“God help us! Enemy will be reaching
us within few hours stay firm, and any how don’t give up your positions”
“Yes sir“shouted
all the 70 soldiers.
Commander Prithvi
Singh was happy to see the confidence in his men. And this time with loudness
and guts he said “they might be more than us so guys take your time to be
ready, we might not see every one over here again, what so ever the result
might be, and in my 30 years of service you all are bravest of all”
“Sir you
don’t worry we are in good position, height of the mountain is with us our task
is to stop them till evening and when the reinforcement comes, we will be at
peace” said the young captain Anand.
“Every good entity
present on the earth is with us, it is enemy who is invading us, and god is on
our side” the voice came from middle of the line. It was Sardar Kishan Singh
the man of god. Saint is the word mostly used for him.
“Then let
god held the guns for us” captain Anand mimicked who was standing in front of
the line.
“Anand...why
you always fight with him, even though his rank is low as compared to yours but
that man should be respected” said the peacekeeper commander.
“He is my
friend, he won’t mind”
“Yeah, I
don’t mind atheist kind of people” said sardar
“Oh stop it
you two! And Everybody keep your guns loaded, also in case of any visible
activity contact me and wait for my order to fire” said the commander and added
“brace yourself guys enemy will we below this mountain before 2 hours that is
with the first ray of sunlight we will be the initial part of The 1999 Kargil
war with Pakistan, Jai Hind and dismiss”
The whole
battalion scattered and took their positions under the rocks and behind the
trees. Two guys on the front most line were captain Anand and Sardar Kishan Singh.
They were under the rocks and loading their rifles.
Sardar asked
Anand in a friendly “Are you sure about carrying that hand gun with you in this
situation?”
“Let’s not
give this Pakistanis any chance of killing me” said Anand with a passion.
Captain
Anand Chaudary the young gun of the lot was an Interesting personality. He was
the favourite of the troop. He was someone who had never tasted failure. A
perfect soldier most of his pals say. He never believed in luck, hard work was
the only thing that was a worth to him. His father had a decent business of
Bakery in the city jaipur. He could have survived by helping his father but
serving the country was above all.
A perfect
life, a perfect soldier, a perfect citizen and also a perfect child, he was
perfect in all ways just any thing missing was a girl whom he could love all
his life like every other person. But he knew well the difficulty of getting
married of being in love in the times of war. So he gave up the hunt and
dedicated his whole life to the country buy giving responsibility of his
parents to his younger brother.
“Why you
always want to run away from death?” sardar took a pause and added “yeah I see,
you want to fill the void of a girl before giving your life for the nation”
“I don’t see
any good in giving life for the nation, it’s better to be alive and serve the
mother earth rather than becoming earth itself” said the patriot soldier while
turning snuggling downside of the mountain and aiming into the woods.
While
arranging his gun sardar replied “This is what I like about you, you are
different from others but at the same time annoying! “
Sardar
Kishan Singh was the people’s man. He was a happy husband, a good father of two
teenage kids and a strong believer of god. He had many reasons to believe in
god. While serving in Kashmir valley he had taken two bullets in his chest
while fighting terrorists. He was quite critical but he survived, he said he
show the shadow of god when he took the bullets in his chest and size of the
shadow kept on increased. When that shadow touched his body which was all red
he closed his eyes and when he woke up he was in hospital were his wife was
constantly praying to god while tears ran all threw her face. Since then there
was no stopping in the worship. He realized that now he is a messenger of the
god and all he has to do is spread his kingdom.
Anand had
been having a total opposite view for above incident. Actually when Kishan
Singh faced bullets it was Anand who pulled him from heavy gun fire and carried
him to the hospital and not god. Anand would always make fun of sardar on this
issue and sardar had never a convincing argument.
“This are
hard times sardaji, let’s not get into that”
Sardar was
now ready with his armour and took a similar position to that of Anand.
“This is the
time to be cautious, enemy can be here at any instance” Anand added.
“Enemy will
never come from here” Sardar said it with confidence.
“How?”
“I have been
in warfare for years, this people have never attacked from a weak position”
“Then from
where they will come” said the shocked captain
Sardar
replied “maybe they will distract us in the downside and try to trick us over
there”
“Then we won’t
leave our positions in any case as the commander told so” and captain added
holding off his gun to the rock
“Definitely
not but if we know if they do something like guerrilla warfare then we might be
in danger “
“What if
they come from all around we will finish them”
Sardar
tapped Anand on the back and said “hopefully yeah!”
The two were
best friends. And the incident of the valley their bond was stronger. Both were
a different kind, in spite of their age difference they shared the tight
strings of friendship.
Commander
did not overrule the possibility of s gorilla attack so he placed soldiers
encircling the whole surface all over.
Anand and
Sardar stood in their same position.
“Sardarji
tell me something about that shadow which you saw in the woods when I saved
you”
“Ash that
feeling was something else, it was like my purpose to be on the earth was over,
and I don’t know why I am still alive today ...why god saved me or rather you”
Anand said
with a smile “Because I wanted our cook to suffer more”
“Yeah that
poor guy has to cook all day for me and when I am at holidays he is happiest”
“Hahaha....”
suddenly the happy face of Anand faded towards sadness.
“What
happened Anand? “
“Sardarji I
miss someone...”
“So you
loved a girl “
“Yeah Sardarji”
“So what is
the story?”
“I am
telling my story but you stay focus “
Kishan Singh
nodded and took out his night vision binoculars and started looking through it
and said “yeah continue”
Anand turns
backwards and took relaxing position and left his gun aside and signalled
Subedar Ram Singh to come beside him. Ram Singh followed the orders and took a
position behind a rock.
“Ram Singh
you stay focused I am relaxing for few moments”
Ram replied
“No problem sir!”
Meanwhile
Commander joined Kishan and Anand and said “Is this the time share love
stories?”
Kishan and
Anand looked at each other after seeing the mystic look of their commander and
then the commander said “Headquarters says they (enemy) are still looming
around the mountain 4560 while is an hour far so this is the time for you to
share your story Anand”
Smiles were
back on all the faces of three and Commander gave orders to the battalion to
quickly place the bombs in the ground where the enemy would arrive and all
others except this three and Ram Sing were busy in positioning the bombs.
Kishan Singh
said with eagerness “come-on Anand”
“After
completing my training before my first posting there was a period in which I
had nothing to do so I helped my father at the Bakery so he could stay at home”
“And that
girl was your customer...” Prithvi said
“yeah it
were the days of hot summers and in jaipur as you know sir summers are tough
and it was evening time I was all alone at the bakery and the Story starts
here...
She entered
the door, she was wearing a decent salwar suit. Her face was as beautiful as of
my dream girl. Simple in all ways thats what I imagined for my dream girl and
here she was in my bakery.
She said
“Do you have any eggless pasteries?”
I replied
yes and pointed towards the pasteries under the table which she could see from
the glass.
“I will
have the one with cherries”
“you want
to eat here or shall I pack it ?” at this time only thing i wanted was to spend
time with the beauty and she told to eat here. So i gave pastery to her and
while she was eating it she said
“mm..do you
make this yourself? They are delicious”
“actually
my father makes them he is quite good at his work”
“Why you
don’t know how to make it”
I was
shocked at what questions she was asking to me then I said “I don’t work here
it just i help him sometimes.
“So you are
from a generation who believes working at a bakery kind of place is not classy”
By this
time she had just finished her half pastery and she was asking questions like a
old lady. I decided to be little aggressive so i said
“Excuse me
there is nothing like classy or not classy for me, I work for Indian Army I
just want to serve the country nothing else”
“Oh don’t
try to be sound like you are patriotic or what actually...”
It was the
time to stop here so I said “Hey girl just finish your stuff and go...you have
started irritating me!”
I was never
so harsh while talking to a girl but things with her things were different. Her
face turned with anger but still she was cute in that look and said
“Its good
you don’t run this place for ever...because you don’t know how to talk to the
customers, take this money and keep the change I don’t want to see your face
anymore.”
I took the
money and tried to return the change but she went out by shamming the door and
throwing the leftover pastery in the bin.
Then while
returning to my home in the city bus
there was a lady beside me whose face was covered with some cloth but was
contantly staring me. She took off her cloth and yes she was that girl only and
i said to myself this is not going to be easy.
“I am sorry
about how i talked with you...actually this heat is getting on me and I am out
of control”
So i also
decided to give a peace signal and said “I should also be sorry, i was harsh
too”
“Its okay
its happens...so lets be friends this is Roselyn and you ?”
“Anand
Mehra hopefully captain in few days”
And we
chatted till mine stop came we waved each other and exchanged goodbyes.
As it is
expected she continued to come to my bakery in evening and while returning we
used to chat in the bus. She always used to reserve a seat for me which was a
difficult thing in those crowdy busses. We chatted about each other, she was
Christian and I a Hindu so we had quite religious discussions also. Our
friendship developed more I started visiting her house, her parents we quite
fancy and at the same time secular so me being a hindu was no matter of them,
infact i herd them that Roselyn’s father wanted to meet my family.
A perfect
love story was going on and then just one day a letter from army arrived. And
it said my first posting was in dangerous Kashmir valley. My parents we brave
for me as they understood my patriotism but for a father whose daughter can any
time become a widow was a concern so he called me and explained his situation.
I decided to not face Roselyn and write a letter to her expressing my feelings
that I loved her but marriage was not possible. I did not waited for reply and
soon took off for Kashmir valley.
During
holidays when I returned for jaipur I heard the news that she was married with
someone and her husband met an accident while returning home. It was one of the
saddest moment of my life, not that she was married but she was a widow.
We exchanged some letters and still this date
we exchange letters, we both love each other but our ways were apart as her
father was not willing to make her daughter widow again so he waited and prayed
that the time would heal the wounds of her daughter and me.
Further
story continues in next part...
