bls31
November 17th, 2014, 06:07 AM
The Broken Promise
It was a miracle that we did some how managed to reach the Indian border. By now we must have been a sight to behold haggard, unshaven, with our uniforms in tatters, most certainly reeking to high heaven of body-odour to those receiving us at Darrang
………
From the Reception Camp we were moved to the rear of the Brigade at Misamari where at least there were a few Section boys to receive and provide some long denied creature comforts to us the surviving personnel of the section.
Once again section boys were collectively together, though still unaware of the sad fact that we had lost the detachments attached to the two Infantry battalions 2 Rajput and 1/9 GR. Having finally made it together, through thick and thin, with unflinching loyalty of many and the concern of one, we had developed a very strong bond, the boys and me.
The next morning I had got the Section personnel collected together, possibly I had to pass some orders received from the Brigade staff.
Immediately after my address congratulating, the men for the ‘Job Well-done’ and making it back safe and in one-piece, the men responded with a full-throated ‘Captain Sahib Ke Jai’, loud enough be heard all over the complex, that was followed by a strange prediction, made once again and in one voice by the congregation ‘Sir you will be blessed with a son’.
It caught me unawares and left me totally flabbergasted, first, it from coming from the men and second having another child was only a remote possibility: both of us, Jeet and I had mutually taken a decision, much earlier, to have only one child, boy or a girl; we were more than happy with the little darling Chotoo. However, God has his mysterious ways or possibly the combined wish of the boys had reached the right place or was the persuasion by Mama, my mother-in-law, that made one of the parties to quietly abrogated the mutual agreement that we had made earlier; sure enough we had a son born on 21st September 1963 at Military Hospital Dehradun
Pregnancy suited her and she once again bloomed like a rose, radiant with the inner happiness transparent, I am yet to see some one looking so attractive in the state she was in.
Chotta as he is called, was born in Military Hospital Dehradun at about 8.30 PM, this time I was in attendance unlike when Chotoo, his sister was born. After an agonising and anxious wait to see her at the earliest I was ultimately permitted in the OT. Her face, in repose, was suffused with an expression of total peace, satisfaction and relaxation after the ordeal of child birth. To keep the suspense for a bit longer no one had told her if the child she had given birth to was a boy or a girl. However, she had been clever and it was no mystery to her, as she confided in me later she had already seen the reflection in the then switched off O T light hanging over her from top.
It was a miracle that we did some how managed to reach the Indian border. By now we must have been a sight to behold haggard, unshaven, with our uniforms in tatters, most certainly reeking to high heaven of body-odour to those receiving us at Darrang
………
From the Reception Camp we were moved to the rear of the Brigade at Misamari where at least there were a few Section boys to receive and provide some long denied creature comforts to us the surviving personnel of the section.
Once again section boys were collectively together, though still unaware of the sad fact that we had lost the detachments attached to the two Infantry battalions 2 Rajput and 1/9 GR. Having finally made it together, through thick and thin, with unflinching loyalty of many and the concern of one, we had developed a very strong bond, the boys and me.
The next morning I had got the Section personnel collected together, possibly I had to pass some orders received from the Brigade staff.
Immediately after my address congratulating, the men for the ‘Job Well-done’ and making it back safe and in one-piece, the men responded with a full-throated ‘Captain Sahib Ke Jai’, loud enough be heard all over the complex, that was followed by a strange prediction, made once again and in one voice by the congregation ‘Sir you will be blessed with a son’.
It caught me unawares and left me totally flabbergasted, first, it from coming from the men and second having another child was only a remote possibility: both of us, Jeet and I had mutually taken a decision, much earlier, to have only one child, boy or a girl; we were more than happy with the little darling Chotoo. However, God has his mysterious ways or possibly the combined wish of the boys had reached the right place or was the persuasion by Mama, my mother-in-law, that made one of the parties to quietly abrogated the mutual agreement that we had made earlier; sure enough we had a son born on 21st September 1963 at Military Hospital Dehradun
Pregnancy suited her and she once again bloomed like a rose, radiant with the inner happiness transparent, I am yet to see some one looking so attractive in the state she was in.
Chotta as he is called, was born in Military Hospital Dehradun at about 8.30 PM, this time I was in attendance unlike when Chotoo, his sister was born. After an agonising and anxious wait to see her at the earliest I was ultimately permitted in the OT. Her face, in repose, was suffused with an expression of total peace, satisfaction and relaxation after the ordeal of child birth. To keep the suspense for a bit longer no one had told her if the child she had given birth to was a boy or a girl. However, she had been clever and it was no mystery to her, as she confided in me later she had already seen the reflection in the then switched off O T light hanging over her from top.