Chandigarh: Soil from Kargil heights brings solace to martyrs’ kin

CHANDIGARH: Most parents of the Kargil War martyrs’ have made it to the Drass War Memorial for the annual

Vijay Divas

function. Some like Capt Keishing Clifford Nongrum (MVC) and father of Capt Vijayant Thapar (VrC) even made it to the towering peaks where their sons’ blood had seeped into the eternal snow and soil. But for the parents of the tortured and mutilated Lt Saurabh Kalia, 4 JAT, it is an urn of soil from the forbidding peak where their son laid down his life that must suffice as a symbol of solace and remembrance.

The Kalias of Palampur in Himachal Pradesh have not been able to make it to the Drass function all these 22 years since the Army scripted a peerless chapter of high-altitude warfare.

“Neither my parents nor myself have been able to go despite invitations from the Army every year. So, we put in a request through the JAT Regiment to the Army that if some soil from Bajrang Post (17,386 feet), Kaksar LOC sector, can be sent to us. A battalion of the Dogra Regiment was deployed at Kaksar much after the War and they obliged us with a bottle of the soil,” said Lt Saurabh’s brother, Vaibhav.

Lt Saurabh’s parents, N K Kalia and Vijaya, have in turn shared a part of the soil from Bajrang post with Sunita Dhonkaria, sister of Capt Amit Bhardwaj, the gallant officer who led a

fighting patrol

of 30 men to locate the missing Lt Saurabh and the five men of his surveillance patrol.

Capt Bhardwaj and his buddy Hav Rajivir Singh from Bhiwani, Haryana, laid down their lives near Bajrang post on May 17, 1999, while ensuring that the rest of the fighting patrol, including eight wounded soldiers, could evacuate to safety.

The legendary camaraderie of regimental officers that ensures they embrace battle and death without flinching followed them much after their pyres had cooled.

At the Kalias’ Saurabh Smriti Kaksh (museum of mementos) in Palampur, photo of Capt Bhardwaj occupies the pride of place along with that of their son, both commissioned into the 4 JAT.


Due to the efforts of Vikas Manhas, who has done remarkable work to provide relief to the martyrs’ families, we recently met sister of Capt Bhardwaj and shared a part of the soil with her as Capt Bhardwaj had selflessly undertaken the mission to rescue Saurabh, but laid down his life in the process,” said Vaibhav, who is a faculty member at the CSK HP Agriculture University, Palampur.

A grateful Sunita, who waged many a battle against the “system” to secure the honour and endowments due to her late brother, took the soil back to her parental home in Jaipur. “Though our traditions forbid it, we have also retained a part of Amit’s ashes in an urn. The soil from Bajrang post added to that. My mother, Sushila, looks after the urns containing the ashes and the Bajrang post soil every day as if she was taking care of her child. As far as I am concerned, I do not believe Amit has ever left us. I refuse to garland his photograph in my lobby as per the traditions for the dead because I firmly believe he lives amongst us in our hearts and souls,” Sunita told the TOI from Jaipur.

The capture of Lt Saurabh’s patrol on May 14, 1999, near Bajrang post, subsequent torture and mutilation of their bodies attracted global condemnation. Pakistan had returned the six bodies of Lt Saurabh’s patrol on June 9, 1999, 26 days after it went missing. Capt Bhardwaj and Hav Rajvir’s bodies could only be retrieved on July 13, 1999, 56 days after they laid down their lives at Bajrang. The 4 JAT troops could see the bodies lying between the boulders and weapons firmly clutched in hand, but could not retrieve them due to intense fire from the intruding enemy, which had occupied the Indian Army’s Bajrang post.

Here lies a tale of a heroic and stoic sister. “I was told by an Army officer soon after that Amit had died on May 17, 1999. But I chose not to tell my parents as the body could not be retrieved. It would have generated pressure on the Army to retrieve his body at the cost of the troops, who were battling intense enemy fire and shelling and could not move towards Bajrang. So, I bore it quietly and ensured that for 56 agonising days I revealed no sign to our parents that he is no more. When his body came on July15, 1999, we opted not to see it as it was blackened by prolonged exposure to high-altitude and it would have forever marred our happy memories of him,” said Sunita.

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