Narratives from the Heart of a Veteran by Lt-Gen Baljit Singh is a powerful account of extraordinary courage, sacrifice, and duty beyond the call

I wonder how many of those who would be reading this piece have heard of Subedar Kali Das of the 8th battalion of the J&K Militia. Perhaps not one unless he/she has read Narratives from the Heart of a Veteran by Lt-Gen Baljit Singh AVSM, VSM (Retd), which tells the story of his courage and sacrifice far beyond the call of duty. On December 7, 1971, Pakistani troops, supported by tanks, had attacked Dewa, a post near the battalion's headquarters in Jammu & Kashmir. Defence having become unsustainable, orders to evacuate was issued at 14.45 hours on December 8. Retreat in broad daylight and under the eyes of Pakistanis who had their tails up, was not easy. They had to be held at bay with automatic fire as Indian troops made their way back.

It was then that Subedar Kali Das volunteered to stay back as a single-man rearguard. Trading his sten machine carbine for a light machine gun (LMG) and six to eight magazines of ammunition, he crawled into a bunker suitable for LMG firing and held the enemy back until he was shot dead. His raw courage drew admiration even from the Pakistanis.   Baljit Singh says that after the ceasefire, they sent his body back in a coffin with a citation that read, "This is the body of Subedar Kali Das of 8 J&K Militia. He died while fighting very bravely in Area Tank ahead of Dewa Post.

He did not leave his trench to the last breath. After inflicting heavy casualties, he became a target of a Ghazi's bullet. His badges of rank are available. A piece of paper was found in his pocket, revealing his name."

  Baljit Singh's book carries a number of such accounts of outstanding valour and bravery displayed in combat. Among the more important of these is the one about 2nd-Lieut Shyamal Dev Goswamy's role as Observation Post Officer in directing artillery fire against the Chinese attacking an important defensive position in Gurung Hill, guarding the airfield in Chushul, Ladakh, during the India-China border conflict of 1962.

Despite being severely wounded, he continued directing fire until he lost consciousness. Second-Lieutenant Goswamy (IC-12665) was awarded the Maha Vir Chakra, India's second-highest award for conspicuous gallantry in the presence of the enemy whether on land, at sea or in the air.

I began reading Narratives from the Heart of a Veteran, a week before India's 77th Army Day, which was observed on January 15, 2025.   Singh has had a distinguished tenure in the Indian Army, spread over 36 years, and much of what he writes revolves round it. His, however, is by no means a chest-thumping glorification of the first-person singular number.

It provides an account in which personal experience is located in the background of history and the interplay of contemporary events in which military deployment and operations occur. It thus provides a perspective that is much wider and deeper than any volume of just reminiscences serves up.

This is clear from the very beginning. His first narrative is about the establishment, under his command as a young captain, of a post, at Rimkin in the Bara Hoti area of Uttarakhand, in April, 1962.

To be defended by a Special Task Force, comprising a carefully selected company from the 14th battalion of the Rajput Regiment, the move was undertaken in the context of China's growing incursions across the India-China border, which were pushing events towards the conflict of October-November 1962. His exertions, which included an eyeball-to-eyeball confrontation with a band of intruding Chinese, earned him a commendation card from the Chief-of-Army Staff for gallantry and  distinguished service.

Immediately thereafter, appears his piece on the hazardous and challenging mapping explorations by Major F.M. Bailey and Captain H.T. Morshead in Tibet, which led to the demarcation of India's border with the latter. A map showing the border was appended to the draft Shimla Convention, initialled on April 27. 1914, by the representatives of the three countries attending the Shimla Conference-Great Britain, China and Tibet-that produced the convention. Subsequently referred to as the MacMahon Line, after Sir Henry MacMahon, then British government of India's foreign secretary based in Delhi, who represented Great Britain in the Shimla conference, it runs roughly along the crest of the Himalaya mountains from Bhutan in the West to Myanmar in the East, marking India's border with China in the east.

Both narratives are important in the context of the India-China border dispute, in which the assertion of the validity of the MacMahon Line features prominently in New Delhi's narrative regarding its position. Understandably, the need to counter China's cross border incursions has been, along with continuing tensions with Pakistan, a major factor in shaping the development and deployment of not only India's army but its air force and navy as well.

Not surprisingly,   Singh's focus is primarily on the army-the generals who led it, the officers and men who have made it one of the finest fighting forces in the world, the battles fought at home and abroad, the varied interests of army personnel and the connections several of them have had with the Bombay Natural History Society. 

Singh himself is an avid and knowledgeable naturalist and ornithologist who was invited to join the board of trustees of the Worldwide Fund for Nature where he served two terms.

There are engrossing accounts of diverse types-from a graphic one of the battle for Chhamb in December, 1971, to the life and time of the19th-century soldier of fortune, Alexander Gardner, whose explorations and adventures ranged over a wide territory, and the derring-do of Lt.-Karamjeet Singh Judge, who was posthumously awarded the Victoria Cross in the Burma (now Myanmar) campaign during World War II.

Baljit Singh's book, mainly based on his published articles, needs to be read for an understanding of what the Indian Army is and what it stands for. This is important given the wide range of tasks it has been called upon to perform-from defending the country's borders to fighting internal insurgencies, maintaining law-and-order and engaging in disaster relief.

It is an army with a great tradition, led from the front by an officers who are sought to be inspired by the motto that Field Marshal Philip Walhouse Chetwode, who commanded the British Indian army, had enunciated in 1932, and which is carved on the walls of the Chetwode Building at the Indian Military Academy in Dehradun.

It reads: "The safety, honour and welfare of your country comes first, always and every time./ The honour, welfare and comfort of the men you command come next./ Your own ease, comfort and safety come last, always and every time." The Indian Army would remain one of the finest of its kind in the world as long as its officers remember the motto.

(The author is Consulting Editor, The Pioneer. The views expressed are personal)