31 as scheduled, with the defence ministry firmly holding the Army chief's date of birth (DoB) will stand at "May 10, 1950", and not "May 10, 1951" as he wants.  If Gen Singh's year of birth was settled at 1951, present Northern Army commander Lt-Gen K T Parnaik would have taken over since the former would continue in office till March, 2013.  One thing is clear. The Army chief does not want Lt-Gen Bikran Singh to succeed him since he believes his DoB was not corrected despite his repeated attempts since former chiefs like Gens J J Singh and Deepak Kapoor wanted to pave the way for the present Eastern Army commander.  Asked about allegations of a decade-old fake encounter in J&K being leveled against Lt-Gen Bikram Singh, the Army chief said the matter was sub-judice. "We have a report of that period, which has been made available to the people concerned. I don't think there was an inquiry conducted at that time. In all encounters, it is left to the civil police to do the inquiry," he said.  The age controversy has deepened the civilian-military divide. Gen Singh, however, contends his age row had neither marred his transformational and anti-corruption drives, not affected his working relationship with the defence ministry. "I work for the organization, not for myself. It may play a role in my family life, or within the four walls of my house, but not outside," he said.