The most epic battle on twitter today is between a diet-soldier Gaurav Arya,abusing and name-calling retired senior army officers for not toeing the BJP line, while they respond by calling him a “Charlie” and say he has lesser knowledge than an NCO.

I’m not sure who to feel sorry for because the army should have known they were being bought out with OROP and all that feel good soldier jingoism. The truth is the BJP politicised the army, used them to get street cred in toughness (because they don’t have the chops for it)

And threw the armed forces repeatedly under buses for political mileage. Pathankot was a disaster, PUlwama was a disaster, Galwan has been a disaster. Everything has been mishandled.

But the default setting of the Indian army has been to have veiled contempt for politicians.

And finally the army seems to be catching on to how they’ve been played not only emotionally, but also politically and as an entire organisation. And this exchange shows that BJP and it’s supporters don’t give a hoot for the army.

The sooner the army stops playing this game for the BJP, the better it’s going to be for them as an institution. The BJP constantly covers up its policy and administrative failures in places like Kashmir by making it a military trick pony show.

This nonsense has to stop.

Hold the government accountable for its policy decisions, hold the army accountable for its human rights record, but don’t say that one is the same as the other. They’re not the same. Mixing the political fortune of the party with the strength of the military has been an error

of massive proportions. Essentially, if the BJP didn’t shine in the Indian military’s perceived “glory”, it would be toast, electorally speaking, by now.

People in the army have a very strong need to be venerated by the public and the BJP built exactly this ecosystem in the country for the army. The army has used this as a shield to deflect criticism on its actions. In the last week it is clear where the BJP stands on the army.

They see it as a tool to be controlled and directed at will. The BJP has, in doing so, also severely underestimated the amount of respect it actually commands with the army. We will have to wait and see how this plays out.

There are still a bunch of generals out there blithely discussing “halalonomics” and signing up to the party and speaking on RSS platforms. So this new tension will need to be assessed carefully.