Night was pitch black with pin drop silence everywhere and sleeping in a guest room with noone around a radius of ten kilometres was frightening. But the long tiresome journey, late lunch and the walk around the location had exausted me to the bottom, that I slept so peacefully until my door bell rang for so long.
Distressed with the noisy bell and agitated with the hindrance for a peaceful nap, I pulled opened the door so angry. I saw my buddy ramnaresh standing with a bulletproof jacket and rifle in his hands, so as a well covered casper behind him.
"Sir, we are gonna make our contact at first
sunlight and CO saab has asked you to be there with guards before that." He explained me the scenario quite dramatically.
Without a second question I washed my face, dressed up in my combat uniform over which the BP jacket was worn along with a metallic round helmet. Ramnaresh took out the iron block and placed it in the front and back of my chest in separate sockets on the bullet proof jacket. Then he handed the INSAS rifle issued in my name for Operation and its ammunition case full of loaded bullets.
With in the next five minutes I loaded myself on to the 'casper' as it swiftly pierced the darkness of night and ramped in towards nowshera village. My 2.5 ton ambulance was already there waiting for me in the outskirts of road head with adequate camouflage and concealment with jungle nets.
Upon knowing about my arrival CO and 2IC of the paltan, Col Tamanpreet and Lt Col Ajay Chauhan drove their vehicles to my camp.
"Jai hind sir." I saluted them in respect as they walked in to my ambulance.
"Jai hind capt Madhav, welcome to rashtriya rifles. We are gonna launch an operation at the first light to capture four militants who are hiding inside one of those houses in the village.
We might have casualties and our boys would take any such injured to your ambulance. You just have to stay here concealed with your nursing assistant and give first aid for the needy
In case you demand an evacuation use the motorrola set provided to you, my back up commander will ram in more number of 'Sumo' ambulances from rear which is half a kilometre behind us.
You just take the call and write a referral, my boys would swiftly pierce the traffic to take them to Srinagar in case necessary. At any cost don't come out of this vehicle or raise your rifle , unless you're threatened by an enemy. I am leaving four guards for your protection under CHM Khushwant singh. Unless they all fall, you need not cock your weapons." In a short stretch he briefed me about everything that need to be done and understanding the scenario I didn't ask much doubts.
But surprisingly CHM hesitated to take up my guard at the first instant and so 2IC passed it to another man. May be he had a lack of confidence in guarding his fellow officers, from previous experiences at the fighting front. Before we could make further assumptions it was dawn again and the troops were on a move
All the companies of RR paltan were present at nowshera that night. Alpha and bravo had surrounded the village with seven houses from north and northeast direction where there was a small stream flowing across the paddy fields which was quite dry. They were commanded by Maj Vikram and Maj Dosanj , the respective company commanders.
Charlie company was vigilantly waiting for some movements inside the first fleet of four houses facing main road, inside a cow shed guarding south east direction under command of Maj Baradwaj
Delta guarded themselves behind the masjid which was towards the west and had marshy shrubs enough for militants to creep out and escape,acommanded by Maj williamson. Echelon company waited for the repercussions and attempt to escape through east in to the distant road head under the control of Maj Kushwaha.
Foxtot coy was deployed as a back up to the southwest behind the woods which was at walkable distance to the proximal road head under command of Maj Neeraj. They had to stay there and prevent any sort of escapades in to the woods which was deep and haunted.
The headquarter company split in to two under CO Col Tamanpreet and 2IC Lt Col Ajay Chauhan and started inquesting the target houses to know in which of the seven those militants had force entered. Hav Ram vilas of HQ company along with SOG approached the first house closer to the masjid for enquiry inside.
Surprisingly a volley of fire was initiated from inside towards them and SOG fell down with a headshot bullet on the spot while Ram vilas jumped out from the doors with a shot on his leg and crawled in to the bushes. He was later recovered in to a casper and taken to my ambulance. Luckily he had a recoil bullet from the door trapped in his gastrosoleus, which I could dissect out easily and dress the wound.
Once the target house was quite localised the 2IC made a loud request for the villagers to
evacuate their houses with proper photo ids. Col Ajay himself took charge of civilian evacuation cross checking the handheld datas with the batallion and their identity cards. While he noticed a young couple from fourth house carrying their jwells and ornaments packed in luggages, he got a hint that there wasn't single target house.
He passed on the message to the tiger and thus both the cordons lead by CO as well 2IC marched to separate houses and took cover. CO with his troops covered the already exposed first house while 2IC covered the yellow house which was next to the stream. They waited for fire anticipating the maggots to cover fire for their leader and it happened.
Fire was again opened at house 1 in the direction of masjid and the tiger couldn't move off his cover. But surprising them the 2IC opened his fire to a young man who appeared behind the window of the yellow house and it went head shot. Volley of fires opened from the yellow house both in the direction of 2IC and the troops hiding behind masjid.
"Delta give me the cover fire and charlie to the 'lamb' so that we can creep in to the huts to surprise them." Col Tamanpreet passed the orders and I could hear it over my motorola.
The sudden change from the firing direction put a surprise in the minds of militants for sure. They retalliated and we saw three of them running behind the yellow house & disappeared in to the bushes and stream.
One each remained inside respective houses
and continued firing towards charlie and delta. Meanwhile CO as well as 2IC with their buddies crawled under cover and approached the backside of respective houses.
"Alpha, bravo and echelon, search for the runaway goats. There are three edible ones in your direction, catch them alive and squeeze their milk if possible." Tiger spoke to us over the set again before entering the first house with his buddy.
"Roger that." The reply came from rest of the cordons and everyone got engaged so quickly. Maj vikram with the help of his buddy Nk Chandan singh noted a man creeping inside the muddy stream towards jungle. Chandan opened his fire at him and he started hiding behind the mettalled lining. So Maj Vikram send a team of three from his cordon above the stream to halt his progression in the expected direction.
Surprising them a continuous fire came to the new party from the bushes and the second one was spotted by Nk Kulveer the buddy of Maj Dosanj. His aim was so perfect that it hit the ear of the suspect and it pierced his temporal lobe. But his one shot had already hit one among the trio who marched to the farther end of the canal and he was down.
Maj Dosanj with his buddy from the farther shore of stream and Maj Vikram with his buddy from the near end continued firing at the hiding rat continuously not knowing he had crawled in to the mud and disappeared in to the marsh in the west.
Sep shamsher who was cover firing for the tiger to enter firsr target noticed the man crawling with mud all over his body and he informed Maj williamson. His shot pierced the man's left shoulder and everyone could hear a loud cry.
Meanwhile tiger with his buddy had already entered first house and disarmed the last man standing there. This was followed by a volley of fire sounds from the yellow house as Hav Khushwant dived in to it and shot the cover firing young man. There was a pin drop radio silence for sometime and I sat awestruck looking through my window as what has gone wrong.
"One goat is missing and our lamb has been hit hardly. Take him to the Dracula." Tiger ordered in not so pleasant voice.
I came to know that Col Ajay has been shot in his left chest while charging in to the yellow house and he would be reaching me at any instant.
Unexpectedly the man with gun shot on his right shoulder, from alpha company reached me first. His wound was bigger with bullet trapped in his humerus so I applied the cheto gauze and did compression bandaging to arrest his bleed. Two wide bore intravenous lines were started, analgesic and antibiotics were started and shifted to the back up ambulance tol transfer him to Srinagar.
Immediately thereafter col Ajay was brought to me bleeding from his left chest profusely as his heart had been pierced by a bullet so pathetically. There was a huge boot mark over his chest as if someone had stamped him brutally after the headshot, sure shot from a DMS boot.
No time to waste I arrested his bleed with compression dressings, intubated him as he has been collapsing and shifted in a portable bag and mask with oxygen cylinder circuit to nearby ambulance and detailed my nursing assistant to ventillate him until he reach base hospital.
Since the operation was going on in the ground I had no option to accompany him to base hospital though I wanted that.
The rest of the troops were busy searching the sixth rat who gave no trail marks. He was seen running behind the yellow house and then vanished in to air miraculously. Foxtot and echelon companies carried out a thorough searching while others maintained their cordon to prevent him from running away with n any direction.
Finally he ended up hiding inside a trench behind yellow house and was shot by Nk Sharanpreet of foxtot company and was caught alive. Thus at the end of operation ADAM we killed four militants and caught two alive with injuries.
Their names were Abdul samadh, Davood imran shaikh, Althumash khudri and Mahmood Illiyassi, who lost their lives and two others we referred as adam and eve as the lawsuit prevent us from disclosing their names. We had two casualties with gun shot wounds, in which both recovered after weeks.
Unfortunately our LAMB fell down there forever before he reached the base hospital at srinagar. Though we had successfully completed our first operation after almost one year, evertone were so depressed on the demise of Col Chauhan who head started the hunt.
Since I had no personal relationship with anyone of them, after my duty I rested back to my guest room to talk to Shakti. Before I could explain her the adventures I had witnessed at the first ever operation in my life, she had a different story to narrate.
"Mads, it was such a hectic day for me dude. We had to attend a case of suicide today early morning, an officer wife who was six months pregnant." She started the conversation over the other side of the phone.
"That's so cruel. Who is she? How could she ever commit that with a child in her belly?"
"She was wife of Lt Col Ajay Chauhan, from rashtriya rifles. I think his unit lies in your area of responsibility only. We are still searching for the cause, what we know is that she had consumed 'Altok' a deadly pesticide late last night."
I sat on my bed awestruck hearing the incident and I tried to check if it was my 2IC's wife. I cross checked with her his army number and whereabouts, to stay hard hitten by a tragic story to explain to my new CO, Col Tamanpreet.
"What the f***!!!" Col Tamanpreet experienced giddiness and searched for a support as I explained about that incident to him at his office.
The whole unit couldn't sleep that night mourning about the family who left them so unexpectedly.
"How could Mrs Chauhan even commit suicide the morning her husband was marching to his final mission." It was like a thunder over the willow trees that split in to half, burned and decayed in the ground.
********To be continued************
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TRUE LIES-PUZZLE FROM ANANDNAG
Mystery / ThrillerA JOURNEY BETWEEN TRUTH AND JUSTICE
