Memories of 50 years ago still fresh, says Brig (retd) of victory in 1971 Indo-Pak war

Brigadier Inder Mohan Singh (retd) recalls with a note of pride and nostalgia: “I was in the leading tank from Hilli to Goraghat (then East Pakistan, which soon became a free and liberated Bangladesh) when I saw an injured Pakistani soldier. The crowd was pelting stones at him. I saved him from the crowd and took him to a military hospital.

It’s been 50 years since the 1971 India-Pakistan war, but Brigadier Inder Mohan Singh (retd) recalls the events as if it happened only yesterday. He remembers the minutest of details of that tumultuous occasion, down to the movement of his regiment to the front and to the map of the area.

Singh was commissioned into the Army on August 22, 1971. He says “after completing my training at the Officers Training School (now the Officers Training Academy, Madras), I joined the 69 Armoured Regiment as a Second Lieutenant on September 5. I turned 20 on September 13 that year”. 

The retired Brigadier recalls with a note of pride and nostalgia: “I was in the leading tank from Hilli to Goraghat (then East Pakistan, which soon became a free and liberated Bangladesh) when I saw an injured Pakistani soldier. The crowd was pelting stones at him. I saved him from the crowd and took him to a military hospital. This good turn was rewarded when we came to know that our tank driver Sahab Singh, whom we were presuming to be dead, was saved by the Pakistan army,”

Brigadier Inder  Mohan says when the war was over, Indian and Pakistani soldiers had tea and snacks together and talked in Punjabi and longed to visit this part of Punjab.

The Brigadier (retd), says “The enemy bombarded my gun position three times and a splinter went through my turban. My mother preserved that turban. We lost five of our soldiers”. 

The retired brigadier says “We formally took the surrender of 29 Cav. Tigers of the Pakistan Army. After that the Pakistani soldiers laid out tea and snacks for all on December 16. There within a few minutes, we completely forgot we had been fighting each other”.

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