AS I WRITE THIS, my state is mourning a 35-year-old who “lost his life in Pakistani firing in Rajouri district of Jammu and Kashmir” on January 19. A son who will never come back to his parents. A father who will never see his second child, who is due in a few months. A husband who will never be around when his wife’s hair turns silver. Lance Naik Sam Abraham of the Sixth Battalion of The Madras Regiment leaves behind his parents, wife Anu Mathew and two-and-a-half-year-old daughter Angel.
A report that is going viral on social media was written by K.C. Bipin, reporter for Manorama News, the news channel of the Malayala Manorama Group, to which the THE WEEK belongs. Covering a martyr’s death was a first for Bipin, and he was swept away by the range of emotions on display in Punnamood, Sam’s village in Alappuzha district. Sorrow. Pride. Hope. And, strangely, a sense of contentment about a life well lived.
The camera zoomed in on Anu when she received the folded tricolour at the graveyard of the St Gregorios Orthodox Church. There was no sorrow on display, Bipin wrote. She might grieve over her husband unseen, as is her right. But, in public, she kept her spine straight and her composure intact. Among Syrian Christians, when a parent dies, it is the eldest son’s right to place a white cloth over the face of the deceased. It is the final act of farewell, after which the casket is locked and lowered into the ground. Thoppil Abraham knows Sam will not be around to do that, but the father has nothing but pride about the manner of his first-born’s going. What else can one expect from a father who gave both his boys to the Army?
I dwelt so much on Sam’s passing, because our cover story for this issue is on a regiment that wears the winged dagger badge, which proclaims: Balidaan (Martyrdom). The Republic Day special issue of THE WEEK brings you the inside story of 10 Para (Special Forces), the Desert Scorpions. To bring you the story first hand, Senior Special Correspondent Namrata Biji Ahuja stayed with the soldiers in their training base, location classified. Additionally, we have interviews with Lieutenant-Generals (retired) D.S. Hooda and Prakash Katoch, and with Colonel Varun Chhabra, who commands 10 Para (SF).
In Palaly, northern Sri Lanka, stands a memorial marking the sacrifice of 33 Indian soldiers who died during Operation Pawan, on the night on October 12, 1987. The paratroopers died in the firefight on Jaffna University campus, “the tactical headquarters of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam”. The highest ranked soldier to die that night was Lt Col Arun Kumar Chhabra of 10 Para (SF)—the dear father of Col Varun Chhabra.
Incidentally, this cover ties in perfectly with our new regular being written by Contributing Editor Barkha Dutt. It’s called ‘This Week, Meet....’ Our first pick is Husain Haqqani, former Pakistan ambassador to the US, who is, most interestingly, persona non grata in Pakistan. One among the many questions he is asking of the Pakistani establishment through THE WEEK is: “Do we want to go from our 70-year embrace of Uncle Sam to a new embrace of auntie China, just because we hate brother India?”
You don’t seem to be in a hurry to go home, Mr Haqqani!
