The drain cleaner’s minar
The contemporary assessment of a terrible souvenir of the past
}History is intrusive, and always finds its way into our today. Sometimes that intrusion is barely perceptible, as the touch of a gentle breeze on the skin. Like the Chor Minar tower in south Delhi’s Hauz Khas Enclave.
Perched at the centre of a residential roundabout, the centuries-old edifice has the vibes of a once-tough family patriarch, peacefully passing his days with his newspapers and Whatsapp forwards, largely ignored by kind but busy descendants. As it happens, the tower has a most dreadful past. Built around 13th century in the Khilji era, it was said to display the severed heads of chor, or thieves—a convincing way, if there ever was one, to discourage petty crime. Towards the top of the tower, the regularly-spaced niches must have been the very places for the ill-fated heads.
Today these dreadful holes have become a refuge for pigeons, who wheel about the tower, returning to the niches after every round. This afternoon the grassy ground about the ruin is utterly serene, littered with no headless corpses but fallen leaves. Squirrels are running about aimlessly. Dry leaves clinging to the barbed wires, on the monument’s boundary wall, are looking like delicately woven embroidery.
But you can’t absorb Chor Minar by simply standing close to it. Its modern-day appreciation is comprehensively experienced only by taking a long aimless round in the neighbourhood. The monument has a commanding presence upon the area, and pops into view most unexpectedly, often appearing like a side-character in the local sights and sceneries. Hauz Khas Enclave is very upscale, and its wealthy residents remain unseen, cloistered inside their great houses—it is the security guards stationed outside the bungalows and apartments who frame the foreground to the minar.
But now a young woman enters a connecting lane with three little kids. The perspective from this spot makes her look as if she and the little ones were heading straight to Chor Minar, knowing nothing of its gory old days.
The most poignant sight of the monument, however, is not anything about the building but a signage board bearing its name—it is juxtaposed by a crude cardboard hoarding that bears the handwritten mobile number of a drain cleaner. The terrifying souvenir of the past has become a harmless oddity, and in fact has been upstaged by an honest man’s listing. Good end to a bad beginning.
NEW DELHI: The defence ministry on Tuesday cleared domestic military purchases worth ₹13,700 crore, including army proposals to buy 118 Arjun MK-1A tanks and equip armoured fighting vehicles (AFVS) with modern protection and countermeasure systems, officials familiar with the development said.
While the new tanks will cost ₹8,380 crore, the protection systems for the army’s fleet of more than 3,000 AFVS (tanks and infantry combat vehicles) will cost ₹5,300 crore, the officials said. The order for the tanks could be placed with the Ordnance Factory Board (OFB) this year, with five tanks to be delivered within 30 months of the signing of the contract, Hindustan Times has learnt. This will be followed by the delivery of 30 tanks every year.
The Defence Acquisition Council (DAC) -- India’s apex procurement body – on Tuesday accorded its acceptance (AON) of necessity for buying the tanks and the AFV protection systems to provide a push to the government’s Atmanirbhar Bharat Abhiyan (Self-relithe
ant India campaign). Defence minister Rajnath Singh chaired the DAC meeting.
“Three Aons for an overall cost of ₹13,700 crore were accorded. All these Aons are in the highest priority category of defence acquisition… these( systems) will be indigenously designed, developed and manufactured,” the defence ministry said in a statement, without naming the proposals approved.
The proposals cleared include 293 Nag anti-tank missiles developed by DRDO, 13 modified ICVS (called the Nag missile carrier or Namica), eight medium power radars called Arudra and practice ammuntion for T-90 and T-72 tanks, officials said.
The Arjun MK-1A is an upgraded version of the Arjun Mk-1, currently in army service.
The new tank will come with 71 upgrades over the existing variant, said one of the officials cited above. “The precise target tracking of the tank ensures accurate engagement during day and night in both static and dynamic conditions,” the official said.
The Defence Research and Development Organisation’s Chennai-based Combat Vehicles Research and Development Establishment has designed and developed the tank. The tanks will be manufactured at the OFB’S Heavy Vehicles Factory at Avadi, outside Chennai.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi handed over a prototype of the Arjun MK-1A tank to army chief General Manoj Mukund Naravane in Chennai on February 14, in a clear indication that the order for the 118 tanks was in the pipeline. prototype was tested for more than 6,000 km across the country’s western sector, followed by 1,500 km of rigorous testing, HT has learnt.
More than 200 companies will be involved in the project, which is expected to generate around 8,000 jobs, said a second official.
Experts said the new tanks and AFV upgrades would boost the fighting potential of the army. “It’s a big leap forward and had been pending for a long time. It will improve the strike capability of the army’s armoured formations. I also see it as a very potent step in the direction of achieving self-reliance in the defence sector,” said former Northern Army commander Lieutenant General BS Jaswal (retd). But some experts flagged concerns about the bulky tank, saying its weight (68 tonnes) would limit the army’s deployment options.
The defence ministry said that the DAC was of the view that capital acquisition contracts - other than design and development cases - should be concluded in two years. “The ministry, in consultation with the services and all stakeholders, will come up with detailed plan of action for achieving the same,” the statement said.
Meanwhile, Bharat Forge on Tuesday announced that it received a ₹178-crore order from the army for its M4 vehicles under the emergency procurement route.