New Delhi: The Army Court had slammed central minister General (retd) VK Singh to violate rules. It said that VK Singh had influenced a military court and harassed senior officers for “vengeance”, bringing disrepute to the Indian Army for personal gain.
The Army Force Tribunal or AFT had created major embarrassment for the minister of Narendra Modi government.
It had quashed the court martial of former 33 Corps Commander Lt Gen PK Rath and has ordered the Army to pay him Rs. 1 lakh for “undue harassment and loss of reputation.”
In 2011, a court martial found Gen Rath guilty of issuing a “no-objection certificate or NoC” to a private builder to build an educational institution on a 70-acre plot adjacent to the military cantonment in Sukna in West Bengal. He had taken this forward after then military secretary Lt Gen Avdesh Prakash noted the requirement for a good educational institute next to the 33 Corps headquarters, during an official visit.
After Gen Rath, Gen Prakash too was court martialled in the Sukna land case.
On Friday, the tribunal observed that the NoC violated no rules as the land did not belong to the Army. It also rejected the Army’s contention that the construction of the educational complex could have been a threat, saying “every activity of civilian nature adjacent to the Sukna station is a security threat cannot be accepted.”
The court of inquiry in the case was initiated by Gen VK Singh when he was the Eastern Army Commander.
Gen Rath alleged in his petition that Gen VK Singh gave “undue importance” to the case as he had a “serious grudge” against Gen Prakash.
Bureau Report
Leave a Reply