I received this wonderful comment with the earlier post from an anonymous writer ...

The army/ armed forces is a very large employer. The living index of a country like india is quite poor and a large army helps in aleviating this because it gives us a sense of mistaken pride. Is it not for this that we have the Parades. A world with out an amry would be utopia and for that we need to become truly humans.

Yes I agree . This is another mail I would like all my readers to read...A friend from Kabul writes as recently as yesterday...Just read it...

Dear Jaya,
Greetings for belated Diwali! I am reporting from Kabul . Here life remains at a stand still. Whereever you go, you have to be under the protection of armed guards. There has been a series of suicide attacks in the recent months. All these suicide attacks are targeted at international development professional . Life is very close to death here in Kabul. You never know who is a suicide bomber. It can be a youth, a women and even a 14 year children. Literally one blast and you are gone. The remnants of Taliban want's to stall the process of development. The entire country side still operates under the irrational diktats of the mullahs. The youth brigade of afg is ready to blow themselves in the name of jehaad. They feel proud to call themselves as fiyadeen rather than engineer and doctor. The condition of women are very pathetic. They are treated like animals. Very often you will hear stone throwing incidents (on women) because of suspected adultery. The whole country has been rattled by unending war and guna battles, spanning over the last three decades. But things are changing slowly. Development fruits are reaching to the villages for the first time in last 30 years...

Isn't this is a horrifying picture? Sometimes I wonder what would India Indeed be like if we had none or atleast just a kaam chalao army... with the growing unrest everywhere would we be able to remain so untouched by it all forever? Do we even realise that the money we spend to keep this army fighting fit( which galls and rankles the honest tax payers ever so often) is pittance compared to the peace it assures us... leave alone the other nation building activities it is forever involved in - the earthquakes , the floods, the train accidents ... just name them. I have even seen an entire stretch of parched land along Ganganagar , Bikaner and Jaisalmer ( along the Indira Gandhi Canal) go completely green under the active supervison of the ecological Territotorial Army battialion of the Rajputana Rifles.I have witnessed fur flung villages in the remote Ladakh Ranges huddle and sleep in peace with enough kerosene and grains to keep them alive through the terribly long winters thanks to the officers posted there.And Finally I have witnessed mothers hanging on to army jawans who worked more than 48 hours relentlessly digging out dead bodies during the Bhuj quake. Would you still question the fact whether we need an army?
I would say we need every one above 18 to go under compulsory Army training and a minmum 5 years stint to make us alive to the fact that it takes more than courage to wear that Olive green...and the fact that the army does more than just fight a war...