Army Chief letter row: Army puts requirements before Parliamentary Committee

NEW DELHI: Army today highlighted before a Parliamentary Committee its requirements but these did not reflect the "deficiencies" flagged earlier by its Chief Gen V K Singh which was pointed out by the MPs.

Army Vice Chief Lt Gen S K Singh was questioned by MPs as to why his presentation to the Standing Committee on Defence did not contain those elements highlighted by Gen Singh in his letter to the Prime Minister.

The MPs said his presentation was not in consonance with the issues raised by Gen Singh before the Prime Minister and asked Lt Gen S K Singh to highlight the shortcomings in procurements possibly on the 9th of this month.

The Vice Chief also agreed to this suggestion, sources said.

When certain members of the Committee raised the issue of leakage of the top secret letter, both Lt Gen S K Singh and Defence Secretary Shashikant Sharma pointed out that writing a letter to the Prime Minister was routine but its leakage was a serious issue, they said.

They said the armed forces were well prepared and the Government was in the process of getting latest and most modern equipment for them in the next two years.

The Army Chief had written a letter to the Prime Minister on March 12 pointing out the poor state of preparedness of armed forces.

In the leaked letter, the Army Chief had said that the tank regiments were short of ammunition and there was 97 per cent obsolescence in the Air Defence systems.

The Defence Ministry has also held several meetings to discuss the capital acquisitions and the reasons behind delays in procurements.