War Stories, Episode 5: An Indian Army officer in counter-insurgency operations, Assam, 2010-2012

Welcome to the War Studies Podcast. We bring you worldleading research from the School of Security Studies at King's College London, the largest community of scholars in the world, dedicated to the study of all aspects of security, defense, and international relations. We explore the complex realm of conflict because the study of war is fundamental to understanding the world we live in and the world we want to live in. Before we begin, a brief content warning for this series content. We will be discussing the firsthand experiences of war and conflict which may well include descriptions of traumatic events and scenarios involving severe injuries or death. These accounts are deeply personal and may be upsetting for some listeners, particularly veterans. If you find yourself becoming overwhelmed, we encourage you to pause the episode or step away entirely. For anyone impacted by these themes, support is available 24/7. In the UK, you can contact the Combat Stress Helpline at 08001381619 or the NHS OP Courage Service. Additional resources are linked in our show notes. The opinions expressed on this podcast are those of the individual interviewed and do not reflect the official views of King's College London, the School of Security Studies, or the organizations for which the individuals speaking were working at the time of the incidents discussed. >> Good morning, Aravind. How are you and where are you? >> Uh, good morning, Robert and Nick. Thanks. Um, I'm fine and I'm currently living in Luxembourg. >> Fantastic. That sounds very interesting. And uh, we just called up very briefly on uh the the lack of pub culture in Luxembourg and why you have to cross the border to go and get your uh, your pipe pulled. >> Um, >> I missed a lot. [laughter] >> The benefit of Kings College London is the number of pubs outside the door. [laughter] Uh, beyond that. So uh what we'd love to do is just very high level first if you could just introduce yourself and just give us a sense of your career the full span um and then we're going to dive down into the specific area which we're going to focus on today which is essentially the the border insurgency uh around Manipur. Um but if you just give us a high level concept of your career today that'd be great. >> Uh yeah sure thank you. So um thanks to both of you for providing this opportunity and a wonderful initiative. So and I'm very happy to be part of it. So I am Arvind. I served in Indian army as a commissioned officer between 2009 and uh 2020. In India we have various dreams to become an officer in armed forces. So I come from uh army regular army and in regular army we have a permanent commission and also short service commission. So I am a short service officer. I was a short service officer but it's strange it lasts for 10 long years of active duty. You are awarded a long service medal but you're still a short service officer. That's how it works. So uh my career in army like I started in Kashmir I joined the special force regiment but unfortunately during my special force selection course I broke my right wrist so I couldn't complete it. So they have to assign me to a fallback arm. So which was infantry. So I was assigned to the Mahal regiment. Um so in India the infantry regiments are organized on the ethnic uh lines of the marshall race like what British Indian army used to be uh before our independence. So I fall back to mahar regiment of the third battalion. It's also a legendary battalion itself because it's produced like one of chief of army staff and battalion did serve in Korean war uh in the demilitarized zone um and also was part of uh the United Nation peacekeeping mission in 2004 and five in Democratic Republic of Congo in the North Ku region. So it's a very illustrious battalion served in various frontiers with distinction and also as a battle honor for 1965 war with Pakistan in the Kashmir sector. So uh I was assigned to the battalion and battalion was deployed in northeastern India. It's a very unique and interesting region uh close to my heart from my university days. I was so curious and fascinated by the uh number of tribal groups there and uh the culture and tradition and how they are still part of the India as a modern country. So uh I was there uh so I spent uh until 2012 in uh Assam and after that uh my battalion got deected. We spent time in Jakan which is again um the tribal state in eastern India which holds 40% of India's mineral wealth. So uh they also had some challenges in form of leftwing extremism. Uh from uh there I we are mostly focusing on conventional war like we prepare for that with the western sector with Pakistan. Uh and then after that I went and spent again four years with special forces. I managed to get back there. So I completed my paratrooper course and again was deployed in Kashmir and got opportunity to work with the intelligence. Uh so uh after that like for final leg of my post uh my military career for two years I spent again in Jaipur in Rajasthan which again we focused on the western uh flat terrain and the desert terrain um with Rajasthan and Punjab the Indian states facing uh Pakistan and some of the notable events on my career were like 2016 2019 where we came close on a verge of a war with Pakistan and how we were prepared for that. But initial uh formative years were spent in northeastern India where we fought or like tried to bring some order internal security order as aid to civil authority uh against this various tribal armed militant groups. >> That's awesome. That's uh a really interesting career and Chrisy I think for the majority of western audiencees not not even sort of areas that we're aware of that there are issues. Obviously, most people have heard of Kashmir. Uh, but certainly some of those Eastern India and Northeasternian challenges are are less publicized. And so, we're going to focus on one of those today. We're going to look at your time spent on the Myanmar border. Um, and yeah, I think for those who love a bit of historical context, I think it's probably helpful to refer to this. This is the area of sort of Kim and Faral, the famous battles of uh the the late part of the the Burmese campaign before the the British and Indian armies um pushed back the Japanese forces. So, it'll be quite helpful as we go through this to maybe describe the ground cuz one imagines it's very jungly. Um but it' be helpful if you could paint a picture as we get there. Um could you sort of then dive into that part of time you spent uh with the battalion up in northeast India? Can you just tell us where you were, what your role was, who you were there with and tell us a little bit about the particularly the complex challenges there of the tribal situation, the disperate groups and uh try and like unpick that Gordian knot. Um and then just give us a little sense of what the terrain is like. >> Yeah, sure. Um uh um so so the battalion was placed in uh what back then used to be uh called North Ka Hills. we call it in short form NC hills. Uh it's in the state of Assam. So just to give the audience of overview, India is a very very big country. Uh we are now 1.48 billion people. So the northeastern India when I refer to it, it has got seven states. So we call seven sisters. Okay. So these are Arunachal Pradesh which has got a border with Bhutan um and uh uh the undemarcated border with Tibet or China now and also with Myanmar formerly Burma. Then you have Assam which is a larger state of the northeastern India which close to 35 million people. Then you have smaller siblings like Manipur close to 3 million and Nagaland with 2 million people. Megalia the land of clouds again another 3 million and then you have Tripura. So this is the the composition of the northeastern of India. They form 8% of India's land mass but they are only 4% of India's population. So approximately based on our last official figures they are like 45 million people. So within this 45 million northeastern uh people like I dive closer to Assam which is 35 million. uh then come to North Kasha Hills or now it's renamed as Dimma Hasau after the Dimasa people where the majority uh tribal group there they are only 85,000 people so this is one of the least populated district in all of Assam. Uh another metric to look at is like it's only 44 people per you know per square kilometer. So it's very scarsely populated. It's a challenging terrain because uh you have the mountainous region so you have very limited road access. The way we sustain our troops or over formations there I have very limited access but the villages and the hamlets are spread all over the mountains and hills and it's a very very humid and hot region. So you also have the mansoons where we have a downpour where people closely associate with Vietnam war scenarios like we face those challenges there and also the another problem of this Dimasa Dimahasal district. You have the major tribe Dimasa and then you have Kbies who are located on the northern part the Kby and then you have Nagas you have Mars you have uh cookies and so this is what's a complex city because this district borders three other Indian states >> and then you have multitudes of tribal groups now it's not they fighting against the authority of the state but they are fighting amongst themselves this is where we come in as the law enforcement when they couldn't manage it tsunami comes in tries to bring an order and aid the civil authority. >> That's interesting. So is that infighting with view to territorial? Uh is it on religious grounds or is it something else? Why is there infighting in what we would consider a modern state of India although appreciate this is on the sort of the very rural end of the spectrum. >> Yeah. So the northeastern India like uh it's only uh recently like uh the the fishes along the lines of religion and when you say in India the communal aspects people usually associate with Hindu and Muslims but when you come to northern northeastern India we have Hindus then you have Christianity they have plethora of all the denominations of Christianity you can find Roman Catholic Protestants Adventist and all it's because of the way the British India history worked like uh all the missionary is coming there and on the top of it is a very very very strong ethnationalism. So in Dimma Hasau it was Dimas who were trying to assert their control but at the same time you have a very limited Nagas and cookies and Mars trying to protect their own villages. So they are forming up their own alliances and trying to fight against the Dimasa groups and then you have a modern state of India trying to put down the authority and order. So yeah, that's all in there. >> So for for anyone uh who might be pulling up a map of Dimmaasau, so I've just done that. So D I M A H A S AO. Um and now I'm looking at a like you said really poor access probably about 800 to um uh 800 to,000 km with what looked like sort of three or four major routes going through it and that's it. And where was the where was your base within all of that? So, so uh uh I I came into the picture in 2011 like the January like so battalion was there since 2009 and that's where the ethnic clashes were picking up uh because of the formation of factions within the major demas groups. So we have a lumbing of the new rail head and because when I was there we still had the meter gauge train network which was built by British during the world war. So only in past few years we have the modern railroads and national highways coming up there. But when I served there we really had a broken roads. The real the nearest rail of Londing to my battalion headquarter was 30 km and we would take in our light transportation close to 2 and a half hours to cover the 30 km distance. So if you are sending a large troop carrying vehicles it will take much more time. But at the same time we also need to deploy our road opening parties to secure the route before sending it. So there is no disruption to our lines of communication. >> Yeah. >> So and then battalion was not concentrated in one place. Uh there's a hatal this was my place where our battalion was there but the companies were spread out as far as uh we had two companies based in another village called long thing which was 42 km away from our battalion headquarter. So this is a common challenges because when we deploy our battalions in a conflict scenario we try to have this density so you have the proximity and we plan our fire plans but none of our conventional wisdom or the textbook what they teach is going to work here because the terrain is difficult population distribution is different on the top of it we never had a mobile communication back then when it was deployed so the so we are completely operating in a modern era of 21st century but you don't have a power we had very few hours of diesel generator backed up power. >> Yeah. >> And uh then you're still relying on radio telephony, no mobile phones, no TVs. So it's it's like the way we have to pull up ourself as a modern military to face this very old eth ethnationalism. It was quite changing back then. So that's so that's fascinating and that gives us a really good sense of the the context and I'm sort of yeah quite at this point feeling the the challenge for your battle group and uh if if you call it or your or your regimen or you know your force elements um and then for you you know drifting more into a storytelling mode now because this is about your experience of conflict. um you know arriving there in in theater um you know what is it that that brought you there? I'm fascinated to know um uh why you ended up in the in the Indian army in the first place and and then sort of moving on from that uh when you when you came to um Assam uh for you personally and the team um uh what was the the general feeling about the the mission at hand and and and the levels of motivation and that sense of cause you know what what was the what was the beating heart of it at that point? Yeah, sure. So, thanks Nick. So, it's a very interesting journey for me because uh I come from Tamil Nadu. That's a state. I'm a ethnic Tamil and and Tamil is our first language, my native tongue and we all learn English in growing up in a school. Uh so I'm completely far away from the front line but as a kid when I was there there was an active civil war happening in Sri Lanka between the majority and the minority tunnels. So this is was like a very televised my first experience of getting to know and the world of war and asking my dad like hey what is it why are they fighting the the trigger point other than that like I never had anyone I've seen in military uniform to get motivated or get drawn into it. No family member uh active in active military uh some of them from my village was there but they were not so but I never had a that kind of regular contact with them. Yeah. So uh I grew up fascinated about military but again and we are talking about early 2000s not much of internet no mass media kind of thing how the present day generation children get exposed to it even through like the video game and uh that kind of stuff. So uh I was very naive so I wanted to become a commissioned officer uh joined my university in Chennai the state capital. I did uh BA in sociology and uh the part of the curiosity to become an officer led me to the cadet core where I was like uh under the tutilage of lot of regular officers cracked the exam joined the Indian army after the and then completed successfully my uh pre-commission training. So when I arrived in Assam other than this for me it's like always I tell here in Europe people ask me how was it uh they think like India is one homogeneous entity. I would say like it's picking up a Italian from southern Italy, Napoli, deploying them in Finland and your troops or Finnish. So Finnish is not a mainstream Indo like a European language. So this the same challenge for me. I'm a I'm a Tamil boy in an Indian army which has got a Hindi as a working language which I learned only during my pre-commission training. >> But here I am with my troops who are Mahars who speak the language of Marati. So, so this this a challenging like so the troops so the uh the medium of uh communication when we are speaking we already are speaking out of our comfort zones and you despite all the challenges we have whatever we are communicating it needs to be very clear so they understand your orders they trust you and then they follow take your uh they follow your leadership and kind of challenges so and and then my troops and myself we are put not in our own uh geographic area. We are deployed in Asam which is completely as foreign as for all of us but we are part of the same country and then we are defending the country and we are under the flag. So uh this this was like the setup we had and also when we were in Assam the bases or not like how people would know as a garrisons we have the garrison towns >> because here we are not >> we are we are trying to find our own space for military. So it was all on the hill slopes. You have the bamboo huts. You have our operational the field engineering accommodation. So it it's completely different like how uh even an average Indian would u visualize us like uh being in those scenarios. So everything was a challenge but uh we have a clear orders and how to do it. But then uh each village has its own tribal uh dynamics. So as as when I joined there I was a left tenant. So I started as a platoon commander going out on patrols not short range it's all long range patrols like over two days 3 days couple of days you're completely on your own if at all you need a support even for someone falling sick it's a radio telephoneony and then your your radio devices should have ability to pick up the signals and and we don't speak the language of the tribal people there because they all have their own language and dialects so these were some of the challenges I can share top of my head >> and and just pick up on that. Sorry. No, pick up on that. >> Did the Mahas or your unit as you know the third Maha Battalion um feel unified in their goal towards what they were trying to achieve in that area? Did everyone understand what the the big goal was and were they on board with it? >> So, so yeah. So, so we it's a very uh professional army. So like I I would say like in India like anyone like as a battalion gets inducted. So we've been having lot of this insurgencies going for a long time since British left India. So uh and uh the the initial years in 1950s and60s we learned it in a very hard way when the battalions were thrown into this insurgency counterinsurgency role picked up from the peace time garrisons. uh the officers had the knowledge and they know what to do but the troops completely coming from different part of India their food the weather everything was a big challenge for them on the top of it you have the hostile populations and then and and the challenges of the gorilla warfare and the jungle warfare so what we have done in late 1960s is Indian army established counterinsurgency and jungle warfare school in a state misorum which is very very close to the myanmarab border um and and um so all the battalions needs to do the pre-induction training. It lasts for 5 to 6 weeks. Yeah. So before your battalion arrives in the theater of combat or the location, you go through there, you do your physical fitness training, uh your equipment. So tailored to the role you are going on, whether it's a border management posture, whether it's going to be counterinsurgency role or it's mostly heavily on military civic action program, these kind of things. And also uh the troops are educated on the morasapandai of uh the major armed insurgent groups in the region. And also what is the motive for each of these groups that is also told to them like it's not like some of them want a separate country some of them want a separate state some of them just want a autonomous hill district some of them want to just set up something what they will feel empowered in this grand scheme of union of India. So also talk to the troops and uh then they are slowly inducted into the region and if that you have a battalion already deployed and if you're relieving them then we do this joint patrolling of the area of responsibilities we take over that institutional memory which the previous battalion gained over their three years deployment because in India we don't do a tour like 6 months tour like how it's done in NATO countries. So once you're deployed to the field regions, it's 2 and a half years to three years you're looking at it. So as a average soldier or as an officer, your physical fitness, your mental fitness, everything needs to stay for that long time of two and a half to three years uh duration. >> But your entire area be so much stronger. Um, it's one of the major failings I think of the the six month system or is that that high level of rotation makes it very hard to build and retain uh long-term intelligence from the the local populace. So, that's a huge advantage, I imagine, and I'm sure we'll get into that later. >> Yeah. [clears throat] >> Just uh looking at the So, I'm looking at Langing here and the and the and the rail head and um and sort of the bustling town around it. So c could you just um uh put us in the picture regarding how how your um battalion was dispersed amongst the area? Were you all centralized in Langing and then and then projected around um uh Dim Hassau or did you have um a series of patrol bases and outposts? You know, what was the what was the situation for your unit um on arrival? Yeah. So, so the battalion was uh headquartered around uh uh the the small village of Ahati Kali. So between them and longing was like 42 km and we had uh two two rifle companies deployed there and uh from the pace like depending upon the areas we need to dominate like we would like fan out uh to the patrols and we never had any small uh smaller patrol bases uh because of untenability of it like if anything happens uh how we could regroup or sustain the operations long and also uh the holistic had like a few other infantry battalions deployed because it's really challenging for one infantry battalion to hold the ground there. So uh so we were based in Ling and depending upon the operational requirements we would perform longrange patrols but sometime if the the operational or the mission task uh necessitated. So we also establish like temporary operating bases so which we hold it for few weeks and we would have a sustainable mechanism. But if you look at it like the conventional infantry battalion in our organization we have the transportation embedded to it but in this requirement like we needed much more than that. So we also have the support from the civil administration we who provides some extra troop carrying vehicles for us. And so these are the things like we have to do. It's not only your purely going in like armed hey I'm going to perform this military operation but you need to have a pretty good >> um uh rapper with the civil administration law enforcement and in India we also have law enforcement like it's not only the local law enforcement we also have the federal armed police force um this this is another interesting we have multitudes of uh police forces which are over half a million so we have to establish contacts with all these people operating in my area of responsibility. On the top of it, if you see, you also have a rail uh road alignment and back then there was a construction project to expand it to the modern broad gauge standard network what we have in India now. So we would also would coordinate with the railway protection force which is another armed police force who are going only this rail tracks and railway installations there. So yeah we need to have know who who is the leader there uh what type of communication they have. they may not be in the same frequency. They may not even use the same type of radio equipment. Uh and then how do we establish them and we also have to be uh in a very good understanding with the village leaders what they call it like ga Buddhas like the village elders they call it. So each village will have it. So whenever we do the patrol we go meet them ask them is everything is in order what are the challenges and then we would also carry lot of essential supplies and hand it over to the village leader to gain their trust like a medicine and if then if some of them are sick then we would tell them we can fetch them or like they can come to our bases and if we can send them to some of the military hospitals to treat. By doing all this thing we are telling the local population and this tribal people the state of India or the authority of India is not uh enimical to them like they have we are there to look after them and at the same time we also creating awareness to them when as a leader as a commission officer I'm talking and some of my uh platoon commanders uh we tell them like the the path of violence what these young people are thrown into it is not good for them. It's not sustainable. uh they want to achieve their goal or whatever like as I said like a separate state or a separate country imagine Damas as um uh like uh 85,000 people want to car a separate state in India and whereas my own state is like close to 90 million people so you're looking at like the states in India 90 million some states like we have like Uttar Pradesh which is more than the population of all of Brazil and now here you have uh Damas like less than 100,000 people craving for a separate state but I completely uh understand and appreciate like why they want it because they wanted to uh don't want the the huge state of India look their welfare and benefit but there are ways to achieve it but not through the armed struggle so this is what we try to portray to it but on a hindsight if I look at it I never did a war studies before going into the theater all I had is my uh undergraduation which was sociology So and I was curious on history and trying to understand what has brought the situation to this stage. So uh this is where I would try to reason with the village leaders or the local politicians or or or the local law enforcement administrations uh why and try to gain trust and build upon the conversation we would have regularly with them. There's there's one thing I'd love to ask you. Um uh because I'm I'm beginning to see some parallels with with Afghanistan here, especially in the fact that you have lots of different flavors of police and you know I can see the I can see around Hatakali where the police checkpoint is and the CPRF so that's your that would be your railway protection force um uh little at the base and the the immediate question that springs to mind to me is how aligned were each of these forces around their objectives? Was there any tension between you? >> So, uh we didn't have uh I would say like the tension because we all know we are for the government of India. So, but the only challenge came in like how we communicate over the mission like hey there's a patrol going out. Yes, they're going and the first question is what are they going to do? But now uh the people working in the local administration are also from those same tribal groups. So now how confident I am going to tell them yeah I'm carrying out a three-day long patrol to that farflung village with this as my objective and then having my mission compromised. So uh this is a challenge we as a young officers we always faced it. Um and and and then also um like sometimes like for example like the the road construction companies or the railway develop the development projects there were a lot of private companies who are trying to come and execute it. So they may not tell us their construction plan but when they're doing these projects in the remote areas they are also exposed to the risk. Lot of times there's there's armed insurgent groups and the splinter groups that's a big problem. If you have one one strong tri the insurgent group you can deal with them but you have multitudes of them on the ethnic lines. Yeah >> and within their own ethnic group they have a splinter groups who doesn't listen to each other. There is no single command and control uh with with what we would call it as adversary. So now these uh civilian developmental uh private companies who are executing this task they get kidnapped and then there is a ransom and then then how are you going to do it? So this this kind of other challenges. So we knew it like we wanted to bring in order we wanted to do it but then how are we doing it when are you going to do it and sometime we would say like we we we won't be able to provide the safety cover what they expect uh from the state. So that may not align with their goal of finishing the road project or the rail project or water water pipeline water tanks construction school constructions and kind of things. So these were the some of the challenges we would uh repeatedly have and and also they these the civilian administration or the entities may not also be aware there's another ethnic group in a neighboring state or a neighboring district had a clash and the potential spill over into my area of responsibility. Of course in the military intelligence and the modern military we get informed of all these things but they are not they're completely unaware of this and then we are putting some restriction and that road checkpoints or um you know the vehicle check points we are carrying out that may annoy the population they they may not because that's that's their own own land they've been driving they've been doing whatever the tribal way of life going and doing their practicing their shift agree shifting agriculture they call it. So they don't the same land but they keep shifting to the different patches of land and here you are coming as a modern military trying to tell like hey you should have informed me and they would say like no why why would I so so this were the really challenging uh times. Yeah. >> So it sounds like if you're open with your plans it's good for trust but bad for security and if you're guarded with your plans it's good for security but bad for trust. Um >> yeah yeah yeah and and and also sometimes we have this uh some of the groups which are surrender or willing to engage in conversation with the government. >> So they would say like yeah we are coming on board to the mainstream but they also or the treasure trove of intelligence because they would have had the former network with the other splinter groups thing. But how do you trust their intelligence? Whether like it is because they are giving you all this information and throwing all the suspicion on particular village or a particular person. It's because they are from the different ethnic group. So do you trust them? Do you don't trust them? And if you overlook the intelligence and something bad happens, then it's on you uh for ignoring them. So yeah. >> And so so that leads quite nicely into those patrols as to what was the objective of those patrols. So some of them were presumably sort of to meet local um village leaders, but some might have been more kinetic with a view to removing disruptive people from the peace process or people that you knew had struck um for example the the private companies uh and some presumably you were engaged by insurgents whilst patrolling. So can you just give us a sort of flavor for what a patrol was like, what the objectives were and maybe we can start to sort of slide into um a couple of patrols where um key instance happened that you know sort of stick in the mind. >> Yeah. Um some of some of the time like uh we also need to uh maintain from our bases the quick reaction force um or we also call quick reaction teams depending upon the situation because a lot of times when some of the incidents happen like uh because given the terrain advantage to them uh they would fire upon a moving train. So from some particular hill like you have a wor of uh light mission can burst and then and we just get reported we need to react to it and you know it it's a nighttime and you don't have a mobile telephone you don't have a modern GPS like it's going to say like so we we so a lot of our patrols were for performing and gaining the understanding of the terrain like area familiarization patrol we will do it so so and and and then like we go there and if we go there like we go and try to get the intel and what has happened we try to stabilize the situation and something like that and sometime like um something has happened between these two groups like there's been a gunfight and then >> now we are going into it like where two of them are fighting so like we have to fight so it's like a it's a very challenging scenario like I I want don't want to bring in this analogy like a Mexican standoff but like it it is like that like you have two groups fighting against each other we are I have to go there and some sometimes like some of them would send uh feelers to the local villages telling that like we want to come mainstream we want to surrender. So how is a surrender going to come and they are going to just knock on a local police station or like so we go that far to a patrol where we go and meet them and say okay fine and then we need to in inform our our battalion commander or formation to say like hey here are x number of people like who are willing to give up arms and come to mainstream. So there is a process how you can bring them in and also we also be super conscious security and safety of them until the time they come into the mainstream and how they do it. So uh this happened and also in India in northeast northeastern India uh with with the hundreds of armed tribe uh uh insurgent groups we have uh those of them who have signed complete surrender but some of them we call it suspension of operation soon. So once you have suspension of operation then we they are given a camps like they have their own camps the militant camps and these people their ranks and foil they are housed there in the camp and their armament is like all their firearms are locked then like you have the airlocks and then the locks from military and the local uh uh the law enforcement. So a lot of times we also need to patrol knowing you're walking into the den like that's their fortress like you go into their camps meet the leader of the under this the the groups which are under suspension of operation talk to them and ask like is everything is in order. Of course they're not going to trust you fully because it's just suspension of operation. They're not surrendered completely. The hostility can commence any time. So when we are going there like you are we we treat that as like a live operation. The the way we sensitize our troops we brief them. It's like it's not like you're going to have walk into your old body or like you see go with your gods down and then you speak to them and again they would have a lot of grievances. They would say like you know the whatever the agreements of uh the suspension of operations the other groups are not following or maybe the governmental authorities are not adhering to or they have not understood their real implications of it. So >> but you as a young officer as a leftenant you are not the sole solution for all the things which they are going to place upon you. So so you need to be super sensitive to whatever they are telling. gather as much as information possible. Come back, debrief your troops, pass all this information to your battalion commander and then to the brigade head. So those were some of the things like we were always doing. It's not like all the time we were like continuously under fire like some of the hot scenarios we have in Kashmir. But here it's like knowing the thing and how do you keep up the morale of the soldiers and how do you >> tell the soldiers to be alert all the time because like we go on lots of patrol throughout the month >> there's just one incident you need to happen which is going to break the whole peace process. >> Yeah. and also cause of casualty to the civilians or to my own soldiers or to the armed groups itself and then that kind of throws the mistrust for other groups who wants to give up fighting and come mainstream. So that that that kind of delicate uh things have and a lot of times we do see sometimes like um uh uh the child soldiers like you know who are who who are not >> like 18 plus or 16 plus what the international convention says they are like grown up able-bodied like they think they're armed with klashniko and you come across them and uh >> how do I say like how do you do it like do do I >> arrest them and then take them and you it's very challenging to lead a long range patrol for which is you walking for 3 days or nights you know or someone and without having a airborne medium of transportation to extract them it's going to be >> I was going to ask is it all by foot as in that did you not have helicopter support or was it the helicopters couldn't get into those areas due to the jungle um so if you had for example a casualty if you took prisoners or yeah had a battle with the enemy and needed resupplying. So with the enemy that sounds it's counterinsurgency. So with these dispersion groups um how did you what was the next step? Was it right on your shoulder we're walking back? >> Yeah. So, so we did had helipads in all of our locations like uh we in our battalion headquarter and then also uh in our company operating bases we had a helicopter but they may not uh the helipad may not be located within the company operating base. We have identified lot of makeshift helipads and we had the coordinates of all of it. uh and and on need basis we would secure those helipads and then like we would rally to our army aviation core what duty they are performing is administration duty or you have the higher comm formation commanders coming to engage the troops like they wanted to um check everything is in order or is a civac like the casuality evacuation in real sense uh for so yeah we depending upon the severity like we had all means at disposal but most of the times I would rely on my own transportation if sometime I don't have transportation I also need to come up with ingenuine ideas like so those the the the region where we were operating were also rampant with the uh illegal timber smuggling or like the so so we I I would know like what are the resources and we know the kind of precise intelligence we would collect is to say who is a kingpin for these villages or the persons. So sometimes if needed like when we are coming back from the patrol like I know the troops are exhausted and it's it's it's it's a scroting heat like we we we completely ran out of our food and then we have some water. Uh but like for water like like we always relied on the local sources we are not like carrying the bottled water. We would water from the streams. uh we do some water tablets to purify it and consume some time or sometime you just boil it and filter and drink it. So I would just rally to my platoon commander in the base and tell like hey is it possible can you organize some local transportation which is not a military troop carrying transportation. So they sh come up and we meet up in some way and then they fetch us back uh that kind of a thing. uh but like if it's really really sensitive operation where we have identified specific person to be picked up, arrested and brought back then we would have established series of way points. So we can also hand over so it's not like you're relying on the troops who are already exhausted after 3 4 days. So you have the fresh troops who can take over the and fulfill the task and kind of things. Yeah. >> Yeah. it this is pulling together a really sort of rich picture of the of the moral challenge for commanders in this space. So you've got um you've got as you pointed to an a tense scenario where a soldier of any rank can cause a major um social incident. I think we used to talk about the the strategic corporal in NATO operations. You know the most junior commanders can cause something extremely newsworthy. Um, and you've got um troops which I imagine have very little contact with home given the communication options. You have longrange patrols, some of which might take you away from a helicopter landing site, even one of your improvised ones. And that means you need to have the trust with locals to get the um the alternative Kazak options and all the rest of it. Um so that's a that's a multidirectional trust and morale sustaining challenge you know how how did that um how did how did your approach to that challenge develop during your time and um and and and how much of a stress was it for you because I can only imagine it probably took up quite a lot of your capacity. Uh yeah yeah yeah it it was indeed a challenge like uh because like when I arrived the battalion was there already for year and a half like so they are pretty much uh like uh found a lot of interesting improvisation what we call uh you know like the solutions. So one of the thing they had was like uh for one of the communication uh po like the pillars like what we put in they managed to get some kind of equipment like where you have the SIM card inserted but it's a very high antenna >> but it will come out to be like a landline telephone. >> So we would tell the troops like hey here we have >> this is indeed a mobile number. If you're going to call your next of kin or your family member, it will show flash them as a mobile number but you're dialing it through a landline. So for me first time after the mobile mobile cellular network was growing in India coming back to the landline telephone but it is indeed a mobile number. So uh so we had it in uh in my battalion headquarter in one of our company operating bases but there are also some locations where we never could do that but those places are strangely and sometime of the day they would have the mobile cellular reception very very feeble one >> so I've seen in one of my platin posts like uh the the troops there they had some of the the plastic bottles they would cut it up put their mobile phone and they would get the longest possible uh the wired headphone. So it's like you somebody dials a number and drops the the wired headphone and you stand in the bottom and then try to speak. So these kind of the things we had it but at the same time the challenge was once troops makes contact with their families back home and the family is like worried about them and then the troops are worried about their family like uh their misses maybe having uh the maternal maternal checkup or something like that. So how are you going to tell this guy like hey is everything okay? A lot of times when they've been blessed with a baby, they are getting the news like after many many many days which is such an important moment in a life of a and here we are telling them oh congratulations yeah go on carry on your task and kind of a thing right and in in a in a modern setup like I I see here in Europe like you you you have your maternal holidays paternity holidays you go and spend time with the family my troops never had that kind of luxury so how are we going to motivate them and keep them or like some some of the very close skin fell sick and they need to go and because a lot of our soldiers they also come from different parts of India and and and and rural areas like where a lot of the time this soldier as as a maybe the single adult male who's responsible for the whole family so they are completely abandoned their family for the duration when they're deployed and they can't communicate with them and even like me like when I like I would give one of my bank cards with my dad and say like hey if anything needed from the family you know so my dad was kind of operating so it was a joint account like that that that's a kind of uh scenario we had and another challenge is also sometime when we knew that we had to send them back for a holiday or even to index the soldiers who are returning back from holiday we had a very very limited window of transportation or the days where we can use it it's not like just go to the road, hitchhike and you're going to reach out like what it's a very risky time because if they what will if this uh insurgent groups know there is a troops who are just traveling in plain clothes in uh because in India most of the time we travel in plain clothes we we wear uniform only when you're traveling for the duty. So moment your holiday begins, you're you're you're in a plane cloth and what if the soldiers gets kidnapped or they get attacked or that like they run into some issues uh they fall sick uh while on the way because it's a very very challenging terrain. The food is not the what they're used to it where water is not there used to it. So these kind of challenges we always had it. So we need to be uh aware not only the resources within my battalion, the resources with the local civil administration, the resources with the the neighboring battalions in our brigade like so that's how we would always try to uh leverage any of the things. So you need to have a very good communication uh interaction understanding and rapper with all these multitudes of people in this uh very hostile scenario. So yeah, >> I'm just conscious of time. I'd love to dive in. Have you when we talk about the threat to uh the your platoon more specifically [snorts] um on patrol um what was that coming from? Was that mines? Was it small arms fire? Um was it you or was it more when you were doing what we would have called in the British army strike operations to take um prisoner sort of uh people who weren't in line with the government of India? What was the threat? And you could you give us a couple of uh examples? Yeah, the uh the threats here was um uh we never had like the mines or like uh the things IDs the improvised explosive devices that were indeed a challenge. So we always advise the troops like when whenever we are doing this uh what we call like coordinance search operation or the search and destroy operations to be aware of it. small arms fire was a very very high threat and also from the automatics like because this um the arm groups also had um a lot of access to the Arsenal like uh the challenge is also like the Mahasa district was bordering like Manipur Manipur has a poorest border with Burma. So between India and Burma if you want to put it there's ongoing civil civil war kind of situation in Burma we have over 4,000 kilometers of border it's a poorest border and lot of times in this across the modern day borders is the same ethnic groups so they have their networks and also uh Burma further being in the Southeast Asia with the network of this the gun running and the illegal arms proliferation is very high. So a lot of times like we were really surprised when we are uh recovering the cache or like when we busting them like we found like grenade launchers like which we thought like these tribal groups like they wouldn't have uh this insurgents have access to like the grenade launchers uh automatic sometimes like you have a modern western uh manufactured firearms uh landing up there. So these kind of the challenges we had and then uh like we also had this um because of the the narcotics was also an issue because the boss is like funding them. >> Uh so uh all these things we had and also sometimes we also to be aware like the weather also can take a toil on the troops on my long range patrols >> especially the mosquitoes there uh the malaria. So we all were provided like the malaria tablets each Tuesday evening. I remember like when you have our meal like the last dose of pudding is not your pudding in normal sense but it's a malaria antimmalarial tablets. >> If you had weekly ones that means you had the nasty ones I think the the ones give you bad things. >> Yeah. So we always slept with our mosquito nets on uh like uh the first thing like if anyone contacts that like as a as a officer in your base you ask like what were you doing? you were not enforcing uh the military rules and authority in the troops barracks and the barracks again is like the small huts whatever we could device and how we had it. So yeah, this way these were all the key challenges for us and then also the threat of ambush like yeah you are going on it's nice foot patrol but like we never knew like what lay against the next hillbend and the the river point uh and and also when you're when you're when you're staying in a village like is this a village completely the hostile to you? Do they the the hostility comes it's not just because they're against the state but maybe a lot of members of their village would have been part of this armed group. So they knew that like we by patrolling we by being there they think that like the kitankin may get compromised. So how do you trust them and that kind of uh the thing? So it was a challenge. Yeah. >> Are there any particular instances that you remember of um ambush or um anything that sort of stands out from your time there? Did you take any casualties from your platoon that were not malaria? >> Uh no. Yeah. So uh the the initial few uh times like uh the the few the first few months like it was uh we had this kind of very active confrontation happening. Uh but then over a period of time uh once we had the the major group of this Damasa DHD the uh they surrendered like the hostilities kind of came down but we did have once an issue like there was few militants like who wanted to surrender. The initial reports told us some X number but the time they arrived to us were lesser and when we asked them what happened to the remaining they said like no they changed their mind they went back but actually what has happened is like because when you they had a fight amongst themselves one of a few of them were killed and they hid their weapons in the in in the in the woods so that they can go and retrive it later and sell it to the next active uh faction. So these are the dynamics like our troops we were never found. Then we have to it was one of the challenging mission my Clinton they have to go for into the hostile place and recover these weapons and also recover the dead bodies of the slain on the uh insurgent. So um it was very tough like you you so this is not a priority mission. So you're not going to get a chopper to come and recover it. So we have to literally carry it with the improvised like the bamboo like very very primitive. So uh uh this kind of a thing but there was one unfortunate incident happened to the neighboring battalion like uh they they they were ambushed because uh because uh it was a suspension of operation but something happened in a neighboring state of Manipur and Nagaland and the groups they decided to ambush this battalion like it was completely caught because we've been used to that peace and suddenly this happened. Uh so that kind of shock across to all of us like then we have to go back into the mode like it's eminent contact like so every mission every patrol you're going to do like you have to adapt to it. So uh yeah those were the challenges but for fortunately uh for the later part of my time like we never had like uh any kind of the casualities in my uh battalion in that particular tenure but indeed like later when I was deployed in Kashmir or in the other sectors we had but not here. It's really hard when when you you mentioned it earlier sort of trying to keep people in a state of alertness throughout that time on the basis that something may happen any moment. Obviously, you hope it doesn't and it sounds like for the for the majority of time it went well. Um but it's very hard to keep people on their guard the whole time and and hence that sort of management of um exhaustion both mental and physical is is so important for your particular platoon. um just tell us a bit more about the relationships there because obviously it's a bit different but also slightly similar to say a British platoon where you know you're the officer who's a Tamil Nadu uh you've got a platoon of predominantly Maharatis um you know how was the relationship presume you've got some senior soldiers in there who've been there around a long time your your NCOs's etc. Yeah. So uh so what I did like is like uh I was always uh curious intellectually. So like I I read out a great deal of Indian history and culture of every state and I so like whenever I meet anyone from India like I would like to know hey you're from that district used to have this festival what is some of the famous things. So like it's trying to break the ice. uh but with my experienced NCOs's being there I would go and understand like hey tell me about like the spliton how are they what have they done in the past and and also like knowing the career path of each of the soldier this is what is expected out of it and I always made a point I would address the soldiers like uh by by the first name so that like they knew that like he's officer it's not like he's considering me as the number but he knows like there's a person behind this rank like uh like in India we still have we call it like SEO what's equivalent of private in uh westernomics so like then spend time with them and we would have like the platoon commander interview like we also had the interview diaries like where you speak to them again all this what is a career aspiration like hey you wanted to transition from a rifle man to a sniper or you want to go into the support weapons or battalion support weapons so like then you kind of prepare them and keep them motivated you know like it's not just this tenure what what lies ahead of the tenure those kind of motivational talks like uh I would do frequently and also I would organize like lot of uh what do we call it barakanas or the big feast so we would make some uh it's not only the traditional chef assigned to your company or the platoon some soldiers are very good in cooking so like we would come okay what do we cook today >> so it's just kind of some of the things having the light moments to keep up this motiv ation keep going and me with my knowledge of the broader things which happens very higher level at a national level or international level lot of times I would educate my troops like telling them hey you know like this is what is happening do you know like we are using uh the antenna 32 to transport aircraft but you know in Indian air force they're going to index like he c130 which is a modern system I tell them lot of them would have traveled in the old antenna but now this is what you expect so I keep kept constantly updating my troops on uh the modernization happening in the army and also tell them some of the things what I read in the news of what's happening in Afghanistan or any of the active conflicts in the world like what it's for them to bear in mind when they themselves go out on operations. So these are the things like how I kept my troops going out and then always encouraging them to come up with um more uh ideas. It's not like they need to wait for their sergeant or the NCOs's to go and ask in a very formal way and they can come up to me with ideas >> still maintaining the command and control not overlooking the sergeants or like not compromising uh the leadership uh structure what we have in army but uh yeah so that was interesting times >> yeah I suppose there's quite a lot of going on in the world I think probably while you were there that the the Pakistan Afghan sort of border stuff was kicking off and yeah, lot lots to lots to share with the troops. But anyway, sorry I intercepted you there. Go ahead. >> No, no, I was just I was going to start sort of wrapping up. Um so I think we're sort of absolutely sort of fascinating and so much color in in that story. I sort of I really feel like I was there. Um what I would love to sort of finish off on and I'm conscious that you did the the MA in um uh myself conflict security and development. So actually after this uh all happened. So you typically ask people you how does war studies help you in your career? But m maybe if we sort of turn that on its head sort of you looking back having done the MA what sort of uh core themes you pull out from your military experience that have helped you perhaps in the in the MA. >> Yeah sure. Uh this very very good question uh repet like because when I arrived there in a kings like there was like a 12 year gap between my undergrad and my masters and I'm doing MA conflict security and development and I had this like 11 years of military experience and all those themes like what we do it in a uh in an academic sense of uh the nation building or conflict security and development. So um when when when when the when the professors are teaching the theory when you're doing this uh literature review which a lot of my classmates were super good at because they've been in the western uh education system they've done lot of their undergrad very similar to the stream where they studying but all I had was only the practical experience. So for me when when when the lecture was finished or like the segment of the lecture was finished I can immediately go into my memory and found out like the theory what you're teaching will that work like I I had in some time when they're talking about laws of conflict I said like I was a commissioned officer I was not even aware at something called just war just intelligence and all the things you know like uh it was very fascinating then I would say like I as a commissioned officer if I was not aware of all this modern laws of armed conflict and the way we need to engage in um uh like a rehabilitating uh this fighters into the mainstream thing. Forget about my troops or my NCOs are being aware like who is not even the uh aware of existence of such topics as niche disciplines to study. So those were the things but um uh but for me how it helped more is like when I was serving an army it's mostly like uh like India the nationalism the patriotism we are doing there for the flag of India but now all the conflicts it's not always like the one one-sided view now with the with the help of the uh the academic command I gained I started always questioning like from the other side view like okay the border with India and China like close to uh 4,000 km plus 3,800 km it's undemarced. Why is it why why are Chinese doing the PLA doing certain things the way they do it now and why why is Kashmir kept boiling despite 75 years of uh independence and why it couldn't be resolved. So I always look from all parts of it and also sometimes I try to criticize critical analysis of the military like whether we are doing the the structure of the uh the combat group like is it a one suiting the mission. So all this kind of thing the critical thinking I picked up a lot and also to accommodate the views varying views of the others like in India when we are talking most of the time with any anyone moment you put the bring the table of put put in the table the patriotism everyone is going to say yeah yeah yeah whatever military is doing is right whatever the government is doing right but that's not how so I I I I contribute uh like so I would say I would attribute lot of my critical thinking uh and with the and also opening up to this academic concepts and also uh like what our professor Max Ball would say like we are not trying to find the solution because it's not going to be the onesizefits-all solution for all of them. It's like understanding the uniqueness of each of the conflicts and then we as academicians like we're trying to recommend solutions for each of the unique uh conflicts which are raging. So yeah, that's where I would put it out. Yeah, >> Arvin's been fantastic. I think if there's one thing that you'd uh uh say that how has the the MA helped you in war studies uh post doing it and I appreciate it wasn't that long ago, but have you sort of um yeah, how have you found the the benefit having done that having done it now? Yeah. So, uh I'm I'm completely working in a uh job which is in a private sector which is not directly linked to it. Uh but uh it's been uh with all the knowledge and all the things I gained there. It really helps even in my stakeholders because I work across with the people from all over the world and that's where and also still I have it in mind like as I'm going I'm still continuing up my uh the personal time readings. So one day I if I wanted to get back into the public policy uh where I can influence um uh like the positive outcome. So that's what I I'm doing it. So while I'm doing all those readings the one thing I always put it on my uh the the glass I wear is the critical thinking and the critical way what we have been encouraged to do in uh Kings uh Wall Street. uh that's what I'm still doing it though I'm working in a private sector uh completely different and but then uh this I do it in each and every news article I read all the books I'm reading all my literature which I'm focusing on so uh that's how it's been uh helping me and I still value and I'm I'm in touch with a lot of my classmates like we are regularly meeting up once a year and uh so we um share all the things lot of them are still there and uh like in South Sudan and in Ukraine and all this uh things. So, we're looking after each other. It's not like the the it's not like you have your degree and it's done and we still uh nourish those um uh the bonds what we have um uh made it in Kingsport for studies. >> Yeah, amazing stuff. >> It's been an absolute pleasure. I almost feel like we could sort of do a revisit and maybe sort of touch on some of the areas like uh Kashmir particularly maybe the the Chinese um border but um for now I think that has been absolutely fascinating really interesting insight into a lesserk known insurgency >> really enjoyable thank you so much Aravvin >> thank you Nick and thank you Robert >> we'd like to thank Kings College London specifically the war studies department and professors James Gal, Jack McDonald, Juliet Patinson, Dr. David Betts, and the School of Security Studies communications team. Without their support and encouragement, this podcast would remain just another idea that never came to fruition. Furthermore, the tremendous War Studies community, especially its alumni, in bringing together such a wonderful collection of unique experiences to share with the world to better understand the experience of war and the lessons learned from conflict. You've been listening to the War Studies podcast produced and edited by the School of Security Studies Communications Team. For more information on our work, visit our website, which you'll find in the podcast description. If you've enjoyed this episode, we'd really appreciate it if you could rate and review us on your preferred podcast provider. Thanks for listening and we'll see you next time on the War Studies Podcast. >> [music]