MAJOR SAURABF KALIA ( 4 JATT)





On 15 May 1999 Lt Saurabh Kalia and five other soldiers - Sepoys Arjun Ram, Bhanwar Lal Bagaria, Bhika Ram, Moola Ram and Naresh Singh of the 4 Jat Regiment had gone for a routine patrol of the Bajrang Post in the Kaksar sector in the rugged, treeless mountains.
They were encircled by a platoon of Pakistani rangers and captured alive. No trace of the patrol was left. Meanwhile, Radio Skardu of Pakistan announced that Captain Saurabh Kalia had been captured by Pakistani troops.
It was after this that India discovered Pakistan Army troops had surreptitiously occupied certain peaks on the Indian side of the Line of Control.
Lt Saurabh Kalia and his men were in captivity from 15 May 1999 - 7 June 1999 (twenty four days) and subjected to torture. Their mutilated bodies were handed over by the Pakistan Army on 9 June 1999.
Post-mortem examinations revealed that the Pakistanis had tortured them by burning their bodies with cigarettes, piercing the ear-drums with hot rods, puncturing eyes before removing them, breaking most of their teeth and bones, fracturing their skulls, cutting the lips, chipping of nose, chopping off limbs and private organs of the soldiers, and finally shooting them through temple.

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