Grandpa Stories for my Grandchildren.
Brig Samir Bhattacharya (retd)
This is a story of a thorough gentleman, an honest politician and a diplomat par-excellence whom I greatly admired and who looked after me as if I was his own son. He was a very suave and handsome Kashmiri Pundit by the name of Mr Durga Prassad Dhar who unfortunately is no more. He was our Ambassador to what was then called the Soviet Union. I first met him on a very bitterly cold afternoon in January 1969 when I with my three other colleagues from the Indian army who were doing our Command and General staff Course at the prestigious Frunze Military Academy in Moscow. Our long four years course also included one year in learning the Russian language and all of us were staying inside the academy officers’ hostel that was next door.
Mr Dhar had just taken over charge and he wanted to meet all of us in his office which was inside his residence that was within the Indian embassy complex on Yulitsa Obookha.(Obhooka Street) The time was around 3PM in the afternoon when the four of us in our ceremonial service Dress accompanied by Brigadier Inder Sethi our Military Attache walked into his office. Impeccably dressed in a dark blue woollen three-piece pin-striped suit he first gave us a big smile, shook hands and as we all sat down I noticed that he had poured himself a large cognac from a Remy Martin Napoleon bottle that was on the side table. So when he asked what would all of us like to have and everybody including the Military Attaché said tea or coffee, I said ‘Sir I would not mind having a little cognac.’ Though the Military Attaché’s face was one of total disapproval, the Ambassador said a good idea and asked the others if they would like to change their mind. After all the formalities like how much service each one of us had, which arm or service we belonged to, how long was the course etc was over, when he asked if we were having of facing any difficulties, everybody kept quiet? So, when I said that though I have no difficulties because I am a bachelor and it, therefore, does not concern me, but it certainly is of great concern to my three married colleagues because their families are not being allowed to join them here. Hearing that the Military Attache gave me a dirty look. But when the Ambassador asked the reason and the Military Attaché said that the Soviet government was asking for payment in American dollars for providing family accommodation, and the Defence finance was not ready to foot the bill, there was a look of surprise in the Ambassador’s face ‘You mean to say Inder(Brigadier Sethi’s first name) that for four long years they will be without their families in Moscow? But this is certainly not a field area is it! Moreover, these four officers who are Majors are equivalent to the Second Secretaries in the Embassy and they are also on our payroll. Therefore please put up the case on priority and I will take up the matter with the Government of India.’ And guess what, soon thereafter the families arrived. One of the officers Major NS Malik from Hodson’s Horse had an early marriage and his wife Shakuntala arrived with two little kids. The other two, Major JS Nagra a gunner officer and Major KS Dingra a sapper officer who were both newly married were joined by their wives Kay and Tina respectively. Malik retired as Deputy Chief. Dingra retired as a Major General while Nagra and I retired as Brigadiers. Malik, Nagra and I were course mates (!5th NDA) . Dingra was from 17th NDA.
After that first meeting with Mr Dhar, I also became friendly with all the Indian Foreign Service Officers in the Embassy and especially those who were bachelors like me. Ronen Sen who retired as our Ambassador to the US, Yogesh Tiwari who retired as our Ambassador to Austria, PK Singh, our first Ambassador to Israel, G Parthasarthy our High Commissioner to Pakistan, Siddharth Singh our Ambassador to Japan, they were all Second and Third Secretaries at that time. And we are all still very much in touch with one another even today.
Thanks to my ability to play reasonably good bridge and chess, I, therefore, used to partner the Ambassador at most bridge parties that was followed generally by cocktails, lunches and dinner in the houses of our senior married diplomats in the Indian Embassy.
On arrival of the families, they were temporarily given hotel accommodation in Hotel Rossiya. This was a newly built massive five-star hotel near Kremlin. A month or two later when they moved to their apartments in the suburbs that were normally given to the Russian families, Mr Dhar very kindly gave me a fully furnished apartment complete with a telephone and a fridge in a complex that was meant for diplomats only.
In March 1971, after the genocide in East Pakistan began, Mr DP Dhar was detailed by Mrs Indira Gandhi to be her Chief negotiator with the Bangladeshi leaders who had sought temporary asylum in India. After the decision to arm and train the Mukti Bahini was taken, Mr Dhar not only assigned me with a special secret task, he also without taking anybody else into confidence in the Embassy through the Soviet Ministry of Defence arranged for my attending special classes on the subject of partisan warfare with the special faculty that was part of the Frunze Military Academy. With the Soviet Union’s vast experience in partisan warfare during the Second World War, Mr Dhar wanted me to write on how we should go about in selecting, arming and training the Mukti Bahini and then deploy them in such a manner so that they could with their hit and run tactics keep the Pakistan army not only busy but also well spread out, be our source of real-time intelligence and also keep the Pak army on their toes all the time. This war of attrition and that of gathering intelligence by the Mukti Bahini was very useful later for the Indian Army when we finally decided to go in and liberate Bangladesh.
These extra classes with a big blow-up map of East Pakistan were carried out twice a week after the regular classes were over. My neighbour in that diplomatic complex where I stayed was Mr Unnikrishnan. He was from the Press Trust of India. I used to borrow his electronic typewriter for making the handouts on partisan warfare for Mr Dhar. Sometimes Mr Dhar and I used to go for a drive in the Ambassador’s car –just the two us to a public park and I had to brief him on what I was being taught. Some days he would drop in alone at my flat and over a drink or two discuss on how best we could arm and train the Mukti Bahini. Though in 1971 he was only 53 years old he suffered a heart attack. That year he negotiated the 1971 Indo-Soviet Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation, He was also a principal architect of India’s military intervention in neighbouring East Pakistan’s civil war which led to the creation of independent Bangladesh.
Since the Indian army was very much dependent on Soviet-made arms and equipment including battle tanks and aircraft, therefore to prepare us for the 1971 war we badly needed not only a lot of spare parts but also more lethal weapons and equipment like the missile boats, amphibious tanks, and bridging equipment. In the summer of 1971, a big high-level delegation led by the Defence Secretary, the Additional Secretary Defence Finance together with all the Deputy Chiefs from the three services arrived in Moscow with their big shopping lists. The Russians when it comes to making money are no less than our clever Banias. So when we placed our demands for the spare parts, they coolly hiked their prices giving the excuse that they were not available right now in the pipeline because the weapons concerned and the aircraft for them had become obsolete And if they had to now once again produce them, then it would also cost us more. So that day when this haggling match was going on and the Additional Secretary Defence said that it was well beyond the given defence budget, Mr Dhar made a lightening call to Mrs Gandhi in Delhi and all he said was ‘Madame Prime Minister I did not know that the security of our nation is based on rupees, annas and pies. Will you please direct the Ministry of Defence and those in the Defence Finance to release additional funds,’ A few minutes later on the telex came the reply ‘ Buy at any cost.’.
Though Mr Dhar was still the Ambassador because of the growing crisis and his negotiations with representatives of the provisional Bangladesh government in exile he, therefore, had to spend more time in India. The notes on Partisan warfare were therefore sent to Mr Dhar by me in a sealed envelope thorough Mr Unnikrishan who also used the weekly Air-India diplomatic courier for his own dispatches’ to his head office in India. Not even Unni was aware of what was in those sealed envelopes though he knew that it had to be something confidential, but being a good correspondent he never asked.
On the 10th of December 1971 morning while I was attending classes in the academy I got a call from Mr Dhar’s Personnell Assistant who said that Mr Dhar had arrived from Delhi that very morning and though he was now very busy holding a meeting with Mr Brezhnev and Prime Minister Kosygin, he would like to meet me. And that after my classes I should go to the Soviet Union’s exclusive special guest house where heads of government are generally kept.
When I landed at that guest house, I was received by Mr Punj. He was a junior embassy official who had been detailed by the embassy to look after Mr Dhar’s personal needs. He took me to Mr Dhar’s room and asked me to wait there till Mr Dhar returned from that high-level conference. Some of the preconditions that were laid down by the Soviet government when we decided to liberate Bangladesh were first that the entire operation in the East must be completed within a fortnight. Secondly, we will not take the initiative and also attack in the West. The time limit of 14-15 days given was because they could only use the veto in the UN only thrice. To help us, the Soviets through their satellites would also keep a discreet watch on all movements by the Chinese troops on our northern borders.
However, in the second week of December when the Nixon administration in order to show their friendship, loyalty and solidarity to Yahya Khan and Pakistan, they moved the US Seventh Fleet Task Force with their aircraft carrier from the Gulf of Tonking to the Straits of Malacca and it arrived at Penang in the Indian Ocean on the morning of 9th December, that together with the slow progress that was being made by the Indian army’s offensive in East Pakistan, had rattled the Soviets and the Indian government respectively. Therefore on the early morning of 10th Dec, not only Mr Dhar with the DCOAS of the Indian army landed in Moscow, but at the same time, a very high-level Russian delegation led by Mr Firubin a high ranking Soviet Minister with the Marshall of the Soviet army’s rocket forces landed in Delhi to hold talks with Mrs Indira Gandhi and our Defence Minister. On 6th December to keep a tag on the US Task Force, the Soviet Navy as per the Treaty of Friendship dispatched two groups of cruisers and destroyers and a submarine armed with nuclear missiles from Vladivostok.
By the time Mr Dhar got back from that marathon conference it was nearing 10 PM. He was dead tired. He said. ‘Shomu, I am off to bed. In another 6 hours, I have to be at the airport to catch the return Air India flight London-Moscow-Delhi. Here is my transistor radio. Listen to the BBC and Voice of America news every hour and if they make any mention of the 7th Fleet Task Force sailing out from Penang, then just wake me up.
At around 2AM in the morning, the Soviet Protocol officer with Brigadier Inder Sethi our Military Attache and Mr Punj entered the room. The Military Attache was indeed very surprised to see me. When he asked me what was I doing here and Punj said that the Ambassador had asked for me, he kept quiet. I was told by the Soviet protocol officer to wake up His Excellency since in another 30 minutes we have to leave for the airport. As soon as they left, I nudged Mr Dhar and told him that it was time to get ready. All he asked was ‘Shomu, are the Americans still in Penang? So when I said Yes Sir, all he said was ‘Thank God’ and asked to sleep for another 15 minutes. It was around 2.30 AM when I again woke him. When he too heard the BBC news at that hour there was a smile on his face. The Task Force till then had not moved out of Penang. He had slept in the same suit that he had arrived in from Delhi, so he simply washed his face put on the heavy overcoat and the fur cap, asked me to carry his briefcase and told the Soviet protocol officer that he was ready to leave for the airport. As he got into the front seat of a big 7 seater ZIL limousine which was his habit that had the Indian tricolour flying and I said ‘Happy journey Sir. I beg your leave.’ He said Shomu you are coming to the airport so sit behind me with my briefcase so that we can chat.’ I got into the car and all through that half an hour journey we chatted in Hindi because he did not want the Russian driver to understand what we were talking about. We did not talk at all about the war but on general things like how were the bridge parties. How was my new car? Did I get a chance to go to some other historical cities in the Soviet Union etc. We were so engrossed with our informal chat that though I did notice the two elderly gentlemen in suits who were sitting behind me they were quiet all the time. One was our Military Aattaché but the other I did not know.
When we reached the airport, and when Mr Dhar was about to enter the VVIP lounge I said. ‘Sir I guess it’s time for me to beg leave and who should I hand over the briefcase too,’ he gave me a big smile and said ‘Shomu you are going nowhere. You will keep holding my briefcase and you will see me off to my seat in the aircraft and hand it over to me there.’
Inside the VVIP lounge, while the Soviets kept raising toasts to the architect of the Indo-Soviet Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation, the darkish looking gentleman who was sitting behind me in the car tapped me on my shoulder and asked.. “Tell me, son, how many years of service have you put in the Indian Foreign Service.? He thought that I was the Third Secretary in the Ambassador’s secretariat. So when I told him that I was not from the IFS but from the Indian Army and that I was one of the four who was doing my Command and Staff College Course in Moscow and that my name is Major Samir Bhattacharya, there was a look of utter surprise in his face. Then he looked at Brigadier Inder Sethi and said. ‘Inder why did you not introduce the young Major to me? Brigadier Sethi said,’ Sir I was about to but got busy in raising a reciprocal toast to the Soviet Marshall who is standing there and whom you had met earlier today at the conference for our defence requirements So when the gentleman extended his hand and said ‘I am General Noronah,’ only then did I come to know that he was the Indian Army Deputy Chief of Staff. And when he saw that I was so very close to the Ambassador, he not only patted me on my back but he also said “I am very proud to see that a young officer having such good rapport with the Indian Ambassador. From that day after I saw of the Ambassador to his first-class seat and handed over the briefcase to him, I could drive and go with my Russian girlfriend and other Russian friends even to the outskirts of Moscow for picnics and sightseeing.
It was in August 1972 when I returned to India. Mr Dhar was then the Minister of Planning in Mrs Gandhi’s Cabinet. During my 10 days debriefing at the Army Headquarters, I stayed with Mr Dhar at his 13, B Safdarjang Road government bungalow. In November 1972 when I told him that I was going to get married, he invited me and your grandmother ( my wife Purnima Shanta ) to have a meal with him and his wife Rani Bhabhi and which we did. When he came to know that your grandmother was not only a renowned dancer who had performed on stage with Hemant Kumar, Konika Banerjee, and Suchitra Mitra but that she was also an accomplished artist from the Calcutta Art College which was the oldest in India and Shanta as a return gift presented Rani Bhabhi with her hand made tea cosy and napkin set that had a colourful peacock as the motif, the old man was more impressed by her than by me. So when he added that thank God Shomu is no longer a bachelor and that my mother had made the right choice, Rani Bhabhi who hardly speaks said ‘ Shomu tum bahut his khush kismet ho’.And she was absolutely right.
In early January 1975, Mr Dhar who was not at all pulling on with Sanjay Gandhi because Sanjay feared that Mr Dhar was getting to big for his boots in the Congress Party. So when Mr Dhar was sent back to do a second term as Ambassador to Moscow, he before leaving wrote to me and asked whether I with my wife would like to be posted to Moscow. When I told him that I would love to but that would be at the cost of my taking over command of a battalion that was due next year, he wrote back and said ‘Shomu your career comes first so let’s leave it open.”
In early June 1975, he had come to Delhi for a conference. On the 12th of June, 1975 he had a massive heart attack and die. He was only 57 years old. Ironically that was also the day when Justice Jagmohanlal Sinha found Mrs Gandhi guilty of electoral malpractices, he not only declared the election verdict in the Rae Bareilly constituency ‘null and void’, he also barred Mrs Gandhi from holding elected office for six years. Then soon followed the emergency in the country. I wanted very much to go with your grandmother (my wife) for his funeral but as the Second in Command of the Battalion we were out on an exercise and my first son Shiraz was only 7 months old. There is a photo of Mr Dhar in my album and when I die I wanted it framed and hanged next to my Dad’s photo because after I lost my Dad in 1959 he became during those 6 years the Father figure for me.
May He Rest In Peace. Amen-Jai-India and Jai-Hind.