Chandigarh: It was the bloodiest night of the Kargil War. As dawn broke on June 29, 1999, a beleaguered Commanding Officer of the 2 Rajputana Rifles (2 Raj Rif), Col M B Ravindranath, Vir Chakra, was taking stock of the blood that had seeped into the forbidding, lifeless alpine rocks. Three of his officers and 10 other ranks had made the supreme sacrifice, 51 were wounded, including 36 critically. None more heroic of those against-all-odds actions than that of the Naga officer, Capt N Kenguruse. As the attack stalled that night, Kenguruse had barefoot launched a suicidal assault up the vertical cliff face of Lone Hill on the Drass LoC. The slippery slopes of Lone Hill had not afforded traction to his Army-regulation snow boots, so he just dumped them. But the odds were so stacked against the daredevil action that Kenguruse never got to the top. All that the Pakistani soldiers of the 6 Northern Light Infantry (SIKKIS) had to do was to push boulders off the top and onto Kenguruse and Hav. Sharman Singh, both of whom were clinging to a precipice under angled fire from the top. They plunged off the cliff, 200 feet to their deaths.Kenguruse, forever frozen in immortality at age 25, was awarded the Maha Vir Chakra (MVC) while Singh the Sena Medal (Gallantry). Kenguruse’s fatal initiative epitomised the raw courage displayed by the Indian Infantry in the unique alpine battles of Kargil where it attacked the waiting enemy in frontal assaults and up heights ranging in excess of 19,000 feet. These were heights, terrain and such tempestuous weather, that other nations would dare send only mountaineering expeditions. But here Indian soldiers fought with blood, guts and ‘jugaad’ resulting in 545 deaths. The Indian soldiers had etched with their blood a saga unparalleled in the annals of super-high altitude warfare.That fateful night, Kenguruse, the indomitable Naga from Nerhema village, Kohima, was leading the battalion’s Ghatak platoon (commandos) tasked by the CO to act as a protective patrol to Delta Company’s infiltrating column under the command of Maj. Mohit Saxena, Vir Chakra. D Company”s assault got held up due to the steep and forbidding approach up a vertical cliff face of Lone Hill. Kenguruse seized the initiative, took off his boots, socks and clambered up the cliff. His daring assault picked a route to the enemy’s position from a flank but up a vertical mountain wall. On top of Lone Hill was the enemy in section strength, entrenched in bunkers fashioned from boulders (sangers), and supported by a universal machine gun (UMG). As Kenguruse climbed to the top, he took a hit.“As the commando team scaled the cliff face, it came under intense fire, which caused heavy casualties. The officer sustained a splinter injury in his abdomen. Bleeding profusely yet undeterred, he urged his men to carry on with the assault…Kengurüse displayed conspicuous gallantry, indomitable resolve, grit and determination beyond the call of duty and made the supreme sacrifice in the face of the enemy, in true traditions of the Indian Army,” said the official citation for Kenguruse’s MVC.A detailed account of Kenguruse’s last moments supported by photographs of Lone Hill has been penned by the late Ravindranath in his memoir, ‘Kargil War: The Turning Point’. The memoir is supported by first-hand accounts from (later Brigadier) Saxena, the D Company commander under whose command during the night of June 28-29, 1999, were placed Kenguruse’s Ghataks. “Kenguruse’s daredevil assault: Failing to find a way to Lone Hill, Kenguruse led his troops through a rock face, climbing it with bare feet and hands, and had gained a route to the top, and together, they had fought their way to the top. It was then that the enemy in desperation had pushed the stones down on this team. The rolling stones had swept this team down the precipice at the edge of which Kenguruse’s team had gathered to launch a final push to the top. It was a merciless tumble for the team, resulting in the death of Kenguruse and Sharman, whose hands still held the grenade he had intended to throw,” wrote Ravindranath.As Kenguruse and Singh plunged off the cliff, Delta Company’s reserve platoon under Sub. Sayar Singh was still 500 metres behind. The first light of dawn June 29, 1999, was just an hour away and threatening to rob the assaulting Indian troops of the cover of darkness. It was a critical situation, as assessed by the CO, who had staged well forward into the battle. “Overall, in my assessment, Delta Company had expended itself, and despite the heroic efforts, we had yet to capture Lone Hill or succeed in capturing a tactical foothold,” wrote Ravindranath. Ultimately, with the Bofors fire coming in and the 18 Garhwal Rifles launching simultaneous flanking assaults on Point 4700, the enemy panicked and vacated its battlements on Lone Hill, Three Pimples and Knoll, which were the three main objectives of 2 Raj Rif that night. Victory had come, but laced heavily with the taste of salty blood in the mouth.
