Mrs. Gandhi planned top secret military operation in Mauritius

[ANPP]

When President Pranab Mukherjee lands in Mauritius on Monday, he will be buttressing a relationship with an Indian Ocean country that is so central to India’s security interests that it went to the extent of planning a military intervention to ensure an Indian-origin Prime Minister remained in power.

The Top Secret ‘Operation Lal Dora’ – which remains highly classified to this day – was conceived in 1983 with Prime Minister Indira Gandhi's approval and called for the deployment of major naval assets including as many as six destroyers with Alouette helicopters and MK 42C Sea Kings for slithering operations, as well as military and civilian oil tankers.

India called off the military part of the operation after the Mauritian Prime Minister Anerood Jugnauth’s erstwhile challenger Paul Berenger got wind of India’s plans and backed off, according to the first detailed account of the events in a scholarly article, ‘Operation Lal Dora: India’s aborted military intervention in Mauritius,’ written by Australian academic David Brewster and former Naval Intelligence officer Ranjit Rai for the journal Asian Security.

Instead, the then chief of the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), Nausher F. Suntook, was dispatched to Port Louis by Mrs. Gandhi to supervise a largely intelligence-led operation to reunite the Indian community whose fracturing along ideological and communal factions had allowed Mr. Berenger to mount a political challenge.

“The matter remains highly classified to this day,” a retired intelligence official familiar with the operation told The Hindu on condition of anonymity. “But it was a huge success. As a result, Jugnauth stayed on as PM for more than ten years. We produced this outcome by political means.”

A measure of this success was Mr. Jugnauth’s decision to request an Indian officer as his national security adviser. “He wanted an intelligence officer but we sent an army man, General J N Tamini, who remained there for many years,” the retired officer recalled.

India’s first intervention in the Indian Ocean came four years later in `Operation Cactus’. Commandos and naval ships were rushed to the Maldives after armed mercenaries sought to unseat the then President Abdul Gayoom in 1987.

But India has never acknowledged its 1983 plans for `Operation Lal Dora’ to save the Jugnauth government in Mauritius. There has been no public account of this operation till the article written by Prof. Brewster and Cmd Rai. In his book on the RAW, former intelligence official B Raman mentioned Suntook's role but did not name the country.

According to Dr. Brewster and Cmd Rai, the Indian military was divided on the planned operation with the then Navy Chief, Admiral O.S. Dawson backing the idea and General S.K. Sinha, who was the deputy Army chief at the time, telling Mrs Gandhi he did not have confidence in the planned operation requested that a senior RAW official rush to Port Louis and help defuse the crisis. So the matter was taken out of the Navy's hands and given over to the R&AW,’’ recalled a veteran intelligence officer.

Suntook died in 2006 but one intelligence officer who was around at that time called the operation a ``very fine piece’’ of intelligence and operational work by the RAW chief who was pitchforked into Mauritius by Mrs Gandhi on the day he was to retire.

Operation Lal Dora when seen in conjunction with the ease of India’s naval interventions in Seychelles and Maldives, both in 1987, points to the vulnerability of small island nations to military intervention by larger countries. But it also shows the ease with which the Indian Government agreed to conduct military operations when a political solution – as it eventually happened – was more feasible.

Soon after that operation, Mauritius became a listening post for the Indian Navy which buttressed a 1974 agreement of sending Indian defence officers on deputation to its coast guard and helicopter squadron. Today 35 to 40 Mauritian police officials train every year at Indian defence training academies.

Though eventually aborted, Operation Lal Dora has a special resonance today because of the Indian strategic community’s focus on promoting the Indian Navy’s role in the wider neighbourhood, especially the Indian Ocean.

This call for a blue water navy has been helped by the improved budgetary allocation for the Navy to buy military hardware.


Mrs. Gandhi planned top secret military operation in Mauritius - The Hindu

 

[veekysingh]

A good read.

 

[INDIC]

Source please.!!!
aren't 2/3 of Mauritians of Indian origin, there will always an Indian origin PM there.

 

[Bang Galore]

Source please.!!!
aren't 2/3 of Mauritians of Indian origin, there will always an Indian origin PM there.

There will be none though whether Indira Gandhi was bluffing with "imminent" military action is moot. The story looks plausible to me.

 

[ANPP]

Source please.!!!
aren't 2/3 of Mauritians of Indian origin, there will always an Indian origin PM there.

The Hindu, front page

 

[RISING SUN]

When President Pranab Mukherjee lands in Mauritius on Monday, he will be buttressing a relationship with an Indian Ocean nation that is so central to India’s security interests that it went to the extent of planning military intervention to ensure an Indian-origin Prime Minister remained in power there.

The Top Secret ‘Operation Lal Dora’ — which remains highly classified to this day — was conceived in 1983 with Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s approval and called for the amphibious landing of troops from the 54th Division to help the Mauritian Prime Minister Anerood Jugnauth fight off a challenge from his radical rival Paul Berenger which New Delhi feared might take the form of an attempted coup.

India’s military plans also included the deployment of major naval assets including as many as six destroyers with Alouette helicopters and MK 42C Sea Kings for slithering operations, according to the first detailed account of the events by Australian academic David Brewster and the former Director, Naval Intelligence, Ranjit Rai, in the latest issue of the scholarly journal Asian Security (‘Operation Lal Dora: India’s aborted military intervention in Mauritius’).

Mrs. Gandhi put the military part of the operation on hold after a squabble between the Navy and the Army over who would lead the intervention. Instead, she chose to task the Research and Intelligence Wing’s then chief, Nowsher F. Suntook, with supervising a largely intelligence-led operation to reunite the Indian community whose fracturing along ideological and communal lines had allowed Mr. Berenger to mount a political challenge.

“The matter remains highly classified to this day,” a retired intelligence official familiar with the operation told The Hindu on condition of anonymity. “But it was a huge success. As a result, Jugnauth stayed on as PM for more than ten years. We produced this outcome by political means.”

A measure of this ‘huge success’ was Mr. Jugnauth’s subsequent decision to request India Gandhi for an Indian as his national security adviser. “He wanted an intelligence officer but we sent an army man, General J.N. Tamini, who remained there for many years,” the retired officer recalled.

India’s first military intervention in the Indian Ocean came four years later, first with INS Vindhyagiri helping to abort a coup in the Seychelles in 1986 (‘Operation Flowers are Blooming’) and then ‘Operation Cactus’ in 1988 when commandos and naval ships were rushed to the Maldives after Sri Lankan Tamil militants sought to unseat the then President, Abdul Gayoom.

But India has never acknowledged its 1983 plans to save the Jugnauth government in Mauritius using military means. Indeed, there has been no public account of this operation till the article written by Prof. Brewster and Cmde Rai, which is based largely on interviews with retired Navy and Army officers. In his book on the external agency, Kaoboys of R&AW, former intelligence official B. Raman mentioned Suntook’s mission but did not name the country.

According to Dr. Brewster and Cmde Rai, the Indian military was divided on the planned operation with the then Navy Chief, Admiral O.S. Dawson backing the idea and General S.K. Sinha, who was the deputy Army chief at the time, telling Mrs Gandhi he did not have confidence in the planned operation. Though they document the concrete military preparations which got under way in Bombay at the time, the two scholars speculate that Mrs. Gandhi’s real aim may have been to spread the word in Mauritius — as a signal to the Berenger camp — that Indian military intervention was imminent.

Officials on the intelligence side don’t disagree. “[The situation in Mauritius] wasn’t really a military threat of the kind for which the Navy was asked to prepare [a plan] for. Actually, Jugnauth had requested that a senior R&AW official rush to Port Louis and help defuse the crisis. So the matter was taken out of the Navy’s hands and given over to the R&AW,” recalled a veteran intelligence officer.

Suntook passed away a few years ago but one officer who was around at that time told The Hindu that the operation was a “very fine piece” of intelligence and operational work by the R&AW chief who was pitchforked into Mauritius by Mrs. Gandhi on the very day he was to retire.

Soon after that operation, Mauritius became a listening post for the Indian Navy that bolstered a 1974 agreement for sending Indian defence officers on deputation to its coast guard and helicopter squadron. Today 35 to 40 Mauritian police officials train every year at Indian defence training academies.

Though eventually aborted, Operation Lal Dora has a special resonance today because of the Indian strategic community’s focus on promoting the Indian Navy’s role in the wider neighbourhood, especially the Indian Ocean. This call for a blue water navy has been helped by the improved budgetary allocation for the Navy to buy military hardware.

 

[Koovie]

Indira had more balls than all male PMs together

 

[Windjammer]

Indira had more balls than all male PMs together

I think reckless is the word.....that's how she ended up paying with her life. !!

 

[Kyusuibu Honbu]

As per wikileaks, currently Indian diplomats remain scornful of Mauritius and take them for granted.

Despite their significance to India's Regional Security Architechture.

Indian diplomats in Mauritius have scorn for
the quaint Mauritian notion that "Mother India" will help
for cultural or sentimental reasons. The new bottom line is
that if India wants something from Mauritius ) short of
territory - they are likely to get it.

Cable reference id: #06PORTLOUIS752

 

[somebozo]

I think reckless is the word.....that's how she ended up paying with her life. !!

Hitler had a lot of balls to for invading soviet union, that did not make him any wiser or Germany any better.
balls dont run politics, brains do!

The Unpardonable Mistakes Of Indira Gandhi
Tuesday, 17 November 2009 08:40
By Dr Jay Dubashi



Smt Indira Gandhi not only brought violence but also corruption. Twenty-five years after her death, we are still trying to cope with both. The Naxalites are a direct end-product of the Emergency. If it is not wrong to use violence to put down your political enemies-which is what the Emergency was all about-why is it wrong to use violence against those who have stolen your lands and your livelihood and are now busy stealing your homes in the name of progress?

"Had she lived on, she would have been 92 years old this year," wrote an old colleague of Indira Gandhi on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of her violent death. He was wrong. Had she not been killed by her bodyguards, she would have been killed by someone else. She was destined for violent death, like Charles I of Britain and Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto of Pakistan.

Mrs Gandhi was not a nice person to know or work for. I doubt if she had any friends. There was a twist in her temperament that kept her away from the rest of the society. I once watched her at a public ceremony over which she presided. A man, a foreigner, wanted to speak to her; so he sent her a note. Mrs Gandhi nodded and the man approached her and was with her for three or four minutes. But not once did Mrs Gandhi look at him, let alone shake hands with him. He left a note on the chair next to her and walked away.

Mrs Gandhi was at odds with every one, or almost every one, in her circle-her husband, her aunts, her cousins and almost her entire cabinet. She was not on speaking terms with any of them. She walked out on her husband, or maybe her husband walked out on her, within five years of getting married. She hated her aunt, Vijayalakshmi Pandit so much that she would have sent her to jail to keep company with two other women she disliked, Rajmata of Gwalior and Maharani of Jaipur, had some friends not intervened. These two ladies were sent to Tihar Jail out of personal pique. If they were maharanis, Mrs Gandhi was an empress in her own right. And the only way to show them their place was to put them behind bars.

She had no friends, only hangers-on, and she made sure they knew their place. One of the toadies was Khushwant Singh, who went out of his way to defend the Emergency-he was not the only one; there were other toadies too-hoping to earn her favours, but he fell foul of her when he started boosting her daughter-in-law, a Sardarni.

Another toady was PN Haksar, a communist, who had managed to get into the foreign service with postings around the world, but not in the US. Haksar was related to the Kauls of old Delhi, whose daughter had married Jawaharlal Nehru. The Kauls and the Haksars were also neighbours. Haksar later became Mrs Gandhi's principal secretary-so did another Kashmiri, PN Dhar-and as a good communist, did whatever the commies wanted him to do, including abolishing private purses and nationalising banks.

But as happens to toadies everywhere, Haksar fell foul of the empress and was shifted to the Planning Commission, a useless posting meant for pensioners. One day, I went to see him at his house on Race Course Road, Haksar sat alone in his vast dark drawing room with curtains drawn at the height of winter, wondering what he had done to draw Mrs Gandhi's ire.

Haksar's uncle had a big showroom in Connaught Place, known to every shopper as Pandit Brothers. It is, I think, still there. There was also another showroom in Chandni Chowk. One day, Mrs Gandhi's police or may be Sanjay Gandhi's goons descended on the two showrooms and sealed them. For good effect, they hauled Haksar's uncle to jail to keep company with other traders. Haksar had nowhere to turn to, for all his relations-which means Mrs Gandhi's relations-were either in jail or had decamped to places far from Delhi to escape the clutches of Mrs Gandhi's favourite son. I do not know what Haksar did to escape the net, but he died a broken man.

There was also a strong streak of violence in Mrs Gandhi's character. In fact, I should say that she injected violence into the Indian political system. We shall always remember her for the dismemberment of East Pakistan-her and India's finest hour-for I doubt if any other Prime Minister would have done what she did. She never believed in the nonsense about non-violence--and also about truth-and absolutely had no compunction about using force where force was necessary. Nehru would have dilly-dallied and talked about Hindi-**** bhai bhai. For Mrs Gandhi, there were no bhais. Violence had to be answered by violence, gun by gun, for at stake was the very existence of a nation under her charge.

It was perhaps her exaggerated faith in violence that undid her. She asked the army to enter the Golden Temple and that very day signed her own death warrant. But she did it with her eyes open.

What I do not forgive her are the ranks of riff-raff she gathered around her, men and women of no substance, whose only job was to feather their own nests and draw a veil over the dark goings-on at the heart of the administration. Mrs Gandhi not only brought violence but also corruption. Twenty-five years after her death, we are still trying to cope with both.

The Naxalites are a direct end-product of the Emergency. If it is not wrong to use violence to put down your political enemies-which is what the Emergency was all about-why is it wrong to use violence against those who have stolen your lands and your livelihood and are now busy stealing your homes in the name of progress? The Emergency too was supposed to have been imposed in the name of progress and growth. Didn't the Emergency-wallas claim that the trains ran on time? So, what is wrong in using force in clearing your lands and your homes of marauders who are arriving from thousands of miles away in search of your minerals, your water, in fact, your very life itself? And it was Mrs Gandhi who started the rot in the name of the Emergency, with her friends in the media egging her on, the same friends who are asking to put down the Naxalites and the others, also in the name of law and order-and, of course, discipline with capital 'D'.

Why did she do it? As I said, there was a kink in her character which ultimately took hold of her and those around her and perverted the very foundation of the republic. This is why we shall never forgive her. For all that she did in Bangladesh, there is a big black mark in her copybook, which time cannot erase. The legacy of violence, which is her special gift to the nation, has wiped out all the good she did or tried to do. This is a pity, but the riff-raff she surrounded herself with are partly responsible for it. Some of them are still active, now singing a new tune of secularism under a new conductor, who now speaks with a foreign accent!

Organiser

 

[IND151]

3 to 4 threads on same topic

Please Merge threads, mods

On Topic> It was nice that she decided to not use military force

 

[ANPP]

Hitler had a lot of balls to for invading soviet union, that did not make him any wiser or Germany any better.
balls dont run politics, brains do!

Yes you are wright. She did very big mistakes in her life but I always appreciate her for what she did for India.

-- End of terrorism in Punjab.

-- Evolution of Bangladesh.

-- Emerge of new India face, which was completely differ from its legacy politician.

 

[IBRIS]

One thing operation Cactus was the sole breeding plan that was planned by the witch Indira and executed by her son Rajiv. Iron curtain lady of India did few deeds in the interest of our nation. May she rest in peace in hell and dump the rest of her breed in hell for bleeding our nation for the sake of vote bank of few breeding cockroaches. West Bengal is an example of such an incident occurred, today as the middle class citizen with dual citizenship I feel threaten and the only thing I trust is my rifle and pistol othe than that their isn't anything that can dare walk through my village. Every house has armed itself with semi automatic. We the common citizens just dont trust this administration of congress. We are waiting for the culprits to walk our path, only we can do is wait patiently for the arriving caos we punjabis are ready and willing to take life in order to protect our property. Let there be crowd of trouble makers, we will just spray and prey....