One Who Wears OG Should be Respected: They Have Earned It

“The safety, honour and welfare of your country comes first, always and every time.

The honour, welfare and comfort of the men you command come next.

Your own ease, comfort and safety come last, always and every time.”

These are the ethos which an Indian soldier carries with him. If you are a fan of Indian Army, you deserve my salute because you bothered to think about those men, maybe just for few seconds, who spend sleepless nights to let us sleep. They say, “You can take rest, I’m holding the post. Nothing will happen to you or your family.” In the services they are trained to do something or I should say give their everything for providing securities for people they never met, never spoke to or never even saw.

“Do you think you are a bond? Your honeymoon period is over son, now you will go through hell.” These were the words my tikki told me when I joined the National Defence Academy, though left after an injury, but I’m sure it is still in use. The campus of thousands of acres provides training facility for all the three services, i.e. Army, Navy and Air Force, and is only of its kind in the world. It may seem like a movie dialogue but Cadets over there are trained to live for their country and country-men.

After whole day of training, academics, games and of course ragras, combined with sweat, blood and cries, at night on their bed their tired mind try to find solace as they have triumphed the world. With an Academy number on their waist, nameless cadets spend their most precious time of life in getting professionally trained to serve the nation, externally as well as internally.

This article is not about a man who is earning 6-digit salary, studied some professional course and at some private institution and who is enjoying all types of luxuries but is about a man who left his home as a boy, with fears and insecurities, who had pain of his lost love or pinning for someone and holding everything as dear as a teenager holds. The only want in his mind was to conquer the world, just like every juvenile, but confused for where and how to begin.

At training academies they teach these boys to start with oneself. For those who don’t have an idea, I must say that it is a really painful process to wear a new skin by tearing the previous one but in the end the academy makes a boy to a better human being and a gentleman. The uniform, shoulder badges and chest medals earned after being a soldier stays with you for whole of your life and with it, it carries all the blood, sweat, mud and grime and pride, along the way.

These days’ scenarios have changed a lot. The news regarding soldiers is nothing but a speck of mud. A woman raped in the Kashmir valley, a fake encounter in the Northeast, officer arrested for spying, a frustrated jawan shot himself or his officers etc. In the society hungry for enjoyment and a media searching for TRP what would be better news than this? People think just by being a part of Indian Army is the biggest support for soldiers and because of this they escape from any and every punishment which would have been given to an ordinary man. They think by the way of representation by media, finally, the great Indian soldier is being pulled down from his stand. Finally, we will see what he is - a common man, who is neither better nor stronger than you and me.

Is it so?

Yes, the soldier of Indian army is a common man and this is the only truth here. He is an ordinary man who has made extraordinary sacrifices, gone farther than he or anyone would have thought he could, who had shown courage far above and beyond the call of duty. Yes, he is that ordinary man who had the courage to stand up every single time there was a call.

Just think, how many of us can claim, sitting in highly luxurious Air-conditioned office, that they have done that, everyday? Running on a treadmill and lifting dumbles are completely different from climbing a steep mountain with back and front packs.

Courage of a soldier is not just tested when he is doing an encounter or is having a guerrilla fight with terrorists or who stands on a post in the war field and who are trying to save his motherland which maybe captured by the enemy. It is also not tested when he is called for some rescue mission from floodwaters or any other natural or artificial disasters. But, what he does every day is a test put in front of him. Reward for passing this daily test is not like a civilian, that he gets a raise in salary, but just that he had retained the honor to wear his uniform for one more day. Let it be normal day of training academies or “routine life” in a regiment, it takes extraordinary courage and pain to survive each day. Very few have courage to make such sacrifice.

For an idea, how tough it is to get an Olive Green (OG) uniform, here is an explanation. You be a book worm and appear for IIT, for many be-all-and-end-all of entrance examination, you will get into 3000 seats. Now to get into NDA, for the entrance you have to be jack of all trades in study. If you qualify the written test then face worlds one of the toughest service selection interviews, i.e. SSB. If you successfully clear it then you will be sent for medical test. Once you are examined perfectly and declared to be medically fit then wait for the final merit list. At an average 320 seats per term is available. If you can make it then you become a Cadet of NDA. Then 3 years at NDA and 1 year at respective academies, for example say IMA for army and you are commissioned as an officer and then you get an olive green uniform. Now you say which is tougher?

This explanation of mine is not to say that the NDA chaps are better and brighter (in fact, the more studious one gets plenty more of ragras to bring them on the same level as the rest). It’s just that they have their own kind.

A very special kind of dedicated one who knew that their life will be bound by immense hardship, silent sacrifices, separation from loved ones, incompatible pay – but the satisfaction that their spine will be always straight like rod. Ordinary boys like Arun Khetarpal, Nirmaljit Singh Sikhon, Manoj Pandey, Yogendra Singh Yadav, Vijyant Thapar and Sandeep Unnikrishnan who turned into legends in armed forces history. (Not able to recognize most of the names? Wait)

Just for not letting his Squadron down Manoj Pandey ran cross-country at NDA with a fractured leg – yes a fractured leg. He is just an example; every single face had shown courage in their field. When tank of 2^nd Lt. Arun Khetarpal was on fire and a superior officer ordered him to abandon the tank he said, “No sir, I will not abandon my tank. My gun is still working and I will get these bastards.”  If not these names, I guess you must have heard of Major Sandeep Unnikrishnan, the martyr of Operation Black Tornado. He died saving life of a junior ranking fellow commando and said, “Do not come up. I will handle them.”

I can’t believe that boys with such spirit, determination and courage would go about killing old peoples and kids or raping women by showing power. For me it is easier to believe that earth is stable and sun revolves around it.

These soldiers ask for nothing, no favors, no repayments, but just some understanding. Every single officer I know almost embarrassed while taking about his “heroism”. “It’s no big deal. We are signed up for this.” they say. A soldier went home with dozens of bullet wound and while talking to his mother said, “Ek medal mila, Ma” and showed her his medal but forgot to mention how singlehandedly he captured a Pakistani position.

While I was at academy I read a small poem written on a wall, by some ex-NDA cadet, called ‘Voice of a Soldier’ and it was like:

“I don’t want a teenage girl

First give me my INSAS rifle

When I die in cold war zone

Box me up and send me home

Pin my medals on my chest

Tell my mother I did my best

Tell those sweet girls not to cry

I am a soldier, born to die”

Academy helps us in becoming physically strong, mentally awake and morally straight. Now, do you think that boys, who had gained such standards from the very beginning, can do all those crimes, in the manner they are brought up by the media?

A soldier is a part of society and belongs to family like yours and mine. He is subjected to the same pulls and pressures of the society. He has his own problems. Let it be regular increase in prices of commodity or education of his child or looking after his elderly parents, he has too much of his own insecurities and worries. I accept the fact that there are few rotten apples but you tell me which segment of society doesn’t have? You say, how many cases you heard in the last decade regarding rape and what percent of it was done by uniform wearers? A handful? We should not forget the fact that these handfuls are out of millions who earned the uniform in that time.

We have seen teachers, who are respected even above God in our country, raping their students. Or take the example of them who proclaims to be saints. There are many cases where we have seen that their disciples have been raped brutally by them. Do you make such impression of whole of their type to be like them as you do make about defense personnel? I am not saying that army is pure and clean or am not even justifying their act. I just want to say that we should not make generalization out of deviances.

Before you can pick a fly out of your luxurious meal, the rotten apples are plucked and thrown out. Neither they need nor do they get armchair judgments. In the forces, justice is sealed, fleet and remorseless. So, if you can’t show them your gratitude, for what they are doing, then at least you have a duty not to disrespect them or their honour, because I think they have earned it. Don’t you?

(originally published on my Live Journal Blog.)