Page 236 - Leadership in the Indian Army

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L IEUTENANT G ENERAL P.S. B HAGAT ,

PVSM, VC

The Soldiers’ General

Premindra Singh Bhagat was one of the rare breed of generals who excelled
in war, as well as in peace. He was, perhaps, the only Indian general whose

hallmark was courage. Physical and moral courage are seldom found
together in the same person, yet Bhagat had this distinction. For the first, he
won a Victoria Cross (VC), during World War II. Of the second, the
instances are too numerous to recount. Though he never attained the highest
rank and retired as an Army Commander, there is no doubt that if anyone
deserved to become the Army Chief, it was Bhagat. If he had, the history of
the Indian Army might well have been very different. And perhaps that is

why he was denied the post. Due to his immense popularity, even Indira
Gandhi did not dare to supersede him, and had to resort to subterfuge to get
him out of the way.
Prem Bhagat was born on 13 October 1918. His father, Surendra Singh
Bhagat, was an executive engineer in the United Provinces. He had two
brothers, Nripendra (Tony) and Brijendra (Tutu), both of whom were older

than him. Prem’s mother died when he was just 9 years old. At that time,
his father was posted in Gorakhpur, and his two elder brothers were in
school at the Prince of Wales Royal Indian Military College (PWRIMC), in
Dehradun. The PWRIMC had been established in 1922, following the
recommendations of the Esher Committee, appointed in 1919 with Lord
Esher as Chairman, and of the Select Committee of the Legislative
Assembly, set up in March 1921, under the chairmanship of Sir Tej Bahadur

Sapru. The Select Committee had recommended that ‘adequate facilities
should be provided in India for the preliminary training of Indians to make
them fit to enter the Royal Military College, Sandhurst’. Soon afterwards,
the C-in-C announced that the military college would be established in
Dehradun. It was inaugurated on 13 March 1922 by the Prince of Wales,