Page 198 - Leadership in the Indian Army

Saturday and there was a party at Behram’s house at the ‘Rosery’ in Upper
Coonoor, very close to ‘Stavka’, where Sam lives. Hearing the loud music,
Sam came over and asked Behram, ‘You chaps are having a party, and did

not invite me?’ When he came to know that it was a pound party, where
everyone brings his own food and drinks, he promptly sent his Gorkha
orderly home to fetch a bottle of Scotch. He stayed there till midnight,
surrounded by a bevy of starry-eyed women, who would rather listen to his
stories than dance with their husbands, much to the chagrin of the latter.
In 1989, Sam went to visit the Military Hospital in Secunderabad. Along
with the medical officers, the nurses were also lined up to meet him. He

stopped near the youngest one and asked her why she was improperly
dressed. The poor girl blushed a deep scarlet, and began to stammer. The
matron, who was an old battleaxe, came to her rescue, and asked Sam what
he meant.
‘Matron, as far as I remember, skirts are to end three inches above the
knee. Your girls have skirts going right down to the knee.’ And holding the

hapless girl’s skirt with both hands, he lifted it until it came to the correct
height.
There were giggles galore, but the matron was not to be silenced. ‘Sir, I
have asked the girls to wear longer skirts, because the men stare at them in
the wards,’ she said.
‘Matron, have you ever asked the girls whether they mind the men staring
at them?’ asked Sam, moving on. This silenced the matron, while the girls

grinned from ear to ear.
Sam’s sense of humour is unmatched and cannot be curbed, even at the
most serious of occasions. In 1995, while delivering a lecture on leadership
in New Delhi, he began to reflect on how times had changed. Even the
English Language had changed, he lamented, and went on to cite several
examples. In his younger days he said, the word ‘gay’ was used to describe

someone full of the joys of spring; a ‘queer’ was a chap who’d rather spend
his evenings in his room reading Milton than playing games; and only
generals had ‘aides’.
Sam’s views on leadership, and the so-called good things of life, are
interesting. In April 1993, he was invited to deliver the inaugural address of
the Holiday Programme for Youth by the Bombay Parsi Punchayet. Talking
about leadership, he said, ‘By and large, men and women like their leaders

to have all the manly qualities. The man who says he doesn’t smoke, he