India’s Most Fearless

by Aroor, Shiv

  ‘Sir, these houses have to be kept under surveillance at all times. We will get something big there one day,’ Maj. Varadarajan told Col. Dabas. ‘But we have to be seen to be totally inactive in that area.’

  Seven months later, in the summer of 2014, as India’s longest-ever general election reached its peak, Maj. Varadarajan’s prophecy would come true.

  At 1430 hours on 25 April 2014, Maj. Varadarajan had just sat down to lunch at the 44 Rashtriya Rifles’ Charlie company headquarters at Shajimarg in Baramulla when he received a tip-off from one of his ground sources. It was the kind of input that meant lunch would have to wait. Jaish-e-Mohammed commander Altaf Wani was in Qazipathri village. And he was in one of the houses Maj. Varadarajan had identified from the codes. There was not a moment to lose. Ordering his QRT to arm up for the operation, Maj. Varadarajan dialled his CO.

  ‘Sir, I have A-1 intelligence. Wani is there. I am rushing to the village with my QRT.’

  Altaf Wani had replaced Altaf Baba as the Jaish’s Divisional Commander and was trying desperately to take his predecessor’s work to the next level—in uniting the suicide squads of the Jaish and the commando-style units of the Lashkar-e-Taiba. Wani had popped up on the Army’s radar not long after Altaf Baba was killed.

  Qazipathri, Jammu and Kashmir

  25 April 2014

  In their squad vehicles, Maj. Varadarajan and his men arrived at the village in less than 30 minutes. By 1500 hours, the QRT had split into 6 buddy pairs and set up a cordon around the two-storey brick house about which the men had received detailed targeting information. Maj. Varadarajan then proceeded to do what he always did before operations in civilian areas—he ordered his men to move residents out of the area for their own safety.

  The house Maj. Varadarajan and his men had their eyes on that afternoon was the biggest in the village. Its spacious compound included a sprawling orchard and 2 outhouses. Maj. Varadarajan scanned the setting quickly. Heavy-calibre weapons could not be used as the men were not clear how many civilians were still inside the house. Army snipers arrived a few minutes later and took positions on rooftops of neighbouring houses. But the sharpshooters had no clear view of their target. They would remain in position, but had no idea what they were aiming at.

  As Maj. Varadarajan began a final briefing with his men, he received a shattering additional piece of information from a resident of Qazipathri. Terrorists hiding in villages routinely endanger the lives of citizens, most of whom are too afraid to speak. Others are desperate not to become pawns in the violence and at times break their silence. Maj. Varadarajan immediately radioed his CO.

  ‘Sir, it’s not just Altaf. There are 2 Lashkar terrorists with him. We are about to make contact.’

  Barely had Maj. Varadarajan signed off when Col. Dabas heard gunshots. The battalion headquarters was not far from Qazipathri village. The sound of gunfire is usually the last thing that alarms a soldier. And in this case, Col. Dabas knew that one of his finest officers was on the job. Even so, he immediately ordered more soldiers from the unit to rush to the location and strengthen Maj. Varadarajan’s cordon.

  The gunshots that Col. Dabas heard were the starting point of what would become a fierce firefight. From well-entrenched positions within the house, the terrorists fired at Maj. Varadarajan and his men, who returned tentative fire as they squinted at the house, trying to figure out where the terrorists were hidden. The gun battle raged on for an hour but the terrorists’ positions could not be pinpointed.

  Maj. Varadarajan checked his watch. It was well past 1700 hours. He knew that something had to be done before daylight faded. Darkness would give the terrorists tremendous advantage. They were probably already planning to draw out the encounter until the sun set so they could slip away from the cordon under the cover of night.

  Maj. Varadarajan winced. He knew that was not an option. Allowing Altaf Wani to slip away after having him surrounded would mean the security forces could effectively forget about getting anywhere close to such an opportunity soon. It would be a psychological blow to the men, and a huge morale boost for the terror cadres. If Altaf Wani managed to escape this encounter, his image would be inestimably inflated across propaganda material as a ‘miracle man’ who had outfoxed the Army’s most hardened soldiers.

  There were other reasons why that evening’s hunt was so important. The terrorists hiding in that house in Qazipathri had killed a polling officer and injured 5 others a day earlier in voting at the Anantnag Lok Sabha constituency. The polling staff was on its way to Shopian when the terrorists opened fire on their bus. Eliminating the men responsible for the murderous attack on the already vulnerable democratic process in the Valley went far beyond just kills by a Rashtriya Rifles squad.

  The day rapidly ended, and with no real forward movement in the fight, Maj. Varadarajan came up with a plan, whispering it quickly to Vikram, who nodded back that he was ready to go.

  As the other men provided covering fire, Maj. Varadarajan and Vikram dropped to their bellies and crawled through the orchard. As bullets flew in 2 directions over their heads, the 2 reached the front entrance of the house. Maj. Varadarajan quickly planted an improvised explosive device, armed it and then motioned to Vikram to retreat with him to a safe distance.

  At 1730 hours, in a deafening blast, the front portion of the house came crashing down in a cloud of debris. Not waiting, literally, for the dust to settle, Maj. Varadarajan and Vikram switched their weapons to burst mode and stormed the house, straining through the murk for their targets. Instantly, they were greeted by a hail of bullets fired by a terrorist who had been half buried in the debris. One of the bullets grazed Maj. Varadarajan’s forearm. A microsecond more and the 2 soldiers would have been shredded, but they both reacted fast, turning their own AK-47 rifles on the terrorist, pumping an unwavering stream of bullets at him.

  Maj. Varadarajan took a step closer to the body in front of them. Bullet smoke rose from the dead terrorist. He bent down to get a clear look. Maj. Varadarajan knew what Altaf Wani looked like. And this definitely was not him. Two more terrorists were still in the house. They had mounds of rubble now providing them with cover. And 1 of them had to be Altaf Wani.

  Before Maj. Varadarajan and Vikram could decide on their next course of action, grenades came flying through the air from a dark corner of the shattered ground floor of the house. Well-trained in room-clearing techniques, Maj. Varadarajan and Vikram dived to the ground, their hands protecting their ears. The grenades exploded feet from the 2 soldiers, shrapnel smashing off the debris, missing them by inches.

  The terrorists followed the grenades they had thrown with fire from their assault rifles. Using this as cover, one of the terrorists bolted out of the house and towards an outhouse in a far corner of the compound. As he exited, the terrorist had briefly looked Maj. Varadarajan’s way. And Maj. Varadarajan saw his face. It was Altaf Wani.

  Maj. Varadarajan had gained a formidable reputation for dominating firefights, aggressively ending them with sheer power.

  ‘His aggression was cold and calculated. There was nothing brash about it. It was Maddy’s belief that the man who takes initiative and packs aggression in a firefight is the one who triumphs,’ recalls Col. Dabas.

  It hardly surprised Col. Dabas, therefore, when one of the officers at the encounter site radioed him with the update that Maj. Varadarajan and Vikram were now approaching the outhouse to take a cornered Altaf Wani down. The QRT continued to fire bullets at the house where they believed the third terrorist was still hiding. But there was no return fire.

  Maj. Varadarajan lobbed a grenade into the outhouse. The blast should have debilitated, if not killed Altaf Wani. But as the 2 men stormed the outhouse, a volley of fire came smashing into Vikram. It became clear what had just happened—the grenade had killed 1 terrorist, but there was another with him. Altaf Wani wasn’t alone when he fled from the debris of the residence and into the cement outhouse—the second terrorist had fled with him. It was this seco
nd terrorist who had been killed by the grenade. Wani had survived.

  The sepoy returned several rounds of fire at the terrorist, but Wani was shielded by a row of logs stacked in the outhouse and was able to fire his weapon from the confined space he was in.

  Maj. Varadarajan saw his buddy collapse to the ground. Vikram had taken 2 bullets: 1 had sliced his neck open, while the other had penetrated his jaw. A gunshot through the neck usually spells certain death. Maj. Varadarajan knew he was about to lose one of the most courageous and dependable soldiers in his team. He knew that not only was his buddy through with this fight, his life too was about to end. As in all encounters, there was not a moment for emotion or mourning. Without pausing for a moment, Maj. Varadarajan lunged forward with his AK-47 and sprayed bullets at Altaf Wani, killing him instantly.

  In those final seconds, some of Altaf Wani’s shots hit Maj. Varadarajan.

  ‘He walked out of the outhouse. He looked okay. We thought he was fine,’ recalls an officer in the cordon outside the house. ‘But then he suddenly collapsed.’

  The soldiers were not sure if Altaf Wani was dead. And they didn’t know what had happened to Vikram. Maj. Varadarajan was breathing heavily when he was pulled from the site, but nothing about his demeanour betrayed that he had 3 gunshot wounds and was losing copious amounts of blood from all 3.

  ‘Yaar, we got him. But sheer bad luck, we lost Vikram,’ Maj. Varadarajan said to an officer who was removing him from the site, barely a grimace on his face. ‘And I got hit too. I can’t believe it.’ Then Maj. Varadarajan lost consciousness.

  An ambulance had arrived to dash Maj. Varadarajan to the Army’s 92 Base Hospital in Srinagar—the only place equipped to handle the injuries he had suffered in the firefight. Col. Dabas had alerted the Pulwama civil hospital en route about the officer’s critical injuries and asked them to make arrangements to stabilize and possibly revive him before sending him onward to Srinagar. But Maj. Varadarajan would not make it beyond a few kilometres from Qazipathri village. He died in the arms of his unit’s 2IC and the regimental medical officer.

  Maj. Varadarajan had celebrated his 31st birthday on 12 April 2014, a fortnight before the Qazipathri operation. It is a day his CO will never forget. The Colonel was on his way to Srinagar airport to drop off an officer, Maj. Aashish Dhankar, who had completed his tenure at the unit. He decided to pick Maj. Varadarajan up from his company operating base and treat him to an extra special lunch at a luxury hotel.

  As the officers drove towards Srinagar, one thing needed to be resolved: should they head to the Taj or the Lalit? Col. Dabas remembers telling Maj. Varadarajan that while the Taj offered a stunningly beautiful view, the other hotel was reputed to serve better food.

  ‘Sir, pehle Taj chalte hain, phir Lalit (Sir, let’s check out the Taj first, then the Lalit),’ was Maj. Varadarajan’s instant reply.

  The Colonel couldn’t say no. The officers went to the Taj first where they had chocolate brownies and steaming cups of cappuccino, before driving to the Lalit where they cracked open a few bottles of beer and finished the afternoon with a sumptuous meal.

  That afternoon was a rarity in the cloistered life that soldiers who participate in operations lead. Maj. Varadarajan wanted the unit’s adjutant, Maj. Ankur Datta, to feel miserable about missing out on the jaunt. So he suggested to his CO that they take some pictures and share them with others in 44 RR.

  ‘When he saw the snaps he decided against it. He thought he looked too bulky. Of course I shared them!’ Col. Dabas later wrote in a letter to Maj. Varadarajan’s young wife, Indhu Rebecca, 3 days after his death. In the same letter, he wrote:

  Now, he [Maddy] is the pillar on which the unit history will rest. The paltan and the Army are indebted to him. As his commanding officer, I am grateful to him for the moments of trust and laughter we shared. Whenever he is mentioned, I will walk tall and say, ‘I knew him. He was my finest officer.’

  Men from the unit remember how no matter how long or hard Maj. Varadarajan’s day had been, he was always up for making others feel special on their birthdays or anniversaries. It was the CO’s birthday on 24 March when Maj. Varadarajan arrived at his house at midnight along with his QRT and the neighbouring company commander. ‘He would do that for everyone. That was Maddy. Personal relationships meant a lot to him,’ remembers Col. Dabas.

  Officers of the 44 Rashtriya Rifles say it was Maj. Varadarajan’s strength and sheer bulk that kept him alive for over an hour even after taking so many bullets.

  ‘The way he was bleeding, I knew he would not come out of this. But it didn’t stop us from praying for a miracle,’ says an officer who was part of the Qazipathri operation.

  Another buddy pair pulled out Altaf Wani’s body from the outhouse after Maj. Varadarajan was dispatched from the site. He had gunshot wounds in his head, neck, abdomen and limbs. Maj. Varadarajan had made sure that there was nothing left of him.

  Maj. Varadarajan’s last words would haunt his CO. Col. Dabas would spend days wondering why the young officer had said, ‘I can’t believe this has happened to me.’

  ‘The only thing I can conclude is that Maddy was so sure of his battle craft and fighting skills that he couldn’t believe they had got him,’ says Col. Dabas who went on to become an instructor at the Defence Services Staff College in Wellington, Tamil Nadu.

  The day after the operation, Col. Dabas called the 44 Rashtriya Rifles’ Subedar Major, the most senior enlisted soldier in the unit, and told him he would like to meet Maj. Varadarajan’s Charlie company. Their morale would have been crushed from the loss of 2 of their bravest. At dinner, Col. Dabas broke bread with Maj. Varadarajan’s QRT. Few words were spoken. Grief overwhelmed pride that night.

  ‘In Maddy, I saw a special operative. I could relate to him,’ says Col. Dabas. ‘He had the patience to cultivate sources and the aggression to influence the outcome of a firefight. His Charlie Company was very much like an SF unit,’ says Col. Dabas. And Col. Dabas would know. He was commissioned in the Para-SF and later moved to another Para-SF unit. Col. Dabas would beam with pride as Maj. Varadarajan’s QRT would always bag top position during division-level competitions involving 6 teams each from the 9 battalions that were part of Victor Force, which oversees operations in the Anantnag and Pulwama areas of J&K.

  Maj. Mukund Varadarajan was posthumously awarded the country’s highest peacetime gallantry award, the Ashok Chakra, on the eve of Independence Day 2014. Indhu arrived in Delhi to receive the award from the President of India on Republic Day the following year.

  ‘India should see the man Mukund was, not my sorrow,’ Indhu said that evening in a television interview on NDTV.

  Indhu has since moved with her daughter to Australia to pursue her ‘new-found passion’ for teaching.

  ‘I often try my best to explain to my 6-year-old how wonderful he was, and we recently came to an agreement after watching Baahubali that Appa is our Baahubali because he was the strongest and he did the best he could to do his duty. It is true, he was perfect for me, but perfect or not, he did his best, always,’ says Indhu.

  Maj. Varadarajan’s citation said he personally led the demolition team and used the resources available to him in a critically short time period to bring down the target house. The citation made a special mention of his ‘aggressive action’ and the avenging of the attack on election officials ‘within 24 hours’ that had ‘restored the faith of public in democracy’.

  ‘Maj. Mukund Varadarajan exhibited most conspicuous bravery and exemplary leadership and made the supreme sacrifice while fighting with the terrorists,’ the citation added. His buddy, Sepoy Vikram Singh, was awarded a posthumous Shaurya Chakra, the country’s third highest peacetime gallantry award.

  Mukund would often ask Indhu to promise him that she would never cry if something happened to him in the line of duty. Indhu took that promise very seriously. As Maj. Varadarajan’s mortal remains were brought to Chennai, television viewers across the country saw Indhu’s calm
, stoic figure next to her husband’s casket, their 3-year-old daughter, Arshea, by her side.

  ‘There is this moment that I will never forget. Mukund told me that his parents and I were his gods. I could understand him extolling his parents, but I was scared when he put me up on that pedestal. I tried to explain to him that I am just human,’ Indhu recalls.

  ‘He saw it differently. He called our daughter his god too on the day she was born. He really did love and respect us as much as God. How can you not be blown away by that kind of love?’

  ‘She (Indhu) would often say she would pull through because she had made a promise to him. We draw strength every day from Indhu’s composure and demeanour,’ says Col. Dabas.

  The Ashok Chakra that Maj. Varadarajan was awarded posthumously was not the first decoration for gallantry that came his way. His CO had originally planned to recommend Maj. Varadarajan for an award in June 2013 for the Altaf Baba operation. But Maj. Varadarajan would not hear of it. Such recommendations are always confidential, but the young officer had learnt about the honour in store for him. He marched to the CO’s office and insisted that if someone had to be recommended for an award, it needed to be 2 young soldiers from his company who had played the role of scouts during that operation.

  ‘Sir, bahut badhiya kaam kiya un donon ne. Woh award ke haqdaar hain (Both of them did a tremendous job and deserve the award),’ Maj. Varadarajan pleaded. He got what he wanted. The 2 men were awarded the Sena Medal for gallantry shortly thereafter.

  The 5-page letter Col. Dabas wrote to Indhu was drenched in the emotions of a CO who respected and admired a soldier 8 years his junior.