India should follow Netaji’s ideology: Ex-Army chief

Hyderabad, Nov 22 : While our nation follows Mahatma Gandhi’s ideology of non-violence, we greatly ignored the alternate ideology of Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose who believed in armed resistance. This was stated by former Army Chief General Shanker Roy Chowdhury while delivering key note address during the inauguration of a two-day seminar on Visionary Leadership at College of Defence Management at Secunderabad here on Friday.

Chowdhury said, “Etemaad (Trust), Ittehad (Unity), and Qurbani (Sacrifice) together represent an alternate paradigm of leadership. He further said, “Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose was authentic home-made leader who actually put on uniform and joined the armed force to defend the country.”

“We are too strong to be challenged militarily. Our training and material are world class. But we lack in ideological content that is sapping the morale of armed forces.” said Chowdhury. In order to have visionary leadership some ideology is needed for the armed forces. Religious ideology is the cheapest and the best but is ruled out in a secular country like India. Applying the rules of Social Sciences like Behavioural Sciences, a visionary ideology can be devised for the armed forces.

Speaking on the occasion, Lt. Gen. S.M. Mehta reminded of the legendary Bollywood figure for his histrionics and said, “First, you must believe in what you believe. Ask why you are doing what you are doing.” He also said that the small countries such as Singapore that got liberated at the same time as India, developed faster after achieving independence, but India gave up. Despite capability most of the defense related equipment is imported in our country, he said. INN