The Brave: Param Vir Chakra Stories (25 page)

After the Indian soldiers have taken over the first sangar, they move to the second. They are unaware that, anticipating an attack, the enemy soldiers have climbed out of their bunker and have taken up positions further up the mountain from where they will target the Indians at point-blank range. All of the Indians are shot at. Two of them will never rise again. Naib Subedar Ramesh Singh survives but he is not destined to live long. He will come back alive but meet his end in Kashmir soon after. Sanjay Kumar is the one who embraces life despite three bullets in his leg and two in his hip. He and his surviving comrades lie back on the rocks and pretend to be dead.

The enemy soldiers aim 15 minutes ofcontinuous fire at them and then, presuming them dead, start climbing down to the third sangar, which is further down the slope. This is when Sanjay Kumar and his mates make a superhuman effort. Despite their injuries, they storm the next sangar. They find it deserted except for dead bodies and unused ammunition. They turn the enemy’s machinegun at the fleeing soldiers and shoot them in cold blood before they can reach the safety of the third bunker.

When they take final stock of the captured area, they find 15 bodies of Pakistani soldiers, a large cache of arms and ammunition, snow huts and tents. They sit down, bleeding from their injuries, using their first-aid kits, waiting for help to reach them. By 5. 30 pm, the unit doctor reaches the bunkers. He gives the men painkillers and first aid. The rest of the team helps the injured to climb down to the base since the heights are too dangerous for stretchers to be used.

It takes Sanjay Kumar the entire night to hobble down. It is 9. 30 a. m. when he reaches the Mushkoh valley from where an ambulance takes him to the field hospital at Ghumri. There are still five bullets lodged in his body; miraculously, none of them has touched his bones or vital organs. What amazes the doctors even more is that he is conscious and walking despite the unbearable pain and blood loss. After the bullets are taken out and his wounds stitched up, a helicopter shifts him to the military hospital at Srinagar. The nurse on duty is surprised that despite being bone tired he will not close his eyes. He doesn’t tell her that he has seen his friends shot and dying in front of his eyes. He has killed men he never knew. He has pulled out burning guns with his hands. He has walked with bullets lodged in his body. He has suffered a degree of pain that will haunt him for life. He has scars that will remind him of a war fought on a cold, craggy ridge where mere mortals went beyond the natural instinct for self-preservation to fulfil their duty towards their country.

It takes him some time to accept that after more than a month ofdodging death on a freezing mountain, his life is not at risk, he has no enemy to vanquish, his mind is without fear. He lets his mind take him to his old parents who live in the small Bhakhra- water encircled village of Bakain in Himachal Pradesh, where he ran across the green fields as a little boy. Under the influence of a heavy sedative and painkillers, he finally closes his eyes to the horrors of war and drifts offto sleep.

Sanjay Kumar was born on 3 March 1976 in Bakaingaon near Bilaspur, Himachal Pradesh, a small village with a population of 650, where the forces are a popular career choice. He was the youngest in his family, born after three sisters and two brothers. His father was a farmer who managed to make just enough to feed and clothe his family and send his children to school.

Sanjay started going to the Kalol High School, about a kilometre from his village, when he was in class one and continued to go there till he had completed his tenth standard. Since his elder brother was in the ITBP and his father’s brother in the Army, Sanjay also wanted to join the armed forces. In 1994, after completing class 10, he went to Delhi to learn to drive a taxi. For some time, he earned money driving taxis but he also kept checking for Army recruitment drives. In January 1996, he got selected at a recruitment rally in Jabalpur and was enrolled in the Army as a soldier and sent to 13 JAK Rif. Sanjay Kumar’s regiment had completed its CI Ops (counter-insurgency operations) tenure in Sopore, Kashmir, and was on its way to Shahjahanpur when the war broke out with Kargil. He was amongst those sent to fight in Dras and the Mushkoh valley.

‘Sometimes, the afternoon when we attacked the enemy sangar flashes before my eyes and my skin breaks out into goosebumps. But most days, I don’t think about it. There was nothing special about me. I was like any other boy who grew up in a village. I was never brave till I joined the Army. It was my training that gave me the courage to do what I did. Any other soldier in my place would have done the same, ‘ says Sanjay, closing the last in a series of interviews with polite finality.

I have already made him late for lunch and he will have to hurry since he cannot reach his afternoon duties late. ‘Ab mujhe jana hoga, jawan mera intezaar kar rahe honge,’ (I will have to leave, the soldiers must be waiting for me) he says apologetically. He doesn’t wait to hear my ‘thank you’.

Based on conversations with Hav Sanjay Kumar, PVC.

It takes a one-and-half-hour flight out of Delhi and then as much time by road to drive from Kangra airport to Bandla Gaon in Palampur, Himachal Pradesh. The snow-covered Dhauladhar ranges appear and disappear at bends in the winding road and dazzle you with their magnificence. And the fragrant white roses that dot the airport and make the tourists gasp in pleasure follow you all the way to Vikram Batra Bhawan, where the late Captain Vikram Batra’s old parents stay in a bright-yellow-walled bungalow. There, they stop and bloom outside the room where an oil portrait of Capt. Batra hangs on a wall. His father sits before it, draped in a pashmina shawl, asking his wife to get you a hot cup of tea, or lay the table for lunch or just corroborate what he is saying from the confines of her bedroom where she is reading the local newspaper.

On the narrow, meandering path that crosses lush green tea gardens on one side and lazy market-places on the other it is not difficult to get directions to the Param Vir Chakra (PVC) awardee’s house. All you have to do is mention his name and young boys with wispy moustaches, old men with doddering gait, spectacled tailors with scissors in their hands and schoolgirls with red-ribboned plaits happily guide you with words and gestures of the hand. You don’t really need the address that the gravelly voice of Mr Girdhari Lal Batra,

Vikram’s father, has painstakingly spelled out for you a day ago.

Not very many years back, a little boy with a puff in his hair and a twinkle in his eye roamed these very walkways, often alongside his identical twin. Luv and Kush. That was what their mother called them. They didn’t have a television set at home and would slip their feet into their rubber slippers so they could sneak out of their house to Nisha Didi’s next door so they could watch the TV serial
Param Vir Chakra
which aired on Sunday mornings at 10 a. m. The twins would be shiny- eyed and open-mouthed marvelling at the bravery of the men who had been awarded free India’s highest gallantry medal. Afterwards, lost in conversation about just how brave the heroes in uniform had been and just how awesome the PVC was, they would walk back home.

One of the twins would actually hold the medal in his hand one day. The other wouldn’t, but he would be the one responsible for getting it home—this boy was the feistier of the twins. His name was Luv. The same Luv, whose house a writer would come looking for nearly three decades later. By then he would have become Capt. Vikram Batra, the 24-year-old soldier who fought for his country on the rocky mountains of Kashmir and died trying to save another soldier.

When she was blessed with twins after the birth of two daughters, Kamal Kanta would wonder sometimes why she had been given two sons when she had asked for just one. ‘Now I know. One of them was meant for the country and one for us,’ she would later say. All she has of Vikram are portraits and pictures and medals and memories that she is happy to share.

She remembers the day a colleague at the school where she used to teach had told her that she had spotted Vikram at the hospital. Panicking, she had rushed there to find him with a few cuts and bruises on his body, smiling broadly. He had jumped out of the moving school bus when the door had opened suddenly at a steep turn and a little girl had lost her balance and fallen off. When his upset mother had asked him why he had been so foolhardy, he had told her he was worried that the girl would come under another bus.

Right from his childhood, Vikram was bold and fearless and always ready to help a person in need. Another time, he ran from pillar to post trying to get a gas cylinder for a new teacher in the school. The teacher had just moved to Palampur and asked for Vikram’s help when he had just not been able to manage one despite all efforts. Vikram promised him that he would get him a cylinder by evening and had kept his word, carting it all the way to the teacher’s house in an auto- rickshaw from the market.

In addition to his gregarious nature—he had a vast circle of friends—his inclination to help any and everyone and his happy temperament, Vikram was brilliant at studies and a national-level table tennis player. He was judged the best NCC Air Wing cadet for North Zone. He had even received a call letter from the merchant navy, and got all his uniforms stitched, but at the last moment decided not to join, telling his beleaguered father that his dream was to become an Army officer.

He took admission in Chandigarh, prepared for the combined defence services exam and got through just as he had promised his parents. The Batras went for his passing- out parade. They were thrilled to see their handsome son in uniform and wondered just how high he would go. They didn’t know then that a few years later, the then Chief of Army Staff, General Ved Prakash Malik would sit in their house and tell them that if Vikram had not been martyred in Kargil, he would have been sitting in his office one day. It would make Mr Batra’s chest fill with pride in spite of the tears threatening to spill over.

13 Jammu and Kashmir Rifles (JAK Rif. ) had completed its Kashmir tenure and the advance party had reached Shahjahanpur, its new location, when it was recalled because war had broken out. After crossing the Zoji La Pass and halting at Ghumri for acclimatization, it was placed under 56 Brigade and asked to reach Dras to be the reserve of 56 Brigade for the capture of Tololing. 18 Grenadiers had tried to get Tololing in the initial days of the conflict but had suffered heavy casualties. Eventually, 2 Rajputana Rifles had got Tololing back.

After the capture, the men of 13 JAK Rif. walked for 12 hours from Dras to reach Tololing where Alpha Company took over Tololing and a portion of the Hump Complex from 18 Grenadiers. It was at the Hump Complex that commanding officer (CO) Lieutenant Colonel Yogesh Joshi sat in the cover of massive rocks and briefed the two young officers he had tasked with the capture of Pt. 5140, the most formidable feature in the Dras sub-sector. They could see the peak right in front with enemy bunkers at the top but from that distance they could not make out the enemy strength. To Lt Vikram Batra of Delta Company and Lt Sanjeev Jamwal of Bravo Company, that didn’t matter. They were raring to go.

Col Joshi had decided that these would be the two assaulting companies that would climb up under cover of darkness from different directions and dislodge the enemy. The two young officers were listening to him quietly as he spoke. Having briefed both, he asked them what the success signals of their companies would be once they had completed their tasks. Jamwal immediately replied that his success signal would be: ‘Oh! Yeah, yeah, yeah!’ He said that when he was in the National Defence Academy, he belonged to the Hunter Squadron, and this used to be their slogan. Lt Col Joshi then turned to Vikram and asked him what his signal would be. Vikram thought for a while and then said it would be: ‘Yeh dil mange more!’ (This heart wants more!)

Despite the seriousness of the task at hand, his CO could not suppress a smile and asked him why. Full of confidence and enthusiasm, Vikram replied that he would not want to stop after that one success and would be on the lookout for more bunkers to capture.

It was a pitch-dark night. Lt Col Yogesh Joshi was sitting at the base of the hump from where preparatory bombardment of Pt. 5140 had commenced. He was trying to make out the movement of his troops he knew would be climbing up under cover of darkness. The Indian artillery had plastered the entire feature with high explosives. For a long time, it appeared as if the mountain was on fire and Joshi hoped that the enemy on top was dead. His hopes were, however, dashed very quickly. The Pakistanis had occupied reverse slope positions when the Indian artillery was pounding them and had now returned to fire at the Indian soldiers climbing up. From time to time, Joshi would see flashes on the dark mountain. From that he would know that the enemy was firing at his men and also just where the two teams had reached.

The enemy had also started using artillery illumination at regular intervals, which lit up the entire area for about 40 seconds. This was done to spot the climbing Indian soldiers. Joshi hoped that his boys were following the standard drill, which was that everyone freezes and tries to blend into the surroundings when the area lights up like daylight. Movement would make them visible.

Suddenly, his radio set came alive and he could make out the voice of a Pakistani soldier. He was challenging Batra, whose code name Sher Shah the enemy had intercepted. ‘Sher Shah, go back with your men, or else only your bodies will go down.’ The radio set crackled and then he heard Batra reply, his voice pitched high in excitement: ‘Wait for an hour and then we’ll see who goes back alive.’ At 3. 30 a. m., the CO’s radio set crackled again. ‘Oh! Yeah, yeah, yeah!’ It was Jamwal signalling that his part of the peak had been captured. Batra and his team were taking longer since they were climbing up the steeper incline.

The next one hour was to be one of the longest for Lt Col Joshi. He could hear gunfire and see the flash of gunpowder, but had no idea what was happening at Pt. 5140. Finally, at 4. 35 a. m., in the cold of the darkness, his radio set beeped again and he heard the now-famous words: ‘Yeh dil mange more!’ It was Batra. He and his men had captured the peak and unfurled the Tricolour there. What was most amazing was that in this attack, the Indian side did not suffer a single casualty.

After coming down, Batra would call his parents on the satellite phone. For a moment, his father would stop breathing because he would just hear ‘captured’ and feel that he had been captured. But then the laughing soldier would clarify that he had actually captured an enemy post. He would then call his girlfriend Dimple in Chandigarh and tell her not to worry. He was fine and she should take care of herself. That was the last time he would speak to her.

Vikram’s next assignment would be Pt. 4875, from where he would not come back alive but he would leave Dimple with memories she was willing to spend a lifetime with. The battalion was de-inducted from Dras to Ghumri to rest and recoup. Less than a week later, they moved to Mushkoh. This was where greater glory was in store for Vikram.

Dimple is a pretty, smiling 40-year-old, who works with a Punjab State Education Board school in Chandigarh. She teaches social studies and English to the students of classes 6-10. Till 3. 30 p. m., she is busy with the children, taking classes, checking test papers, planning the next day’s lessons. She has no time to even take a phone call. But after she gets back home and sits down with a cup of tea, she confesses that in the past 14 years, not a day has passed when she has not thought of Vikram.

Chandigarh is full of his memories for her, she says. ‘When I pass the bus stop I remember how I would drop him there so that he could catch a bus to wherever he was going; when I’m in the University I remember how I first noticed him when he came and sat between me and a guy who was trying to get uncomfortably close and subtly told me to move from there. When I’m in the Nada Saheb gurudwara I remember how he tailed me in a parikrama (circumambulation) and then called out: “Congratulations, Mrs Batra, we have completed the fourth phera (circle) and, according to your Sikh religion, we are now man and wife. “ When I’m near Pinjore gardens I remember how before going to Kashmir he took a blade from his wallet, cut his thumb and put a streak of blood in my parting to dispel all my insecurities about whether he would marry me or not... ‘