In late 1975, I had the honour of being a member of a party of policemen that visited Hot Springs in Ladakh. On a cold wind-swept hillside, in front of a simple memorial, we stood in silence to pay homage to all policemen who had laid down their lives for the country and the people they serve. Our group included Sonam Wangyal (aka ‘Hero Sahib’), who recalled the events at Hot Springs in 1959.
On October 21, 1959 a patrol party of the CRP and the Indo-Tibetan Border Force (IB) was ambushed near that spot. Ten police personnel were killed and ten others taken prisoner. Hero Sahib was present when the ambush took place.
The Chinese released the prisoners a week later, after torturing them and subjecting them to inhuman treatment. The bodies of the slain policemen were returned after three weeks. This ambush was the eyeopener about China’s designs in Ladakh.
Remembering this incident, police forces all over the country observe October 21 every year as Commemoration Day, to honour their comrades who have lost their lives in the line of duty. Functions, small and large, are held in police lines, parade grounds, and offices where the names of those who have made the supreme sacrifice during the year are read out.
Since Independence, more than 35,000 police personnel have lost their lives while discharging their duties. The number of police casualties kept steadily increasing with the years and in recent years it has been around seven hundred to eight hundred. The annual toll has often exceeded one thousand, notably in those years that saw more violence in the Punjab, Jammu & Kashmir, the North-East or in the Left Wing Extremist belt.
Police personnel die all kinds of deaths – getting killed while displaying the highest dedication to duty and country. Valourous deaths, deaths that are the stuff of patriotic songs and ballads! A large number of police personnel get killed fighting terrorists, insurgents, robbers and other criminals. Many lay down their lives at the border, in enemy fire or by getting shot at by smugglers and traffickers. Some get blown up in mine blasts. Others die in a hail of bullets in an ambush. A few tragic incidents sometimes cost many lives and briefly focus attention on police casualties.
There are also a large number of policemen who get killed in ways that range from the bizarre to the stupid. Deaths that seldom attract attention or find mention in newspapers. But these men and women in khaki are equally dead and their children as orphaned as the children of any hero. Policemen who die in unexpected and unusual ways. By getting mowed down by a speeding truck. By getting lynched by mobs for doing their duty. Sometimes through sheer exhaustion and fatigue. Due to sunstroke and frostbite. In accidents. By drowning while saving someone else’s life. Or getting asphyxiated in a burning building. Senseless deaths. Pointless deaths. Many that are avoidable deaths.
The Wuhan virus has added a new challenge to the lot of police personnel. It has resulted in still longer working hours, heavier load of cases and complex crowd management challenges. Policemen and policewomen throughout the country, as a class, have been among the most exposed of ‘Covid Warriors’. The Indian Police Foundation, which has been tracking the price exacted by the virus, records that in a strength of about 30,00,000 police personnel, more than 1,35,000 have tested positive for the virus. More than 800 have died. Countless other police personnel suffer from Covid-related psychiatric issues. The infection rate is as high as one in twenty-two!
Undoubtedly, among the names read out this morning of police personnel who died on duty, there must have been of many who fell victim to the Covid19 virus. There will be many more whose names will be read out next year.
I have attended the Commemoration Parades every year, in my office, at functions organized by state police forces, by the Delhi Police at Kingsway Camp or at the recently constructed National Police Memorial. But this year the Wuhan virus has prevented me from attending any function. This year, therefore, I offer my homage to my fallen comrades in khaki, sitting at home.