Of chocolate-cream soldiers.

Byline: Jawed Naqvi

CELEBRATIONS last week of two political thinkers and activists from the previous century who are dear to the Hindu right opened up room for a discussion about the love of and trouble with the army that dominates post-colonial societies, including South Asian democracies.

Vinayak Damodar Savarkar was in the news because of claims by his right-wing Hindu supporters that he first described the uprising of 1857 as India's first war of independence, while colonial historians saw it as a sepoy mutiny. The fact, however, is that the tag of India's first war of independence was the title of the book with a collection of 31 articles by Karl Marx in 1857-58 published in The New York Daily Tribune.

The other person idolised in the news last week was Jayaprakash Narayan, or JP. It was JP's birthday on Oct 11 when he would have been 117 years old. The government issued a postage stamp in his memory. JP toyed with Marxism while studying at Berkley. He later embraced agitational politics centred on Gandhi's non-violence. He died in 1979, five years after launching a massive anti-Congress movement from Bihar, which gave the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) critical legitimacy in India's mainstream politics, paving the way for AB Vajpayee and LK Advani to join the federal government in 1977.

In 1975, JP called on the military and police to revolt against the elected government of the Indian republic. The RSS had become the spine of his movement, feigning as it did its transient passion for India's secular and socialist constitution.

The human dilemma of the soldier has been discussed intellectually at length.

Did the RSS not hold JP's hand in exhorting the army and the police to disobey Mrs Gandhi's orders? Mrs Gandhi declared emergency citing the threat and put down the call to rebellion. Savarkar applauded the failed anti-colonial mutiny, which was brutal and costly for both sides, while JP called for the military to intervene politically in Indian democracy.

It is a tribute to the Indian army that it remained loyal to the constitution. Others in India's neighbourhood have not been so lucky as they succumbed to the lure of 'stability' that a politicised military usually promises in post-colonial societies, as opposed to the rough and tumble and periodic chaos that is an inevitable part of free people jostling for the attention of fellow compatriots.

It is useless to debate today whether the RSS would brook a similar call to the army -...