The year is 1962. A tall, sturdy IPS officer while reading the newspaper in his balcony is not convinced by the facts in an article as to why India was doomed to lose the Indo-China war and that too comprehensively. It doesn’t take him much time to connect all the dots and decipher that the war was imminent and India’s Intelligence Bureau had failed miserably to predict that in advance. And now the government was merely clearing up the mess by giving illogical explanation to the country through newspapers.

Fast forward to 1965 where conspiracy theories are abound as to why the same mistakes were allowed to happen in Operation Gibraltar (Pakistan War, 1965). India would have paid a heavy price for it and lost Kashmir if the operation by Pakistani infiltrators was successful. The event turns out to be a wake-up call for the Indian security agencies which results in the formation of Research And Analysis Wing or RAW.

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Rameshwar Nath Kao was an introvert and a man of very high intelligence. During his service in the Nehru administration, Kao had proved himself as a reliable officer and a master strategist, and therefore Indira Gandhi had no doubt about his appointment as the first chief of India’s external intelligence agency, RAW.

Kao or Ramji as he was popularly known in his private circles was the first spymaster of independent India and played a major role in the liberation of Bangladesh. Those who were close to Ramji later disclosed that India has not seen a spymaster so meticulous as Kao. Under Kao, India provided support to the freedom fighters of Mukhti Bahini in Bangladesh and helped them defeat Pakistan in Operation Searchlight.

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In the 1971 war, intelligence was thorough enough that the Indian Air Force could bomb the room in which the East Pakistan Cabinet was in session. Naval commandos were able to blow every single Pakistani ship in the Chittagong harbor. This was the zenith of Ramji’s success and made him an immediate hero in Delhi’s power circles.

Kao later on also played a major role in the merger of Sikkim into India before the Chinese forces could attempt a hostile takeover. Learning from the 1962 Indo-China war, under his guidance, RAW was able to create a new nation within three years of its existence. Such was his command over RAW that the handful of his trustworthy officers were called ‘Kaoboys’.

The following note by the Chairman of Joint Intelligence Committee K.N Daruwala sums up the man R.N Kao was –

"His contacts the world over, particularly in Asia—Afghanistan, Iran, China, you name it—were something else. He could move things with just one phone call. He was a team leader who rode out notorious inter-departmental and inter-service rivalries, which is commonplace in India."

India will remember its first ever Intelligence chief and Spymaster ‘Ramji’ as a patriot and the man who gave birth to an entire nation, single-handedly.

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