The Brits & the Gurkhas (Satis Shroff)

The Gurkhas Win 202 Years Later (Satis Shroff)

Satis Shroff

June 09, 2009

Commentary: FALKLANDS AND THE GURKHA ISSUE (Satis Shroff)

Twenty seven years ago, the British and the Argentineans fought over the Falkland Islands and turned, the otherwise peaceful and serene South Atlantic into an inferno. The Malvinas were claimed by the Argentineans and the British. Nurse Nicci Pugh was a witness to the hostilities from a safe distance on board the hospital ship HMS Uganda. The conflict began on April 2,1982 after Argentina invaded the Falkland Islands. Britain´s PM Margaret Thatcher sent a task force which resulted in the death of 1,000 people, after which the Falklands (Malvinas) were liberated on June 14, 1982.

Much like Florence Nightingale, who left England on October 21,1854, and started caring for the wounded soldiers at Scutari, Turkey, on November 5,1854, and took a large group of women as nurses (38 women, including 18 Anglican and Roman Catholic sisters), Nicci Pugh was one of 40 nursing officers on board the hospital ship Uganda. Ms. Pugh´s job was x-ray units to provide modern hospital care facilities for the injured British Tommies, civilians and also possible Argentinean soldiers wounded in the conflict. In the ship were operating theatres, 120 beds, burn-units, labs, x-ray units, a blood bank, in addition to a helipad. The Uganda was anchored a mile south-west of San Carlos Water, where there was heavy fighting. With the knowledge that hospital ships had been sunk in previous wars through shelling or torpedoes, the ladies had to go through the angst of being bombed by the Argentinean aircraft which frequently made sorties over the Royal Navy armada.

The British staff on board the Uganda have gone on record as having treated 700 patients. Among the patients were also injured Argentinean soldiers. It might be mentioned that the ship HMS Sir Galahad was shit by enemy fire, whereby 120 patients were treated in the burns unit on board the Uganda. Some 500 surgical operations were performed. Most of the injuries were caused by gunshot, shrapnel and mortar. Amputations were also carried out due to the anti-personnel mines deployed and hidden by the Argentinean soldiers. Even the injured Argentinean soldiers were treated with the same respect and dignity.

After the war, Ms. Pugh returned to her old job in Cornwall as an OP theatre nurse, but wasn´t able to talk about her experiences for years. That was her coping method. Life had to go on. But unlike the Lady with the Lamp, Nicci Pugh didn´t have to face medical ire, and works as a voluntary carer to help injured servicemen to re-visit the Malvinas to pay their respects to their own fallen comrades, and visit the killing fields of the Falklands. But for the Gurkhas who have fought for Britain since the times of Queen Victoria till Queen Elizabeth II since 200 years, there´s no noteworthy memorial in Britain. Are the Gurkhas merely guest-workers or ´cannon fodder´ only? Britain laments that there´s no memorial for the courageous Lancaster Bomber Command which lost 55,573 out of 125,000 pilots during their deadly missions to bombard German towns and industrial complexes, collateral damage notwithstanding. But no one speaks of the courage and sacrifice of the sturdy, dedicated, loyal Gurkhas from Nepal, who laid their lives for the Glory of Great Britain, and are still doing the same for the United Kingdom. After World War I and World War II, the Gurkhas were ignominiously booked a passage to Nepal via India. Even today, instead of integration, education and service in the UK for the extraordinary service to Britain and the Queen of England since generations. They are not even tolerated when their service, i.e. unfair contract, with the Arbeitsvermittlungsagency MoD is over. The MoD is treating the Gurkhas similarly as the German government did with the so-called ´guest workers´ from Turkey, Italy, Spain and Portugal during the fifties, only to realise that they hadn´t invited guest workers but human beings, who had families, dreams, hopes of a better quality of life, the same education as their own children. Under Angela Merkel there´s a new integration model for migrants which is showing a positive trend and in accordance with the European Union´s ideas of a better world. The Gurkhas must be given the same status as their British counterparts and comrade-in-arms, the same buying power and dignity in the United Kingdom, and the UK government would do well to put an end to the discrimination that has been meted out to the Gurkhas and their families. They must be accepted and welcomed as old and new migrants, and the UK´s loyal, historical allies, instead of being discriminated on flimsy grounds. If the Gurkhas have to go to the European court it is indeed a shame for Brown´s government, which has been trying to save precious sterling pounds on the integration of the Gurkhas and has been diverting the common man´s money for other purposes.

An e-mail from Argentina

Hello Satis,

Thanks for your message. Nice to meet you. Well you're from Freiburg, 

I have a mp3 file of an audience recording from a Roxette concert 

that took place in Freiburg. Very funny...

Regarding the Falkland war, we all Argentineans feel some kind of

impotence, Imagine if one day some people broke into your house and 

take you away from your own house. We cannot do anything and I don't 

think Argentina will get back the islands. UK is a very strong country. 

Well, that's the position of Argentina. UK claims that they were always of 

their own. I don't really care who's the owner. The main point is that

the war was pointless and it was not about the islands. There were

many purposes besides these events, the war was just a disguise.

In 1982, the government in Argentina was in charge of the military, people

didn't have the right to express what they felt, everything was banned.

People was really tired. so the military government 

NEEDED something to give an incentive to the Argentineans. Something that 

proves they had the power. They made us believe that we could get back the 

islands that once were occupied by the British. That was the main purpose of the war.

UK hadn't any interest on these islands, but it was like a war trophy for

them. Obviously, it was like a fight between 2 kids, a 5 years old boy 

against a 15 years old boy. As we usually say "the bad events show the 

best and the worst from people". And the war was not an exception.

The TV always reported that we were about to win the war, they 

were always lying in order to calm down us. The media was controlled, 

including the radio, some songs were prohibited or edited. 

A certain censorship. During the war, the songs sung in English were not 

allowed to be played. And the soldiers were 18 years old teenagers, 

who were recruited by the law, they didn't know what war was really all about, 

they didn't have the right to decide what to do with their lives. It was an 

order and they must obey "the call of the country," so they were sent to the war.

In 1982 I was just a 7 years old boy, I didn't know what was happening

to my country. In all schools, there was a campaign called "A chocolate

for the soldiers". We had to write a letter to the soldiers and we

had to give them away a chocolate, that's because of the low temperature.

There were another campaigns in order to collect warm clothes and food

because the army only gave them the basic elements. And even worse

they were treated badly. Most of our hopes never arrived and those chocolates

never were sent, in fact some people stole and re-sell them later.

That's why I wrote that "Some events show the worst and the best from people".

Of course there were very nice people who helped a lot. We usually are very

kind.

The UK military also took advantage of these events. Furthermore, a retired

Chilean military recently admitted that the Chilean military helped the UK army

telling them the position of the Argentinean ships and soldiers and the

strategies they had. Everybody wanted a piece of this cake.

Besides this, the General Galtieri, the most hated person in Argentina,

was drinkin' whisky while 600 young Argentineans kids were dying.

Very sad to be true.

To sum up, there were many events and I could write pages and pages

about this. The war was pointless, I think nobody won this war,

it was a big lost for 2 countries and a benefit for a few people.

Arnaldo Mariano S., Jul 6, 2007, 10:21am EDT

http://www.zfs.uni-freiburg.de/zfs/dozent/lehrbeauftragte4/index_html/#shroff

E-mail from Satis Shroff:

Dear Arnaldo,

I can now understand your feelings about the Falkland War. I found your metaphor of the 5 year old boy fighting against the 15 year old a very appropriate comparison. Your story really moved me, even though I come originally from Nepal, the land of the Gurkhas.

Thank you very much for sharing a part of your autobiography. You really ought to write "pages and pages about this war" as you said, and let us read them at www.Gather.com.

I think it's very interesting reading. For me it was a fantastic experience to hear how the people suffered and what they thought about in those days in Argentina. This helps us to understand each other.

Even a Gurkha or Nepalese and an Argentinean can be friends. I reach out my hand to you, dear Gather friend. If more Argentineans went to Nepal on their holidays to see how the Gurkhas live and what everyday problems, dreams, hopes they have, then they would be certainly friends and understand each other. Duty, obedience and discipline take on a bitter taste after the war. Many GIs visited the former battlefields (Germany, Viet Nam, Cambodia, Japan, Burma) and met their former foes, which is a good thing, for men are not murderers when they are forced to do their duty as soldiers.

In Nepal there's no compulsory military service. The Gurkhas are professional soldiers because they never had someone to motivate them and pay their school, college and university bills. If someone is ill, one goes to the local shaman (dhamey-jhakri) for he can be paid with some eggs and a chicken. Money is scarce in the hills of Nepal. That's why the Nepalese youth from the hills join the Gurkhas. Many are school drop-outs but many can't afford to go to school. They have to do child-work in their parents' farms in the terraced, craggy hills of this beautiful Himalayan country.

That's life, Arnaldo. Let us nevertheless try to make this world a better place to live in, despite our cultural differences.

Sincerely,

Satis

Satis Shroff, Jul 6, 2007, 11:13am EDT

News from the Past: Brown´s government: arrogant & indifferent to the Gurkhas

Former Gurkha soldiers from Nepal have won the right to sue the British Government in the High Court for alleged racial discrimination. The Gurkhas allege that they have been discriminated against, in at least 20 different ways, while serving with the British army and subsequently during retirement.

Lawyers for the troops filed a claim for damages at the High Court in May in an action that could cost the Ministry of Defence £2bn. Their case is to be argued by Prime Minister Tony Blair's wife, Cherie Booth, a prominent barrister.

Nepalese soldiers have fought alongside British soldiers since 1815, and have served in recent years in the Falklands, the Gulf War, Kosovo, Bosnia, Sierra Leone and Afghanistan.

Equal pay demand: The soldiers argue that since a 1947 Tripartite Agreement between India, Nepal and the UK, the Gurkhas have been linked to the Indian Army's pay scale instead of the British army's.

They say this has resulted in a disparity between British pensions and those paid to the Gurkhas, Phil Shiner, a solicitor with the Public Interest Lawyers group which is acting for the Gurkhas, said they were hoping for a decision from the High Court before Christmas.

"So far, this government has acted with arrogance and indifference," he was quoted by the Associated Press news agency as saying.

"I hope even at this late stage that sense will prevail."

In declaring the case admissible on Tuesday, the High Court gave the Defence Ministry until 9 September to put forward its arguments in the case.

British defence: A Defence Ministry spokeswoman told Reuters that the military would "robustly defend our position in court".

"The Gurkhas are treated well and will continue to be. We value their services and treat them in a good manner," she said.

But the Gurkhas' lawyers say they have 20 test cases, claiming that 30,000 Nepalese retired from the service with inadequate or no pension, and that widows had not been properly compensated for their loss. Aside from financial complaints, they say they have been subjected to different rules on family leave, food, dress codes and religious practices.

It is not the first time that Ms Booth, who specialises in human rights abuses, has tackled her husband's government in court. In May 2000, she argued on behalf of trade unions that the government needed to offer more leave benefits to parents of young children.

That case is before the European Court.

The British and the Gurkhas: Worlds Apart? (Satis Shroff, Freiburg)

Prince William has received his coveted curved knife, the Khukri, after a four-day stint with the Gurkhas. According to a close source Prince William is seriously thinking of joining the Gurkhas. This comes at a time when the Gurkhas are battling for their pensions, human rights and dual passports. For even though generations of Nepalese soldiers called the fearsome Gurkhas, have fought Britain's colonial and other wars (Falklands, Croatia, Iraq) the Gurkhas don't have the same rights as ordinary British citizens.

It was a magnificent scenario: the proud Royal Scouts led British cadets, Territorial Army and Gurkhas over Waverly Bridge and along Princes Street. The Gurkhas were led by a man in spotted leopard cloak beating a drum, followed by vehicles with armed Gurkhas.

Who are these Gurkhas? You might ask. They are Britain's 3,500 elite soldiers from the small Himalayan country Nepal. These Gurkhas have fought and died with the British Armed Forces for two centuries. This year, according to the Scotsman (news.scotsman.com), Gurkhas have been dumped back in Nepal with a stipend by the thousand. This, after two centuries of fighting your wars for you. They are not, never have been, paid the same as a British soldier.

When it comes to money-matters, the Brits have always regarded the Gurkhas as cheap labourers and mercinaries that you can recruit in a matter of months, or even weeks. There are always 28,000 young Nepalese who want to join the Royal Gurkha Brigade. Only 200 are chosen annually. What happens to the others? Do they join the Maoists to get battle experience? I knew one named Kunjo Lama who didn't make it at the recruiting depot in Dharan (Eastern Nepal) and worked as a teacher in a Nepalese village in the hills rather than face the ignominy of returning home as the laughing stock of the hamlet dwellers. Losing one's face is something serious in the Nepalese world, and for the Nepalese psyche. But Kunjo made it at the next admissions and even took part in the Falkland War at Port Stanley against the Argentinians.He showed me a photograph from his wallet of himself and his fellow Gurkhas in front of a helicopter, armed to the teeth during the war at the Malvinas.

Sometime later during a trip to London I saw how the South Asian people were living in London's East End, where the Cockneys use to live earlier, with its brick-houses (Monica Ali's 'Brick Lane'). Nay, the Gurkhas didn't even enjoy the same status as the asylum-seekers from India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Jamaica and other former colonies, settled in London's East End or Southhall. The Gurkhas are based in Church Crookham, Hampshire, but they are lucky if they can return to their home country after fighting Britain's wars and police missions in the British Rhine Army, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Borneo, Cyprus, Falklands, Lebanon, Croatia, Kosovo, Iraq and Afghanistan.

To think that so many ethnic Nepalese mothers have lost their sons, and so many children have lost their fathers and sisters their dear brothers fighting for the Glory of Britain, is indeed worth contemplating and discussing about in the London Parliament by the new government.

The Gurkhas, who are ruthless warriors at war, have always been obedient, loyal, disciplined and subordinate to their British officers for 200 years. Their loyalty and bravery have always been unfaltering. Had Indira Gandhi taken the Gurkhas as her personal bodyguards like the Queen of England, instead of the Sikhs, at a time when the storming of the Golden Temple of Amritsar was a big issue in Punjab and India, I'm sure she would have lived longer. 

But most South Asians think: that's kismat. It was written in her fate that she had to die a violent death. Schicksalsdenken.

A Gurkha serves in the Army a minimum of fifteen and a maximum of thirty years after which they are discharged and obliged to leave Britain for Nepal. No, they aren't allowed to stay on, settle down and enjoy the English countryside with their meagre pensions, as far as English lifestyles and pays-scales are concerned. This speaks for the British government's nefarious 'special treaty' with the Gurkhas and the Royal Narayanhiti Palace in Kathmandu (Nepal). Nepal now has a republican government, with a Maoist as its head, the king has been ousted, and it is hoped that the new Nepalese government will make positive amendments or scrap the treaty and draw a new one with equal human rights and dual citizenships for the Gurkhas.

The British government always uses Nepal's government pay-scales as a yardstick to pay off their loyal Gurkhas. There are so many British citizens working all over the world but what would happen if they were paid according to the laws existing under the rule of Queen Victoria and received the same pay scale as in those days. The Gurkhas are not living in the past but in the present, and the cost of living is high everywhere and their families need food, clothing and education. Gurkhas aren't social cases for the men have been enlisted by Her Majesty's officers at Dharan (Nepal) to serve in the Gurkha Brigades, which officers like to emphasise as an integral part of the British Army. The British government realised soon enough that the India of the former Raj-subjects were being qualified, and were clever at Oxford and Cambridge and they wouldn't tolerate the master-and-servant relationship which the burra sahibs had propagated during the Raj.

But Nepal is another matter. The Ranas and Shahs have exploited the country and its manpower resource for longer than two centuries and were to blame for the bad manpower management deals with the then British government. Another factor that is to Nepal's disadvantage is the fact that Nepal wasn't really conquered by the East India Company, and has thus never belonged to the British Commonwealth. That explains why the wealth and equality hasn't reached Nepal's Himalayan boundaries as yet, for the targets of equality are always specific and comprise aristocratic privilege, capitalist wealth, bureaucratic power, racial or sexual supremacy, and the desire of a group of people to dominate their fellows.

Today, we have the possibility of doing away with these discriminations and injustices. Under Gordon Brown we have the chance to give the Gurkhas a helping hand of real friendship, and not only lip-service, and make good. 

Prior to the EU-membership of East Bloc countries, when a Polish worker came to help pluck the strawberries in the vicinity of Freiburg (Germany), they weren't paid the actual rate for west workers in Germany either. Now that the Poles have no zlotys, and are paid in euros in their own countries, it doesn't seem to be lucrative to go all the way to Germany, with the result that the strawberries get overripe and go kaputt. Ethnic Germans are reluctant to do this back-breaking job under the blazing sun.

The British Army once sacked 111 Gurkhas, and as a result the Gurkhas wrote a petition to the Queen of England to help the men who had been sent to Nepal, and to improve the treatment of the Gurkhas (who had after all fought for Britain in the Falklands) throughout the Army. The petition to Queen Elizabeth II was signed: Your Majesty's most obedient servants. The all (sic) ranks of SP 1/7th Gurkha Rifles.

A question that vexed me is why the Gurkha children have to do the SLC (School Leaving Certificate) exams of Nepal, instead of the GCSE 'A' levels, like all school-kids in England? The British government and the Nepalese monarchs never appreciated the importance of better, higher education for the offsprings of the Gurkhas. With British educational certificates and degrees thousands of sons and daughters of the Gurkhas would have had better chances in their lives and would be much better off than their soldiering Dads and brothers. The idea from the start was to put the Gurkhas and their families in ghettos alias barracks or lines, and no attempts were made to integrate them and their families in the British society.

If a Gurkha would join France's Foreign Legion, they'd be taught the French language and would get a much better status in the French society than the British give to the Gurkhas. I don't want to say alas, but Nepal just wasn't a French colony, though the French managed to come up to an enclave named Pondicherry in India. Nepal has no special relationships with the French but with the British

There have been isolated instances of Gurkhas involved in recent courtroom skirmishes with the British Ministry of Defence to receive the same pension and conditions as other British soldiers. Whereas an ex-Gurkha received 40,000 English pounds payment from Britain after a court ruling, which was an isolated instance, another Gurkha claim was rejected by a Nepal court. 'Better to die than be a coward' is the motto of the Gurkha warriors who are an integral part of the British Army. It should run 'better to fight a battle with a good lawyer against the Ministry of Defence than against Britains foes, as we say in Germany: bis die Fronten geklärt sind.

Britain and its admirable people still have to do a bit of soul-searching on the question of their best friends-in-arms. The officers in the administration and the Defence Ministry think of the Gurkhas still as cannon-fodder and not as humans, at eye-level with the same rights and equality. They still play the game of the Raj: masters and servants. This must not be tolerated and must be put to an end by the new government at 10 Downing Street, for they have gone too far. It is hoped that the impeccable British people will rally around and support the brave, but legally weak, Gurkhas by giving them a helping hand. I know that the British people do give a helping hand to the underdogs of their own or other societies when necessary, and that I appeal to their fairness.

What is the difference between an asylum-seeker and a Gurkha in Britain? In the long run the asylum-seeker gets a British passport, British pay (if he or she's qualified) and British rights and his or her children kindergartens, schools, colleges and universities in Britain, and become a part of the British mainstream. Not so the Gurkhas and their families.

Due to questionable 'special relations' between Britain and Nepal that haven't been ratified yet, the poor Gurkha and his family have to say goodbye to Britain and head for the barren hills of Nepal. That's the plight of what Sir Ralph Turner MC, 3rd Queen Alexandra's Own Gurkha Rifles, 1931 said, "Bravest of the brave, most generous of the generous, never had a country more faithful friends than you." 

When you think of how true, loyal friends are treated for their faithfulness in even present-day Britain, you can only shake your head or hide in shame. 

During the Falklands War out in the Malvinas under Margret Thatcher's primiership, the British were put in an embarassing situation by Argentina's UN- representative when he accused the British of having deployed 'Gurkha mercinary' troops. The British government demented that and said it had special relationsships with Nepal and that the Gurkhas were its own troops, belonging to and integrated in the British Army.

But the sad reality is: when a British leutenant saunters by, a Gurkha-Major is obliged to salute him! And not the other way around. This still means that all soldiers are equal in the British or Gurkha army, but some solders are more equal than the others, George Orwell's Animal Farm, which Gurkha school children learn in good English schools in India's Darjeeling and Nepal. In this context it must be mentioned that over 50,000 Gurkhas died in the two World Wars under the Union Jack and another thousand since then, even though the Gurkhas were reduced and demobilised to Brigade strength in the British and Regiment strength in the Indian Army. This was after the partition of India in 1947 after an agreement between Nepal, India and Britain, whereby four regiments from the Indian Army were transferred to the British Army, which then became the Gurkha Brigade. 

It's still the white sahib commanding the natives, despite the so-called handsome pensions that the Gurkhas receive, according to Nepalese standards. When I lecture in Switzerland I earn almost 100 Swiss Francs per hour, like all Swiss and German lecturers, without discrimination about my origin and descent. I think that it's high time that the Gurkhas received the same wages as their British fellow soldiers. Please don't come up with the Sugauli Treaty or 'special relations crap' that dates to the times of Queen Victoria and Junga Bahadur Rana. We are living in modern times and democracy exists in England since a long time. The world has learned from the British what fairness is not only in sport but in everyday life.

I think it's high time that the Gurkhas went to an international court in Strassburg, Belgium UN(NY) and received Flankenschutz from Human Rights Organisations in Britain, Britain Watch, NGOs and whatever. Sally and rally around and give the Gurkhas a helping hand so that they can also have equal rights and their sons can receive education in Britain and when they are qualified they can work and live there. They are not exotic creatures, they are human beings who also ought to have equal human rights. Britain still has the chance to repair the damage it has done towards the Gurkhas by giving their children a decent English education, for education is the best gift we can give to children. Give education to a Gurkha child and you have given him or her something very valuable and priceless and they will be thankful all their lives.

(This article was published on The American Chronicle, Blogspot.com, Swiss.com, Gather.com, Ning.com, Wordpress and a host of other publications & websites in the years 2007-2008. It bears information on the Gurkhas and their problems. But now the Gurkhas have won and Gordon Brown has capitulated, thanks to a charming, politically active, courageous lady named Joanna Lumley who beat Brown in his own game. Her father, by the way, was rescued by a Gurkha and she never forgot it and thanked the Gurkhas in her own way. Gurkha hats off to a great lady).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iqQ5yXSBkno&NR=1