The Man from the Other Side

I observed him carefully as he walked to the door. I knew that time was running out but suppressed the urge to check my watch. I took a deep breath and started counting in reverse under my breath. “Ten, nine, eight, seven….” I was wishing him, almost urging him with my focused mental acumen to turn back just once and look at me in the eyes. Every step that he was taking away from me was bringing me out from my irresoluteness. Perhaps this was going to be the point culminant of my military career, if Major Rawat retraced his steps.

Just about half an hour ago, I wanted this chapter to be wrapped up fast. As soon as Major Rawat entered my tent with his adjutant in tow, he marched up to me in unfaltering footsteps, with an unflinching expression. I knew just about how much torturous and insulting, this can be for any military personnel. Here was Major Rawat, standing just across the table, his stare, not even for a moment, leaving my face, not a line on his stern face moving as he clicked his heels together, to salute me. As I returned the salute, I offered him a seat, but he remained standing. This was the nadir of any soldier’s career and I am sure that many would consider death to be more honourable than to relent to an unconditional surrender. There were a number of protocols regarding the surrender and he softly asked his adjutant, a young lieutenant, barely in his mid twenties to wait outside the tent. Similarly, I asked my adjutant, Captain Shaukat Ali to do the same. The deathly silence inside the tent was deafening. I fumbled for a tin of cigarettes in my drawer, I scraped around in the drawer with my fingers for the tin, and even that sound seemed to be obtrusively vulgar in the death-like silence that prevailed. On second thoughts, years of social conditioning stopped me in my track and I decided against offering him a cigarette. My nervousness was growing by the minute. I was noticing a mild tremor in my hands. I looked at my watch, it was around 1: 10 P M, mid-noon, but even the sunlight seemed to be mellowed, failing and resigned and it added to the gloom. The steady chirp of a bird and the recurrent metallic clicking of the cicada added to the despondency that was already shrouding me.

Major Rawat’s khaki uniform was smudged with grease, dirt and clay, it was torn in a few places and smelled of residual gunpowder, starkly different from the crisp and ironed olive green uniform that adorned my frame. His peaked cap was twisted and warped and bore marks of stress. The place, where a metal insignia should have embellished his uniform was a makeshift hurriedly-made, stitched cloth insignia. I could sense that he was eyeing me the way, I was checking him out. Suddenly, he broke the silence, “Let us get on with the process, Shall we?” His voice was low but firm and it felt like he was in command of the whole situation and that I was a mere protégé.

I opened the file in front of me, which contained the pre-determined conditions of the instrument of surrender, pushed it towards him so that he could go through the clauses mentioned in the instrument. This lightened up the heavy atmosphere somewhat, as Major Rawat, cleared his throat, put on a pair of glasses on his nose and started examining the contents of the instrument. I noticed that there was a crack in his glasses and suddenly felt a surge of emotion run through me. Now this was a very unlikely and most inappropriate thing to happen, considering the setting. Firstly, I was an officer of the Allied forces, and commanding the victorious side. Here was this man opposite me, who was by all means my enemy and the win over him in this battle had cost me a number of my finest men. I decided that I had to collect myself and my emotions and looked across the table. Major Rawat was adjusting his glasses and there seemed to be a faint smile on his lips which almost seemed like a smirk. I suddenly remembered that I had forgotten to go through the language and the spelling in the terms of surrender, after dictating the notes, in a hurry, and bent forward to ask him if there was anything mentioned in the document,  that was inconsistent with the discussion that we had, had, prior to the framing of this document. The defeated officer smiled wryly and asked me for a pen. I hurriedly started looking for a pen, without even wanting to know, why and finally managed to find a red marker pencil, that was used to mark strategic positions on maps. This I handed over to him. He surprised me again, by not replying and adjusting himself in the chair with a relaxed air and simultaneously started striking out portions from the document and at the same time laterally entering corrections over the struck out areas, without even once asking for my permission, even for courtesy’s sake.

Suddenly he looked up at me, and in an soft but authoritative voice, stated, “perhaps owing to urgency and haste, a few clerical errors have been committed in the document, which I have taken the liberty of rectifying. Especially in one instance, owing to the fact that a single letter is missing, the entire meaning stands changed. Please can you go over the instrument once more?” Saying this, he moved the file back, towards me. The sentence which had been marked by him read as ‘All PoWs will be accepted at the Battalion HQ and hence will be transported to the Regimental HQ.’ I read the sentence again but failed to find any fault with it. Actually owing to the precipitation of sudden events one by one, I was sort of stupefied, sort of under a trance. He smiled again, and said, “If I am permitted, can I add a ‘T’ before ‘hence’, because only then, the meaning of the sentence holds good.” I agreed immediately and without even turning the file, back towards him, he added the ‘t’ in the designated place. It now read as ‘All PoWs will be accepted at the Battalion HQ and thence will be transported to the Regimental HQ.’ I recalled that captain Shaukat Ali was a student of English literature before he had joined the army and was in the habit of using classical language.

“Major, I have gone through all the clauses of the instrument of surrender, and I abide by all of them. With immediate effect, according to the orders of my headquarters, all of the 137 jawans and officers under me shall surrender their arms and withhold any further military actions.” Major Rawat, stated this in a very slow but deliberate manner, as if he was have trouble breathing. Then he stopped to look at me. It was becoming increasingly difficult for me to keep a straight face as all the upheavals occurring for the past few days had played havoc with my psyche and my emotions.

It was May 1944, men of INA special groups had entered Manipur India, together with Japanese forces in the middle of March 1944. Colonel Malik of the Bahadur Group hoisted the Indian flag for the first time on Indian soil at Moirang near Imphal. The spirit was very high and upbeat for both the Japanese soldiers as well as the INA after the Burma victory. Some 7000 men from the INA’s First Division participated alongside the Japanese troops in the Battle of Manipur. What was happening in Imphal was of immense importance to the INA as well as to Netaji as this would prove to the world that they were not merely paper tigers. Setting foot in India and gaining a strong foothold here was after all what the Indian National Army lived and died for. This was its raison d’^etre, the excuse for its very existence in the first place. The 2^nd and 3^rd battalions of the Subhash Brigade, commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Shah Nawaz Khan had made considerable progress and the mood was extremely buoyant in the INA camps.

The Allied forces were facing a number of disadvantages. The area was too hilly for airstrips and the wounded could not be evacuated. The wounded were carried in trucks lined with parachutes from supply droppings. The handful of doctors did the best they could, but it was obviously not enough for the multitude of casualties thronging their tents everyday. The 3^rd Battalion of the Subhash Brigade had crossed the Manipur river, south of Tiddim and with the element of surprise to their advantage had achieved some degree of success. I was commanding the 2^nd Battalion of the 14^th Punjab Regiment and received RAF report of a new bridge near Tiddim. I now realized the scale of the Japanese threat on the Tiddim Road. During the night, as per orders from the HQ, I asked troops to move along the Tiddim Road at 0530. My plan was for a small force to climb the ridge in order to guard the right flank. That night it rained heavily, and under the cover of the rain we moved forward at dawn. We inched our way slowly into the designated territory and finally at 1100 hours, I ordered a blitz attack which proved to be an immediate success. Their whole position was overrun leaving 38 dead and 67 injured.

Major Rawat, CO of the 3^rd Battalion of the Subhash Brigade, spoke to me again and broke my chain of thoughts. He bent forward and in an almost apologetic voice now, said, “a number of my boys are seriously injured, Major, and we are totally lacking in medical facilities, and although we have a doctor in the Battalion, he is totally helpless without medical supplies. I would be indeed grateful, if you could arrange for their treatment.” I assured him that a doctor carrying medical supplies will attend to the injured at the field itself and those who could move would be carried up here. Major Rawat seemed to be at peace now. He now thanked me and nudged his head towards the file and asked “where do I have to sign?.  I explained to him that we both needed to sign along with our adjutants as witnesses.

Major Rawat called out softly “Lieutenant Rao, please come in” . Similarly, I called in Captain Shaukat Ali, my adjutant. He then proceeded to sign at the assigned place, then after a momentary thought,  he halted for a moment deliberately, and then added the date, time and place, below his signature. This procedure was followed by me and then both the adjutants one by one. Major Rawat then took out his pistol from his holster, placed it in front of me on the table and stood in attention. Then he saluted me and said, as if he was reading out from a book.

 “I, Major Vijay Rawat, Commanding Officer of the 3^rd Battalion, of the Subhash Brigade of the Indian National Army along with 137 jawans and officers am surrendering my arms and announcing ceasefire from my side.” He then looked towards me for a reply. There was a lump in my throat and I was unable to speak for some time. I saluted him back and replied. “Major, by the powers invested in me as the Commanding Officer of the 2^nd Battalion, 14^th Punjab Regiment of the Indian Army, I accept the surrender of arms of Major Vijay Rawat as well as those of his officers and men of the 3^rd Battalion of the Subhash Brigade of The INA and accept him along with his men as PoWs.”

Everything stood still for a moment. The air was heavy with a pregnant silence. I noticed that tears were flowing freely down the young Lieutenant ‘s face, his lips were quivering, however, not a single line moved in Major Rawat’s impassive face as he stood in attention. I was now on the point of breakdown. I was thinking to myself, “Will he not utter a single word?, will he not command me to join him and his forces in his fight against the British?” I kept saying to myself, if he even hints at such a proposition now, I would jump at it in agreement, happily. “Will he just leave his pistol with his self respect and simply leave? What was in a uniform? How could just the name of two different armies, separate us?  “The tricoloured insignia in the tattered uniform of Major Rawat, was blinding my eyes. A tiger was jumping out from the tricolor. My uniform held the insignia of the British Crown. “If he changed his decision now, would I be able to fight him back now, hold arms against him?” I was shivering like a reed as he was walking out of my sight. My only brother, Major Vijay Rawat was walking further and further away from me, Major Sanjay Rawat, CO of the 2^nd Battalion, 14^th Punjab Regiment.  I had not seen him in the last 5 years, nor heard of his whereabouts. But the memories of childhood and youth and the bondages that blood brings about silently kept calling out to him to return. He was my blood, my kin, somebody I had loved and idolised to the core.

“Six, five, four, three…I was muttering, as he lifted the corner of the flap of the canvas, that served as a doorway to the tent. He bent his tall and lean frame, so as to move out through the short tent opening, all the while, never turning back even once. And then, he was gone, perhaps forever.

Year 1970, Spring time. The Moirang War Cemetry was sprinkled with flowers. Lush green grasses separated each immaculately maintained white tomb stones from one another. I had come visiting with my family. I now led the retired leisurely life of an ex army personnel of the Indian Army who had been honoured and decorated many times over. As I stood before the epitaph, that read, “When you go home, tell them of us, and say, that, for their tomorrow, we gave our today” I saluted Major Vijay Rawat, who had remained true to his ideals all his life and proceeded on trudging down the slope towards my hotel.