Our Correspondent

Rajouri, July 8

On the complaint of the Commanding Officer (CO) of Field Veterinary Hospital in Sunderabi town of Rajouri district that a soldier is missing from the unit since Friday, the police have registered a missing report on Saturday and started investigations.The police said according to the complaint, Sepoy Wagh Baba Saheb on Friday left the unit for Sunderbani town reportedly to get money either from bank.When he didn’t return till late evening, a search was conducted by his colleagues in Sunderbani and its adjoining areas but to no avail.On Saturday, the CO in a written complaint, informed the Sunderbani police about the missing soldier.“The police have registered a missing person complaint and started investigations. He was untraced till Sunday evening. Unit officers have been asked to contact his family members in Maharashtra to know if he has left for home,” said Inspector Tilak Raj, SHO, Sunderbani.

Tribune News Service

Jammu, July 2

Northern Army chief Lt Gen Ranbir Singh on Monday visited the forward areas in the Akhnoor sector along the Line of Control (LoC) and interacted with the troops deployed there.During his visit, the Army chief lauded all ranks for their unwavering dedication and high morale while guarding the LoC.

After months of deliberations, the Defence Ministry has approved a list of items which will have to be purchased by each soldier from an annual clothing allowance of Rs 10,000, official sources said.

After months of deliberations, the Defence Ministry has approved a list of items which will have to be purchased by each soldier from an annual clothing allowance of Rs 10,000, official sources said. The clothing allowance was recommended by the Seventh Pay Commission in lieu of personnel clothing which was earlier being provided through ordnance factories, they said.

Soldiers and Junior Commissioned Officers (JCOs) will now be required to procure clothing items, including summer uniform, shirt angola, woollen jersey, mufti dress and accoutrements like lanyard, belt, badges, ribbons, chevron and formation sign using the clothing allowance, Army and Defence Ministry sources said.

Yesterday, Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman finally approved the list of items that will now have to be purchased by each soldier from the clothing allowance now sanctioned, they said. All other clothing items, including combat dress, physical fitness training kit as also the newly-introduced improved physical training (PT) shoes, will continue to be issued to all soldiers from the military stores as authorised items, the sources said.

Recruits will also continue to get additional dresses during recruitment training as before. The items which will be supplied to the soldiers from military stores also include blankets, ground sheets, raincoats, mosquito nets etc.

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Special clothing items that are authorised to soldiers when deployed at Siachen, super high-altitude and extreme cold climate areas will be issued as per present procedures, the sources said. “Dress allowance caters to meet the long-due aspiration of soldiers who wanted well-stitched and well-fitted uniforms,” said an Army official.

The Seventh Pay Commission had recommended the clothing allowance based on the feedback from soldiers regarding quality and inappropriate fitting of dresses provided to them. It was, hence, decided that provision of dress material and allowing soldiers to get it stitched as per their individual fitment would be a better option, the sources said.

An Army Major’s wife’s body was on Sunday found with her throat slit near the Brar Square in the Delhi Cantonment area.

New Delhi: An Indian Army Major Nikhil Handa was on Sunday arrested from Meerut in Uttar Pradesh for his alleged involvement in the killing of another Army Major’s wife, Shailja Dwivedi, in west Delhi on Saturday.

The woman’s body was found with her throat slit near Brar Square in the Delhi Cantonment area on Saturday. Initially, the police were informed that a woman had died in an accident. Later, when they inspected the body, it was found that her throat was slit, they said.

This is how the police zeroed in on Major Handa:

– The police got to know from the CCTV footage at the Army base hospital that Shailja was seen in a car with a man for the last time.

– As per the police, this man was Major Handa.

– Shailja’s husband, Major Amit Dwivedi also told the police that he suspected Major Handa in his wife’s murder.

– From Shailja’s CDR, the police were able to ascertain that on Saturday, she had talked to Major Handa from 10 am to 1 pm.

– The police then began searching for Major Handa and dispatched six teams to look for him.

– The Major’s phone was repeatedly switched off.

– The whole of Saturday night, till Sunday morning, in the Delhi-NCR area, within a radius of 550 km, the police team raided various places to trace Major Handa.

– The Major was continuously changing his location.

– The Delhi Police team were then informed that a silver car, which they searching, was seen in Meerut’s Daurala area.

– The police then reached Meerut and arrested Major Handa. After the arrest, they informed their counterparts in Meerut.

– According to the police, the accused had allegedly run a car over the woman’s face and the body in order to make the incident appear as an accident.

– Major Handa was posted in Nagaland’s Dimapur. Two months back, Amit too was also posted there.

The platoon commander of 3 Jat Battalion sacrificed his life while repulsing assault by Japanese forces on Imphal

Col Dilbag Dabas (Retd)

“Post reorganise karo, mein covering fire doonga” (reorganise the post, I will give covering fire) were the last words of Jemadar Abdul Hafiz during the final assault on Nungshigun in the battle for Imphal during World War-II.Among 27 Indians awarded Victoria Cross during World War-II, five were Haryanvis, and Jemadar Abdul Hafiz, son of present day Haryana, was one among the bravest of the braves. He was the youngest Indian to have been awarded the Victoria Cross, as also the first Indian to have been awarded the Victoria Cross in a battle fought on mainland India during World War-II. Abdul Hafiz, son of Choudhry Nur Mohammed, a Rajput Musalman of Pawar gotra, was born in Kalanaur, a Muslim-majority town in Rohtak district of then undivided Punjab. Kalanaur remained most developed till 1947 with two madarsas and a high school from where Abdul Hafiz passed his matriculation. At that time there was a provision of granting Viceroy Commission to eligible Indian aspirants at the entry level itself. With Viceroy Commission on his shoulders, Jemadar Abdul Hafiz, just about 19 years then, was platoon commander of 10th platoon in D Company (Rajput Musalman Company) in 3 Jat Battalion. Jat battalions then were structured around two companies of Hindu Jats, one of Punjabi Musalmans and one of Rajput Musalmans. On March 7, 1944, the Japanese launched a full scale offensive on India with their 15 and 31 Divisions tasked with capturing Imphal and Kohima, respectively. By March 28, Japanese cut the 90-mile Imphal-Kohima all weather motorable road, the lifeline of the Allied Forces operating in Imphal plains. 3 Jat Battalion, as part of 5th Indian Division, was airlifted from Arakans to Imphal and was deployed astride the Imphal-Ukhrul road, five miles north-east of Imphal town, in order to block this approach to the Imphal plains. On March 29, the battalion moved further north and took up position astride a track leading to a feature named Nungshigun with the D Company forward about seven miles north of Imphal. In the early hours of April 6, the enemy attacked a standing patrol of four men and occupied the feature. As this feature overlooked the company’s position, its occupation by the enemy was dangerous. Therefore, the Company Commander, Major WD Ritchie, ordered Jemadar Abdul Hafiz to attack the enemy with two sections of his platoon at 9.30 am. The battle was witness to the most conspicuous act of bravery and supreme sacrifice by Abdul Hafiz that earned him the coveted Victoria Cross. The battle account is available in the War Diary of 3 Jat Battalion and also corroborated by book “For Valour” written by British historian Bryan Perrett.(The writer is veteran Gunner, 6 Field Regiment)

The battle account as available in the War Diary of 3 Jat Battalion 

• On 6 April 1944, in broad day light, Jemadar Abdul Hafiz led his platoon in the attack which was up a bare slope with no cover and steep near the crest. Before the attack, Jemadar Abdul Hafiz assembled his jawans and convinced them that they were as invincible as Ali, the noblest warrior in the Prophet’s army. During the attack, when few yards below the crest, the enemy opened fire with machine guns inflicting several casualties on the attackers. Undeterred, Abdul Hafiz personally led the dash with the battle cry “Nara- e-Takbeer! Ya Ali!”.
• The assault progressed with great dash up the last few yards of the hill feature, which were very steep. On reaching the crest, Abdul Hafiz was wounded in the leg, but seeing a machine gun firing from a flank, which had already caused many casualties on his men, he immediately dashed towards it and seizing the red hot barrel, pulled it upwards while another man killed the machine gunner.
• Abdul Hafiz then took a Bren gun from a wounded jawan and moved towards the enemy, firing as he advanced and killing several of them. So fierce was the assault that the enemy, although present in superior strength, ran down the opposite slope of the hill feature. Regardless of the machine gun, which was firing at him from another feature, Jemadar Abdul Hafiz pursued the enemy, firing at them as they fled. At that moment, he was badly wounded in the chest from a machine gun fire and collapsed holding the Bren gun and attempting to fire, shouting at the same time “post reorganise karo, mein covering fire doonga”. He died shortly afterwards holding the Bren gun in his left hand, the gun whose trigger he could not pull to give covering fire.

Avneet Kaur

Jalandhar, June 17

Akanksha Gulati, 21, of Kanya Maha Vidyalaya (KMV), who was cadet in the II Punjab Girls Battalion of the NCC, carved a niche for herself by qualifying the Combined Defense Service (CDS) exam in one-go, in which a total eight lakh students had appeared. She has also been selected as a cabin crew member in Vistara airlines recently.Akanksha always wanted to pursue a career in the armed forces. She said the love for olive green uniform and the dream to serve the nation always motivated her to continue with the efforts and give in extra hard work.Being a ‘C’ certificate examination holder with A-grade in NCC, Akanksha was also declared as the best cadet from Jalandhar. Apart from this she has also reserved the name for herself in the best speaker trophy and has hosted many college events and other programmes.She has also been an active participant in youth festivals and says, “Participating in different events boosts me and prepares me for the future endeavors.”Having completed her 3 year degree course in English Honours in May, Akanksha was planning to pursue her higher studies, she said, “I feel it was my good luck and of course my hard work that I qualified the CDS exam and got placed in Vistara airlines. Though I am yet to join the company. In the meanwhile, I will also not stop studying, I have plans to pursue MBA.”Sharing her success mantra she said, “I have burnt midnight oil to crack the CDS exam. Continuing both my English honours studies as well preparing for CDS was a tough job altogether, therefore, I use to study at night and gave my sincere efforts to crack the exam.”

Tribune News Service

New Delhi/Srinagar, June 15

Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh met Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday and weighed the option of extending the Ramzan ceasefire (which ends on Saturday) in Jammu and Kashmir, particularly in the backdrop of the killing of journalist Shujaat Bukhari and the upcoming Amarnath Yatra, scheduled to begin from June 28. “Indications are it is unlikely that the government would favour further suspending operations,” an official said. Rajnath said he would speak on the subject on Sunday. “Let everyone celebrate Eid on Saturday.”EDIT: Murdering a journalistOPED: Kashmir press in perilIn Srinagar, a day after the murder of Bukhari, editor-in-chief of ‘Rising Kashmir’,  the J&K  Police arrested Zubair Qayoom of Saderabal, Srinagar, who had allegedly snatched a pistol from one of the two security officers attached with Bukhari. “With the cooperation of the public, we were able to trace the fourth suspect. The pistol has been found and so have the clothes he was wearing during the attack, which he had dumped,”  IGP (Kashmir Zone)  Swayam Prakash Pani told the media here. “We are probing his role in the killing. Both PSOs (personal security officers) were carrying pistols. One pistol was recovered but the other was missing, which has now been found,” he said.A special investigation team (SIT), led by DIG (Central Kashmir Range) VK Birdi, will further probe the case. The police have already released the CCTV pictures of the three bike-borne militants who sprayed bullets on Bukhari as he stepped out of his office in Press Enclave and boarded a car on Thursday evening.  Their faces covered, one is seen with a bag. “We have leads on the identity of one of the attackers,” said a police officer. “The murder, it appears, was meticulously planned.” While the police see militants’ hand, the Muzaffarabad-based amalgam of Kashmiri militant groups — United Jihad Council (UJC) — and Lashkar-e-Toiba condemned the killing. The UJC chief, Syed Salahuddin, has demanded an international probe. “The killing of Shujaat Bukhari at a time when the UN human rights commission released a report on the  rights abuses raises many questions,” he said. 

Tribune News Service

Srinagar, June 5

Army’s Northern Command chief Lt Gen Ranbir Singh on Tuesday visited Siachen Glacier, the highest battlefield in the world.The Army commander was briefed on the operational preparedness and the current situation, a Srinagar-based defence spokesman said.“The General Officer Commanding-in Chief interacted with troops at the Siachen base camp and complimented the tenacious resolve, unstinting commitment of the troops deployed in the extreme weather and inhospitable terrain,” he said.Lt Gen Ranbir Singh arrived in Srinagar on Monday and reviewed the overall security scenario in the Kashmir valley. The Army commander was briefed by Chinar Corps commander Lt Gen AK Bhatt at Badami Bagh Cantonment on the overall security situation and major operational, logistical and administrative aspects pertaining to the corps.