It is not for nothing that India’s National Security Adviser, Ajit Doval has blurbed (in the very front cover) of Prakash Singh’s latest book “Unforgettable Chapters: Memoirs of a Top Cop” as “Prakash Singh is one of the most brilliant professionals that Indian police has ever produced”.
My association with Prakash Singh dates back to the late1990s when we were co-speakers in a conference. I was struck by his wisdom, humility and the manner in which he reached out to me, paternally.
Our acquaintance has grown over the years and he has never missed any of my book release ceremonies in Delhi or have been too busy to closely read my writings.
Indeed, it is his judicious advice which has led to my comprehension of the North East and particularly about my home state, Assam of which he was the Director General of Police in 1991.
In a rather revealing section for those who are not well versed with the insurgency in Assam during Prakash Singh’s tenure as the Chief of Police in Assam, Singh writes:
“On 1 July 1991, the ULFA gave us a shock; in a meticulously planned operation, it kidnapped 14 officials from the Guwahati, Jorhat, Sibsagar, Tinsukia and Darrang districts…We carried out aggressive operations to rescue the kidnapped persons. Quite a few ULFA activists were arrested and there were significant recoveries. However, we were not able to locate the kidnapped persons…We were persevering and mounting relentless pressure on the terrorist outfit. However, our operational plans were upset because the bureaucracy and the political establishment was not supportive. In retrospect, I feel that there was some kind of pre-election understand between the ULFA and the Congress leaders of the state that the ULFA should not disrupt the elections and, in return, the party, if voted to power, would release the ULFA detenus. Whatever may have been the inside story, I found my position very untenable and, therefore, gave in writing that I may be relieved of my charge as DGP, Assam. I was not prepared to be a toothless tiger”
The above excerpt speaks volumes about a man who K.M. Rustamji, the Founding Director General of the Border Security Force (1965-74), an organisation which Prakash Singh himself led in later years, termed as “If India can still hope, it is because there are men like Prakash Singh in the Indian Police.”
It was one of my finest hours when the doyen of the Indian Police Service undertook a conversation with me on 30 June 2021 in “Northeast Now”.
The conversation was in the backdrop of the “Drone Attack” on the Indian Air Force station in Jammu on 27 June 2021
Responding to a question which he posed thus, “Do you think there is a need for a re-calibration exercise by India keeping in mind the latest drone threat?”
I responded, among other aspects, that:
“The problem with our security establishment is that they do not possess or recruit specialists—by even by way of lateral entry—who have the ability to think out of the box. Also, the manner in which training is imparted to the ones that enter the establishment by way of the conventional has no novelty. As a matter of fact, novel concepts are not only not comprehended by the policy makers, but are resisted to the hilt. I cannot help resist but remind you of the daring plan that you had devised way back in 1991 when you were DGP, Assam for a very short period of time. You had planned to attack the ULFA camps in Bhutan by training a special force that would be led by the then IG (Operations), E.N. Rammohan. It was known only to EN Rammohan and you! But your plan to oust the ULFA from their safe havens in the Himalayan kingdom—and you had ensured that it had the tacit support of Thimphu—twelve years (2003) before they were finally driven out was as short lived as your stint in Ulubari. Somehow the matter leaked out from your office and Delhi prevailed upon you to abandon the plan. I wonder how many innocent lives were lost in the years between 1991 and 2003!”
(https://nenow.in/top-news/you-have-the-watches-we-have-the-time.html)
In later years, Prakash Singh honoured me by co-authoring an article with me in The Pioneer (4 May 2022) titled “India’s National Security: Imperatives for 2022”
(https://www.dailypioneer.com/2022/columnists/india—s-national-security–imperatives-for-2022.html)
I have seldom found a person of his stature and eminence lending his towering name alongside an commonplace student of India’s national security such as I. I feel blessed that I have an ardent well-wisher in Prakash Singh.
He and I continue to discuss the future of India’s national security, about the direction it should take in the coming years. His capital association with various national commissions and reform platforms are testimony to his farsightedness.
I have just returned from trouble torn Manipur and I made it a point to take his advice before I left on 7 May 2024.
Indeed, an autographed copy of “Unforgettable Chapters” reached me just before I left for Kangpokpi and Senapati in the “Land of the Sangai”.
I returned on 10 May to eagerly lap up his inimitable work and write a review not only about Prakash Singh’s latest offering, but his titanic identity which he has so magnanimously and affectionately sought to enjoin, as aforesaid, with my out and out mediocrity.
Men like Padma Shri Prakash Singh are legends. They dwarf us by their collosal presence.
We, who sit by his feet in order to learn and fathom the true nature of Karma, has to, in Prakash Singh’s paraphrasing of Lord Krishna’s words in the Bhagavad Gita (page 173) have to “inquire from him submissively and render service unto him.”
The sage words are equally true for both God and Country.
