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Chief of Army Staff, General V.K. Singh, disclosed here yesterday that he had rung up the Army Commanders on the eve of going to Supreme Court earlier this year and told them that the age row was a personal matter. In an exclusive interview to Times Now's Editor-in-Chief Arnab Goswami, General Singh disclosed that he spoke to all his senior officers after approaching the Supreme Court on January 16, asking them to talk to troops down the ranks and ask them not to get "worked up." "The day I went to the court I spoke to all my corps commanders, all my army commanders and told them please tell our men, this is my personal issue. It has got nothing to do with the army. They don't have to feel bad. They don't have to feel worked up. They don't have to feel any of this," he said. The Army Chief also questioned the manner in which the Supreme Court and a judge on the bench treated his petition on the date of birth controversy. "I know what has happened in the Supreme Court," General Singh said. "I will not delve into it. Some point of time, later on, I think I will put it down as to what exactly information we had on how things have gone on. The only thing I can say is that if at all a very senior Supreme Court judge says 'Blow with the wind', I actually rue this fact that I went to the court... If all of us are told to 'blow with the wind' then we will all become muggers, we will all become corrupt. Wind is going that way. Are we going to go that way? That is why it was the end of it. When my lawyer asked me I said just withdraw. Enough. I don't want to move (the court)," he said. It may be recalled here that General V K Singh had moved the Supreme Court on January 16 against the government's decision to treat his date of birth as May 10,1950 instead of May 10,1951 based on earlier commitments made by him. General Singh said that there was a coterie, which was waiting for him to retire, and that he was aware that he would run into difficulties if he disturbed the status quo. "I held back purchases of Tatra except those for which there was no alternative," he said during the interview. When asked to comment on how the confidential letter written to the Prime Minister that was leaked, General Singh said that neither he nor anyone close to him was the source of the leak. "In Army, we don't do things like this. It is not our culture...It is a treasonable act. Let us find out who leaked it. I am quite sure and let me tell you this my Army, the 1.3-million Army, is sure that their chief will never leak a letter like that. That's the surety I have," he said. General Singh alleged that someone within the government had to be behind the leak of the confidential letter he wrote to Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh on glaring gaps in defence preparedness. The Army chief alleged the whole thing (about the leak) was geared to give the impression that it was V K Singh, who was leaking it. "Should have. Where did this letter leak out from? It is a top secret letter," he said when asked whether someone within the government was "leaking the letter". The Army Chief also criticized The Indian Express report of April 4 about how troop movements near the capital on the night of January 16 - the day General Singh moved the Supreme Court - rang alarm bells in the highest levels of the government. General Singh said that this report was part of an "agenda" and said that the newspaper's Editor-in-Chief Shekhar Gupta, who was one of the authors of the report, had met him over lunch and asked him "questions" about the troop movements. Asked if this conversation was on the record, General Singh said: "He (Gupta) was not recording it, but I am quite sure there is no journalist in this world who is ever off the record." When asked whether his "side of the story" was taken, General Singh said: "No." General Singh also rejected a recent proposal from Pakistan 's Army Chief, General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani. to demilitarise the Siachen Glacier. "These are all gimmicks that keep coming from the establishment in Pakistan and we will be fools if we fall for them," General Singh said.

Army Chief fumes on eve of retirement, alleges official role in letter leak