Sunday, July 26, 2009

The Pioneer > Online Edition : >> Cowards in a nation of braves

  • The Pioneer > Online Edition : >> Cowards in a nation of braves

    tags: no_tag

    • Kargil war veteran Baldev Singh was shot dead and robbed by three men in Bhajanpura, North-east District of Delhi. He was carrying Rs 8.45 lakh. The incident occurred around 10 am barely 50 metres from a police picket — reportedly manned by two personnel...”
    • The murder of an Army veteran, a man who fought in the last war we faced, in, as media is fond of describing, broad daylight, a short distance from a police picket where two worthies in khaki were reportedly on duty. The police claim to have ‘cracked’ the case; four men have been arrested; the story has been duly published; and, that is the last we shall ever hear of this murder.
    • We have an annual ceremony to honour the unknown soldier at Amar Jawan Jyoti, the memorial at India Gate, and that’s about all. We do not celebrate our spectacular military victory in 1971 lest Pakistanis are offended and reminded of Mrs Indira Gandhi’s audacious decision to rend asunder Mohammed Ali Jinnah’s “moth-eaten Pakistan” and deliver Bangladeshis from the rapacious tyranny of West Pakistan. There’s a sneaking suspicion that December 16 is studiously ignored by our politicians (including, and it must be noted, those of the BJP) because the observance of Victory Day could ‘hurt’ Islamist sentiments at home.
    • So, it is not entirely surprising that the Government should also ignore Vijay Diwas — July 26 — the day a defeated, devastated and demoralised Pakistani Army turned tail and fled from the heights of Kargil, more precisely, the few remaining bunkers in its control, leaving its dead to rot in the rocky wilderness of Drass, Kaksar and Mashkoh Valley.
    • tragically, they ran out of ammunition. Before they could send out an SOS (there have been suggestions that their communications equipment failed to work)
    • For the 20-odd days that Captain Kalia and his men were alive, they were brutally tortured in captivity — their mutilated bodies bore the evidence of chilling inhumanity: Ear drums pierced with hot iron rods, eyeballs carved out with knives, genitals chopped off, every bone broken and splintered. And, after all this, they were shot in the head. No apology was offered, none was sought!