
[BOOK REVIEW] Slightly over-the-top on some issues, but insider accounts of the rot within are always a good read
By: V.K. Singh
Raman’s credentials are impeccable. Having joined RAW at its inception in 1968, he spent 26 years with the agency, seven of them in Paris and Geneva.
Raman is not sure who coined the term ‘Kaoboys’, but among the three persons he mentions, T.N. Kaul seems the most likely. The book covers a wide gamut of events under seven PMs. His adulation for Indira and Rajiv Gandhi are matched only by his veneration for the first five RAW chiefs.
Raman is not sure who coined the term ‘Kaoboys’, but among the three persons he mentions, T.N. Kaul seems the most likely. The book covers a wide gamut of events under seven PMs. His adulation for Indira and Rajiv Gandhi are matched only by his veneration for the first five RAW chiefs.

Read between the lines, and the book has interesting inferences: for instance, the government paid a commission of $6 million to an Iranian middleman to get a soft loan of $250 million from the Shah of Iran. How then can the government treat commissions paid in deals like Bofors as crimes? Again, based on RAW-IB inputs, all Sikhs entering Delhi during Asiad 1982 were stopped and searched. The humiliation drove many into the arms of Khalistani terrorists. The situation rapidly deteriorated. Who took the decision to ban the entry of Sikhs? Besides, if most PMs were better informed than RAW or IB, as he writes, it’s a sad reflection on the agencies.
To be fair, Raman has listed the failures of RAW along with its successes. In ’69, RAW and IB assessed that 2,100 Naga hostiles had gone to Yunnan for training. Sam Manekshaw and Maj Gen M.N. Batra, the director of military intelligence—Sam’s designation and Batra’s rank in the book are wrong—told the joint intelligence committee that the number was around 450, which later proved correct. Among the other lapses are the failure to prevent Mujibur Rehman’s assassination in ’75; not sharing with IB the information received from MI-5 that could have prevented the arms drop in Purulia; ignoring warnings from IB about unusual activity in Pakistan’s Northern Areas which led to the Kargil fiasco; and giving Rajiv Gandhi incorrect advice in the Bofors cover-up.
Raman acknowledges the culpability of the intelligence agencies in the Indira-Rajiv assassinations. After Operation Bluestar, R.N. Kao, then senior advisor, decided that no Sikhs would be deployed for the PM’s close proximity security. When she expressed her misgivings, the orders were cancelled. Had Kao stood his ground, the tragedy could have been averted. In ’91, intelligence agencies knew Rajiv was under threat from Khalistani terrorists and the LTTE. Yet nothing was done, on grounds that the SPG Act did not cover an ex-PM’s security. After the assassination, RAW’s monitoring division was able to track down the conspirators by intercepting and decoding LTTE communications. Had its earlier monitoring been as systematic, Rajiv would have been alive today.

Raman makes a strong case for parliamentary oversight.He says major debacles like Kargil and Rabinder Singh’s escape could have been pre-empted by a suitable monitoring mechanism for RAW, on the pattern of the CIA and Mossad. He blames the political establishment for its apathy to intelligence issues. Coming from an insider like Raman, the advice should be taken seriously.
(The author is a retired major general and former joint secretary of the RAW.)
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