Phone call from Chandigarh my wife least expected

Julio Ribeiro

What would have been the turn of events if the Centre’s plan to confront Bhindranwale and his followers on their way back from Mumbai to Amritsar had materialised? Perhaps Operation Bluestar would not have been necessary and the hurt caused to the Sikhs would have been avoided! Life is full of ifs and buts that could have changed the course of history!

I considered myself lucky to escape the wrath of Indira Gandhi, the Iron Lady, for failing to anticipate the ‘escape’ of Bhindranwale from the Dadar gurdwara. I completed my term as Mumbai’s Police Chief and took command of the CRPF, a body of men I had always admired. Alas, this spell lasted only for six weeks before I was pulled out and sent to Gujarat to settle the communal problem there.

Four months in Gujarat and I was brought back to Delhi in the newly-created post of Special Secretary in the Union Home Ministry. In that capacity, I was tasked to find a suitable substitute to the incumbent DGP of Punjab from among the senior IPS officers cutting across states. Hari Barari, the DIB, was to assist me. The officers we selected were either rejected by Arun Nehru or Surjit Singh Barnala, the CM of Punjab at that time. One officer from Gujarat, acceptable to all, refused the job!

It was Good Friday, of 1986. I was resting when the phone rang. It was Arun Nehru summoning me urgently to the Prime Minister’s residence. I drove off in my car and was soon ushered into a private balcony where I noticed Rajiv Gandhi sitting on a swing. Arun Nehru, Arun Singh and Arjun Singh were the only other persons present — no Cabinet Secretary, nor Home Secretary or other bureaucrat.

I was asked to take over Punjab Police. I was told that Hindu hopes of a peaceful existence would increase fourfold when my appointment was announced! I was also told that my status as a Secretary to the GoI and my salary would be protected. And, lastly, that I should take some ‘black cats’ for my personal protection!

This last suggestion I promptly rejected. If I was to command a force, there was no question of distrusting them. No leader of men can succeed if he distrusts his men! I told Rajiv Gandhi that I would have to gain the trust and loyalty of the men I led if I was to succeed in my mission. If I failed in that effort, the mission itself would fail.

Taking over as DGP

The Prime Minister told me that a plane was ready to fly me to Chandigarh! I asked for time to inform my wife, pick up my uniform and essential clothing. He said all that would follow in another aircraft. I had just to phone my wife from Chandigarh and tell her what needs to be packed till the rest of my luggage was despatched!

Arjun Singh and Arun Nehru accompanied me and presented me to Surjit Singh Barnala. The Chief Minister was obviously in the know of the decision. He welcomed me with noticeable warmth and that made me comfortable. I phoned my wife from the Raj Bhavan telling her of these recent developments that were bound to change the course of our lives. She was not amused. She had just settled down to a more ordered existence away from the nomadic one she and I had been forced to live in the previous year since we left Mumbai. I reminded her of the marriage vows we had taken — “for better or for worse!”

That evening I was introduced to the security detail that I inherited from my predecessor. There was one ASI and four police constables, all armed, and all Jat Sikhs, as I later learnt. They became part and parcel of my existence for the 3-1/2 years I spent in Punjab. Some of them kept in touch with me over the phone till even recently. They were good policemen and good human beings.

In the middle of that first night spent in the Punjab Raj Bhavan, there was a knock on my door. It was the security detail which came to inform me of a terrorist attack on a ‘jagran’ outside a temple in Jalandhar. My uniform had not arrived, but I got back into the civilian clothes I had worn on arriving in Punjab and told the detail to prepare to leave for Jalandhar.

The men were taken aback. The seniormost among them ventured to say that police movement at night had stopped because of fear of terrorist attacks! I told him that, that was precisely what I intended to correct. I was not going to miss the opportunity to send a message to the rank and file that the incoming DGP expected his men to face the miscreants at night just as they did during the day.

The message was obviously conveyed to the SHO, Jalandhar, who was waiting to receive us when we landed at his police station in the early hours of the morning. He had good news for the new DGP! He had followed the trail of the culprits and actually got hold of them with their weapons just outside the town. That was music to my ears. That music coming on top of the excitement of the chase obviated the necessity of snatching a couple of hours of sleep before getting down to the job of commanding a somewhat demoralised police force.

Next week: Winning minds and hearts