June-July 1999 saw some of the most bitterly fought battles in the Kargil War. Colonel Gaurav Chaturvedi looks back on those days -- and the extraordinary saga of the men he fought alongside.
Key Points
- 'Kargil War was a full-scale conventional war.'
- 'The artillery duels turned night into day.'
- A soldier fights for his buddy, his company and his battalion. These are the people he fights for when he is under heavy fire.'
"Love from your fellow soldier is the most unconditional love you can ever get," says Colonel Gaurav Chaturvedi, a Special Forces officer from the elite Parachute Regiment who fought in the Mushkoh Valley in the Kargil War.
After joining the army at 21 in 1991, following the footsteps of his father who had also served in the same unit and was severely wounded in the 1971 Indo-Pak war, Colonel Chaturvedi was already a battle-hardened soldier when the Kargil War broke out in the summer of 1999.
In eight years of service, he had served high-intensity field tenures in Siachen, Manipur and Jammu and Kashmir when his unit, the 7 Para special forces, received orders to report for war.
He had been in gun battles, raids and encounters with terrorists in the North East.
He had seen his buddy and radio operator killed by terrorist sniper during a patrol in the jungles of Manipur at age 21.
He had been through the baptism of fire, not once, but several times.
Yet when he reached Mushkoh, he realised he had never encountered such fierce barrage of enemy artillery fire.
These were not skirmishes he had seen in the jungles of the North East.
This was a full-scale conventional war.
The day soldiers from the 7 Para unit landed in Drass, the assault to recapture Tiger Hill and Tololing had already been launched by other units of the army.
From their loading point, they could see heavy shelling and fire as young Indian soldiers fought ferociously to win back those peaks, one bloody inch at a time.
Point 4875.
Pimple Complex.
Point 4590.
Point 4700
Point 5140... and many more.
The Pakistanis had occupied a string of heights from where they attacked the National Highway 1, the lifeline to Ladakh. One by one, in a series of brutal assaults which are now part of military folk-lore, Indian soldiers won each one of those back.
Captain Vikram Batra was awarded the Param Vir Chakra for the assault on the strategic Point 4875 in the Drass sector.
Captain Anuj Nayyar awarded the Maha Vir Chakra.
Both young men just 23-24 years of age, killed in action fighting heroically alongside each other on July 7.
Colonel Gaurav, who held the rank of major during the war, had met Captain Batra just a few days earlier. While his troops helped bring Captain Nayyar's mortal remains down the steep mountains.
The Mushkoh Valley witnessed many casualties and injuries. The fighting was fierce; each victory paid in blood.
"The artillery duels turned night into day. It was prolonged -- 100 rounds of relentless fire. There was only smoke and fire on the road. I still get goose bumps thinking about it."
"It was beyond adrenalin," remembers Colonel Gaurav.
The paratroopers were tasked to open up the route to the Bakarwal Ridge and clear Point 4700 of the enemy.
The track was flanked by a mountain on the right and a river on the left.
Pakistani troops entrenched on advantageous heights fired at Indian soldiers from the hill tops. As 7 Para worked through the shelling, they could see artillery fire streak through the sky and fall into the river.
Not knowing for certain if the Pakistanis had occupied Point 4700 or vacated it, a detachment was led by Captain Ajay Kumar, an expert in mountain warfare.
The steep and rocky peak was scaled in bone-chilling temperatures in extremely dangerous high-altitude terrain.
"The Pakistanis held up their fire till they were 200-300 metres away, and then opened up. The whole party fell down."
Captain Ajay and Lieutenant Vrijendra Singh Lingwal fell down a gorge and could not be located for 3 days. They were surrounded by the enemy.
"The enemy was firing and rolling down stones to pin the rest of us down. We were trying to probe how many they were in numbers and also trying to ascertain if Captain Ajay and Lieutenant Lingwal were alive or dead."
"We were in the fog of war. It was very confusing."
The success of operations on the adjacent peaks shifted artillery support towards 4700, and helped them move forward.
The unit climbed up the vertical rock face under direct fire to claim victory at Point 4700.
Both Captain Ajay and Lieutenant Lingwal survived, and later rose to become distinguished colonels. The team of para commandoes launched a final assault and captured the peak in the early hours of July 12.
Naik Gopal Singh was killed in action in the heroic attack. The post is now called Gopal Top.
"A soldier fights for his buddy, his company and his battalion. These are the people he fights for when he is under heavy fire," says Colonel Gaurav who has been in many gun battles in a military career spanning 25 years.
"You trust them with your life. You are most alive when you are almost dead. You are most alert. You can feel every leaf move."
"Indian Army officers lead from the front. Their men follow -- and will fight for you till their last breath."
The men of 7 Para lost another soldier in the action in Mushkoh.
A Pakistani artillery burst took the life a young Naik Bhanwar Singh who was seeing his first war. Shrapnel from a shell that exploded on the tract behind the truck ripped the canvas of the vehicle that was carrying the soldiers to the loading point in Drass.
From there they were to start a brutal climb on foot to Bakarwal. The objective was to capture Point 4960 which directly overlooked Point 4700 so that the enemy could not return to recapture that hard-won peak.
What happened next was sent to me in a WhatsApp message by Colonel Gaurav.
So touching was the content of his message that I have not been able to take it out of my mind. It tells you everything about honour, brotherhood and the soldiers' creed.
I have tried to paraphrase it below. It might move you to tears.
The truck was loaded with 19 men and ammunition. It was led by two young officers, Captain R S Chib and Lieutenant Abhijeet Singh.
As splinters burst into the truck, the vehicle came to a grinding halt, keeling towards one side, and the soldiers jumped out through the smoke and acrid smell.
When the headcount was done, there was one soldier less.
It was Naik Bhanwar Singh. The shrapnel had shattered his skull and face.
He had collapsed and died instantly.
Just before the explosion, he had told a fellow soldier to ensure that if something were to happen to him, his wife should get the Rs 25,000 he had kept in his trunk for his daughter's wedding.
Naik Bhanwar's Singh's senior Subedar Mukhtiyar Singh then stepped into the truck where the young soldier he had mentored and trained had met a violent end.
The violence of war stared back at the battle-heartened subedar from the floor of the truck.
A proud Sikh and an experienced soldier, Mukhtiyar Singh Sahab did something that took the breaths out his band of brothers.
He opened his turban, the symbol of Sikh pride, sat down beside Naik Bhanwar Singh's remains and bound the skull to his torso with the full length of the turban cloth.
It was a bandage made of the most dignified fabric to hold his junior's shattered skull.
Subedar Mukhtiyar Singh bade a final goodbye to the soldier under his command with the greatest honour from the battlefield. A jeep from the convoy under the charge of Lieutenant Abhijeet Singh took his mortal remains back to Gumri.
The remaining 18 soldiers in the truck continued their journey to the battleground.
They waded through high icy streams and climbed arduous heights with heavy guns and ammunition on their backs to capture Point 4960.
They fought and won for their fallen brother-in-arms Naik Bhanwar Singh. [Years later Naik Bhanwar's Singh's son joined the Indian Army as an officer.]
The Kargil War IS replete with similar sagas of courage, some told, many untold.
Every year, during the months of May-July, the victory is commemorated and remembered as Vijay Diwas. Soldiers killed in action in superhuman acts of bravery have become the stuff of legend.
The victory in Kargil was as much about them as it was about Naik Bhanwar Singh, Naik Gopal Singh, Subedar Mukhtiyar Singh, Colonel Ajay Kumar, Lieutenant Singwal, Colonel Gaurav Chaturvedi and many, many more.
Colonel Chaturvedi went on to see fiercer action fighting terrorists as commanding officer in the Assam Rifles in the North East and in operations in the Siachen Glacier.
After his retirement from the army, he built a successful corporate career.
"Life catches up with you, but there is not a single day when you don't have it at the back of your mind" says Colonel Gaurav when I ask him if the July-August months remind him of those days of the war.
"Kargil was very, very fierce with intense active combat. But I have been part of many other missions which were fiercer, more dangerous."
"All those remain with you for life."
In 2018, Colonel Gaurav travelled with his family and fellow officer Brigadier Sameer Karol who served alongside him on many field posting to Kargil and Leh.
He wanted to remember those hard battles and honour the memories of soldiers who had fought and bled together.
Then one day, he wants to return to the jungles of North Manipur and walk the track where he lost two buddies to terrorist sniper fire over 30 years ago -- and where he carried out many daring ops.
Soldiering is about bonds forged in the face of gun battles. Bonds that endure beyond death -- and whenever Colonel Gaurav Chaturvedi makes that journey, he will be honouring that brotherhood.
Photographs curated by Manisha Kotian/Rediff
Feature Presentation: Aslam Hunani/Rediff
