Families Matter

Shunali Khullar Shroff

Twenty Indian soldiers and their commanding officer were killed in a brutal clash on 15 June 2020 in the Galwan valley. As terrifying details of the hand-to-hand conflict in which Indian soldiers were assaulted with crude and barbaric weapons emerged, most of us were left feeling indignant and anguished.

While there were some voices in the media asking for an economic boycott of China, there were more than a few wanting the Indian Army to give a befitting reply to China with an aggressive military response. This isn’t the first time that the Indian public and Indian news media have debated over a border conflict involving India and nor is it the first time that casual warmongering has taken place across our television channels and on social media.

Honour is important. Our national pride understandably demands that we ask our forces to go all out and give the enemy a bloody nose, but who ultimately pays the enormous price of war?

Is it the mother who will never see her 22-year-old son again? The 16-days-old daughter who will grow up without a father? Or the wife who did not realise that the last time she spoke to her husband would be the final conversation between them.

I spoke to Salma Shafeeq, wife of Major Shafeeq Mahmood Khan Ghori, who sacrificed his life on 1 July 2001 in Baramullah during Operation Rakshak, about the consequences faced by the family of a soldier killed in action.

You had been married only 10 years when your husband was killed in ops. Your children were only four and eight respectively. Can you take me back to that time and speak a little about it?

Our last family posting was in Amritsar in 1999. After that my husband, who belonged to 172 Field Regiment, was sent to serve 30 Rashtriya Rifles in Baramulla district in Kashmir. My children and I moved to Bangalore to the family accommodation to be close to my mother. I was only 19 when I got married and I had no idea what I was signing up for. I imagined a life full of good postings, parties and romancing around India.

At what point did you become aware of the sacrifices an army life called for?

In the beginning, it was difficult for me to accept the fact that my husband was constantly on the move. I was left alone for long periods when he would be on an exercise or in a field posting. There were no mobile phones then and I us