Author: Archana Masih
Publication: Rediff on Net
Date: June 17, 2004
URL: http://specials.rediff.com/news/2004/jun/17karg1.htm
Lieutenant Vikram Batra knew he
only had one night.
Dawn would hit Peak 5140 earlier
than the rest of Jammu and Kashmir and he only had a few hours to complete
his mission.
Pakistani invaders had taken positions
in bunkers at a height of 17,000 feet. From their vantage point, the enemy
could see the advance of the Indian troops and target them -- killing them
as they climbed the steep incline.
Lieutenant Batra and Captain Sanjeev
Jamwal -- both from the Kangra valley in Himachal Pradesh -- were ordered
to recapture the peak in the cover of darkness on the night of June 19,
1999, about five weeks after the Kargil war began.
The operation was much too dangerous
to be carried out during the day.
Aware of the enemy's advantage,
Lt Batra -- who was later promoted to captain on the battlefield -- decided
he would attack the enemy from the rear. He commanded his men to climb
the treacherous mountain stealthily.
Peak 5140, the highest point on
the Tololing Ridge, was one of the most arduous and crucial peaks in the
Drass region. If it fell, it would clear the Pakistanis from that sector
and pave the way for further victories.
He knew they had to win.
Captain Vikram Batra in the Drass
sector
It was dark and cold. The men crawled,
quietly. A wrong move could take them to their death down the rocky ridge
and Batra, who had earned an instructor's grade as a commando, was determined
not to lose any men.
He was deeply upset when a terrorist's
bullet meant for him had struck his man behind him during his first posting
in the terrorist- prone region of Sopore in Jammu and Kashmir.
'Didi, it was meant for me and I
lost my man,' he had told his elder sister over the phone.
But tonight his guide was the framed
motto of the Indian Military Academy, Dehra Dun, that he had brought home
to Palampur, Himachal Pradesh, at the end of his training.
The safety, honor and welfare of
your country come first always and everytime.
The honor, welfare and comfort of
the men you command come next.
Your own ease, comfort and safety
come last, always and everytime.
The motto had been molded into his
heart as a Gentleman Cadet. There was no better time to live by it than
now -- when India was at war and he, in his first major battle.
Durga Mata ki jai' -- their battle
cry tore the night sky as 24-year-old Vikram and his men assaulted the
enemy.
The bunkers were destroyed, many
enemy soldiers killed and 13 J&K Rifles won a decisive victory.
All his men had made it alive.
Vikram was elated. 'Yeh Dil Maangey
More' -- the Pepsi catchline those days -- he told his commander at base
camp.
His words became the catchline for
the Kargil war.
Vikram Batra had led a brilliant
operation in one of India's toughest campaigns in mountain warfare. His
men swore by him. General Ved Prakash Malik, then the Chief of the Army
Staff, called to congratulate him. His triumph was being beamed from television
screens across the country.
Photographs of him and his men striding
the captured Pakistani gun at the base camp made it to every newspaper.
In a time of war, he became the
face of the young Indian soldier who fought ferociously and died fearlessly.
His code name was Sher Shah.
The other soldier India knew with
the same name had lived in the Middle Ages and was called 'The Lion King.'
Sher Shah Suri was an accomplished commander who defeated the Mughal emperor
Humayun and sat on the throne of Delhi for five years.
Vikram Batra was the hero of the
nation. Two weeks after his conquest of 5140, people would remember him
as the Lion of Kargil.
Daddy, I've captured.'
G L Batra can never forget that
phone call that June morning. Vikram's voice was cracking through the satellite
phone. He was talking too fast and wasn't clear at all.
For a moment, he thought his son
was captured. But the school principal knew it was preposterous to think
that he would be allowed to call his parents if he were a prisoner of war.
Yet he was frightened and asked Vikram to speak clearly.
'Oh Daddy, I've captured the enemy's
post. I'm OK, I'm OK.'
'Bete [son], I'm proud of you,'
replied Mr Batra, 'may God bless you to carry on your task there.'
It was the happiest moment of his
life. He had named his son 'Vikram' because the name spelled character
and strength and he had lived up to it.
It was the morning of June 20, 1999.
Through the previous night Vikram had commanded a daring operation and
his father reveled in his accomplishment.
The capture of 5140 would finally
lead to the decisive fall of Tiger Hill, and to India's eventual victory.
Nine days later, Vikram called from
base camp. He was leaving for another crucial operation.
He never called again.
G L Batra in the office at the petrol
pump awarded by the government in Vikram's honour
G L Batra and his wife Kamal saw
glimpses of their son on television. He looked different with his beard
and camouflaged jacket.
Like always, he was brimming with
confidence and his spirit was soaring.
Like always, that smile never left
his face.
Mrs Batra's heart had lurched when
Vikram called to tell her that his unit was being sent to the Kargil front.
The last war India had fought was
in 1971, three years before Vikram and his twin, Vishal, were born. He
was just 24, had served in the Indian Army for only 18 months -- what if.
She quickly pushed that thought
out of her mind. If all mothers were to think that their children shouldn't
join the army, who would protect this vast nation?
When she heard that he had captured
his first peak it was as if she had won.
She had lived most of her life in
the lap of the Dhauladhar mountains in Palampur. She saw the mountains
each day and knew them as invincible. Now her son was telling her that
he had captured a perilous peak like the Dhauladhar, maybe even higher.
She felt proud like only a mother
could be.
G L and Kamal Batra at their home
in Palampur
Vikram you are going for another
crucial operation, what are your thoughts at this moment?'
Mr Batra watched his son on the
evening news when the television reporter questioned him at the base camp.
Over the past few days, the school
principal had tried to catch a glimpse of his son after he came home every
day. But that day something about Vikram left him uneasy.
'I wish the families of the deceased
soldiers are looked after well by the government and society,' Vikram replied
and turned his face from the camera.
Sitting in his home, hundreds of
miles away, Mr Batra read the facial expressions of his son and instantly
knew what was going on in his mind.
Vikram doubted his return, Mr Batra
thought.
This time, the father turned away
from the television screen and broke down.
His wife asked him why he had suddenly
become so sad. He did not have the courage to tell her what he felt.
At that moment he knew their son
wasn't coming back.
Kamal Batra with a picture of Vikram.
His cap and the Indian flag that had wrapped his body is kept in front.
The last time Vikram was home with
his family in Palampur was during the Holi festival in 1999.
He had got leave for a few days
and his mother pampered him with the goodies he liked best -- pakodas,
home made potato chips and mango pickle.
Like the ritual he followed on each
visit, he went to the Neugal Café, a Palampur eatery by the Neugal
river, for a coffee and met an acquaintance who spoke about the war.
'The war has begun, who knows when
you will be asked to go, you better be careful.'
'Don't worry, Vikram told him,'
remembers Mr Batra, 'I'll either come back after raising the Indian flag
in victory or return wrapped in it.'
Before Mr and Mrs Batra knew, Vikram's
holiday was over and they were at the bus stop seeing him off. The mango
pickle and potato chips were packed in his bag for him and his friends
in Sopore.
His unit had received orders to
move to Shahjahanpur in Uttar Pradesh but the war altered their deployment
and Vikram was deputed to report for duty in Kargil on June 1, 1999.
He informed his parents, asked them
not to worry and called them at least once in ten days. He made his last
phone call on June 29.
He asked about everyone in the family.
His elder sisters Neetudidi and Seemadidi. His twin, whom he fondly called
'Kushli.'
She was relieved to hear Vikram
say: 'Mommy, ek dum fit hoon, fikar mat karna [I'm absolutely fine. Don't
you worry.]
That was the last time he spoke
to her.
Vikram Batra would have joined the
Merchant Navy. He was to join the ship in Hong Kong. His uniform had been
stitched, his tickets booked.
But he changed his mind.
A decade later, his decision would
become the opening line of an Indian Oil print campaign. The public sector
company paid tribute to the Kargil hero and lauded him for rejecting a
lucrative career for the service of the nation.
'Sometimes an ordinary Indian can
make a Rs 120,000 crore company feel humble. For every step we take, there's
an inspired Indian leading the way,' read the ad copy, alongside a black-
and-white etching of Captain Batra.
A framed picture of the text hangs
in the petrol pump awarded in his honour to his parents. The advertising
agency also sent the etching, which Mr Batra has kept carefully.
On the wall on the other side is
a photo-copy of a magazine feature commemorating 'The Lives and Good Times
of a Country.' Vikram heads the list of heroes.
In one entrance test for the Indian
Administrative Service, says Mrs Batra, one of the questions was -- 'Name
the peaks captured by Captain Vikram Batra?'
"It is very rare and our good fortune
that we were given a son like him who put the country first."
A fortnight after he became the
face of the Indian soldier in the Kargil war, Vikram Batra died.
He was mortally wounded on the morning
of July 8 after fighting through the night while recapturing Peak 4875.
He was ill but had insisted that he was fit for the mission and completed
it in a manner that put him alongside some of India's greatest military
heroes.
Vikram with his men had begun a
tortuous climb to strengthen the flanks of the Indian troops fighting the
invaders at 16,000 feet.
The conditions were extremely tough,
the climb steep. At a gradient of 80 degrees, the thick fog made the advance
even more precarious.
The enemy got wind of Batra's arrival.
They knew who Sher Shah was, by now his military prowess had become the
stuff of legend.
Vikram with another young officer,
Anuj Nayyar, fought the enemy's counter-attack ferociously.
They cleared enemy bunkers, egged
their men forward, engaged in a hand- to-hand combat and forced the Pakistani
retreat.
The mission was almost over when
Vikram ran out of the bunker to rescue another junior officer who had injured
his legs in an explosion.
"His subedar begged him not to go
and said he would go instead," says his father, "but Vikram told him: 'Tu
baal-bacchedar hain, hat ja peeche. [You have children, step aside]"
He lunged forward to save the young
lieutenant, when a bullet pierced through his chest.
By the morning India won back Peak
4875 but lost Vikram Batra.
For his sustained display of the
most conspicuous personal bravery and leadership of the highest order in
the face of the enemy, he was awarded India's highest decoration in battle
-- the Param Vir Chakra, posthumously
His comrade in battle, Anuj Nayyar,
also died while clearing his fourth enemy bunker.
He was awarded the Maha Vir Chakra
-- the nation's second highest honour.
Captain Vikram Batra's statue in
the town centre in Palampur
Vikram's parents received the news
of his death the same day.
No one was at home when two officers
arrived at their doorstep that afternoon. When Mrs Batra, a schoolteacher,
came home and her neighbours told her about the visitors -- she screamed.
Army officers would only come home
if there was bad news, she thought, and prayed fervently before dialling
her husband's number.
When Mr Batra reached home and saw
the officers, he doubted Vikram was alive.
He told the two colonels to wait,
went inside and bowed his head in the pooja room first.
When he came out, one officer stepped
out, held his hand and said: 'Batrasaab, Vikram Batra is no more.'
Mr Batra collapsed.
The next day, his son's body received
a hero's welcome and was cremated with full military honors.
In their sorrow, the family drew
strength from Lord Rama, whose twins Luv and Kush were the inspiration
for the pet names of the Batra boys.
"Our child had captured three peaks,
he had taken the nation by storm and suddenly he was no more," says Kamal
Batra, rivulets of tears flowing down her cheek.
"But when God gives you a mortal
blow, he gives you the strength to cope with the grief. Guru Gobind Singh
sacrificed four sons for the country. Maybe there was some reason why God
gave me twins -- one he had marked for the country and one for me."
Captain Vikram Batra's funeral was
attended by a host of dignitaries and citizens. The Chief of Army Staff
visited Vikram's home and commended the young officer's courage.
'Had this kid returned from Kargil,
he would be sitting at my post in 15 years,' General Malik told Mr Batra.
His father laughs heartily. The
first time in the four hours we have spent talking about his son.
Vishal, Vikram's brother, had hoped
his brother would be a brigadier one day. His friends would be so impressed,
he thought, when he walked by Vikram's side.
Now he has lost count of the number
of times Vikram has given him a chance to be proud of being his twin. It
happened again recently when he was away on work in the UK. He had gone
to Scotland and entered his name in a visitor's book at a tourist hot spot.
'Do you know Vikram Batra?' asked
an Indian onlooker on reading his name.
"Is there any better reward than
that people remember his name in a far off place like Scotland!" says Vishal,
a banker, who returned from London last month.
Vikram was the family charmer. So
popular that his friends, teachers -- and even the barbers in Chandigarh's
Sector 17 -- remember him to this day, smiles his father.
Chandigarh was the city where Vikram
went to college.
It was also where he found the girl
he would have married had he lived.
Top: Mr Batra receives the Param
Vir Chakra from the President of India. Below: Army Chief General V P Malik
in the Batra home
Vikram had met her at university
and planned to marry her when he returned from the war.
'Make it a point to meet her whenever
you are in Chandigarh,' Vikram had told Vishal when he left to join the
army and Vishal had kept the promise.
Five days before Vikram's death,
he was in Chandigarh and she came to see him at the station.
As Vishal stepped onto the platform,
she called out his name and said, 'This time make sure to marry me off.'
'Pucca,' he replied.
When the news came, Vishal could
not muster the courage to speak to her. At the funeral she stood with her
parents and wept quietly.
Five years after she lost the only
man she loved, his cards and the stuffed teddy he gave her still adorn
her cupboard.
She is a teacher now and has sworn
to never marry.
Vikram's parents tried to make her
change her mind but it has all been in vain.
Like all mothers, Mrs Batra had
hoped that her son would be married. He would have a wife, kids and she
would see the next generation.
Last year, when Vishal was getting
married in Chandigarh, she missed Vikram.
He should have been a groom alongside
his identical twin, she thought.
As the band played merry wedding
songs, as the shehnai boded the auspicious hour -- Kamal Batra cried for
the son she had lost to the country.
The Batras have framed some letters
of condolence. One from a lady who lost someone most dear to her in a cruel
assassination in May 1991.
'In this hour of deep grief, I only
know too well how words are of so little consequence, nevertheless, I do
want you to know that you and your family are in my thoughts' -- Sonia
Gandhi.
The chief of army staff wrote that
in Vikram's death the army had lost a dedicated and devoted officer. 'It
is a personal loss to me.'
Air Chief Marshal A Y Tipnis: 'I
along with all the personnel of the Indian Air Force salute him for his
patriotism and devotion to duty.'
George Fernandes, defence minister:
'I hope you will bear this loss with courage and fortitude.'
Vasundhara Raje, Union minister,
now Rajasthan chief minister: 'Your son has brought honour to his unit
and country.'
The agony on Mrs Batra's face is
heart wrenching. "The day his body was brought home, it was excruciating.
No parent can see the dead body of their young son."
Mr and Mrs Batra live alone in a
house which bears Vikram's nameplate in the verandah. When they feel sad
they look at his pictures, remember his words, his laughter. Sometimes,
they cry, it lightens their heart.
"His loss for us is lifelong. But
our son gave his life for the glory of this country. He made us proud in
his death."
Captain Vikram Batra never lived
here, but this is his home.
His parents moved here after his
death. They know it is a home Vikram would have liked.
A board at the top of the lane points
towards the house. Eight of his framed pictures adorn the walls inside;
at the centre of the room hangs a framed citation that makes the hair stand
on end.
The Param Vir Chakra -- India's
highest award for gallantry in battle.
In a wooden frame lined with gold,
the three words in red are powerful and dwarf everything and everyone.
A picture of Mr Batra receiving
the award from the President hangs on the same wall. The award offered
some consolation for Vikram's sacrifice, feels his father. It was reassuring
to know that the country appreciated his son's exemplary valour.
When the officers handed the flag
that had wrapped Captain's Batra's body and his cap to Mrs Batra, she packed
them neatly in a transparent plastic sheet so that it did not get soiled.
She kept it on a table in front
of his picture.
Every morning when she bows her
head to god, she takes a look at Vikram too.
Today a statue of her son adorns
the town centre.
Across Vikram is the statue of another
soldier -- Major Somnath Sharma, India's first Param Vir Chakra winner,
who also hailed from Palampur.
'I will fight to the last man and
the last round,' Major Sharma said before he laid down his life evicting
Pakistani raiders from Srinagar airport in 1947.
He couldn't have found a worthier
successor than Captain Vikram Batra to share his space with.
