Shekhar Gupta: An argument with Ajit Doval

Not on his voting choice as he's a political appointee, but the proposition that only stable governments are strong and coalitions weak

National Security Advisor (NSA) Ajit Kumar Doval is being unfairly attacked for saying, in his Sardar Patel Memorial lecture Thursday, that for the next 10 years India needs to be a hard power and must have a stable, majority government. It shouldn’t be objectionable. The NSA isn’t a civil servant. He’s a political appointee and doesn’t need to hide his voting preferences. I won’t even fight with him if he had gone a step further and said that such a strong and decisive government could only be provided by Narendra Modi.

I would argue with him not on his political