'A Big Salute...': Former Brigadier applauds heroic operation to successfully retrieve bodies of fallen brothers

A retired Armyman replied queries raised on social media as to why were the bodies of three soldiers remained buried for over 9 months and efforts were not made to retrieve them earlier. 

Brigadier Hardeep Singh Sohi, Shaurya Chakra (retired) hailed the efforts of High Altitude Warfare School (HAWS) to retrieve the bodies of their fallen comrades. 

In his post on X (formally Twitter), he wrote, “To set the record straight:- 

1 When four soldiers were lost on 8 Oct 23, after 6 days of digging one body was recovered.  

2. This time the team went with chainsaws and GREF grade shovels using RECCO radar and after 9 days digging successfully recovered balance three. The bodies were buried under 70 feet crevasse covered with snow.” 

Brig S S Shekhawat, the Deputy Commandant of HAWS, personally led the search operation, emphasising the mission’s importance. 

Brigadier Hardeep Singh Sohi applauded Shekhawat’s efforts and had posted “He Is Not Heavy, He Is My Brother. A Big Salute To #HAWSGulmarg for retrieving the bodies of three Havaldar Instructors who were buried in snow in Oct last year while undertaking an expedition to Mount Kun.” 

The bodies of three of the four army personnel, who died after their mountaineering expedition team was struck by an avalanche last October at a height of over 18,300 feet in Ladakh, were recovered amid challenging conditions last week. 

The bodies of Havildar Rohit Kumar, Havildar Thakur Bahadur Ale and Naik Gautam Rajbanshi were trapped deep within a crevasse and lay buried under thick layers of ice and large volumes of snow for the past nearly nine months. 

In the Army’s spirit of ‘Leaving No Man Behind’, a team of mountaineers of the HAWS then undertook a heroic mission to recover the mortal remains of their fallen comrades, they said. 

“Operation RTG (Rohit, Thakur, Gautam)” that sought to retrieve their bodies was launched on June 18. The mission was named in honour of the missing soldiers and the rescue expedition consisted of 88 expert mountaineers. 

In July 2023, a 38-member expedition team from the Gulmarg-based High Altitude Warfare School (HAWS), an elite training institution under the Army, had set out to conquer Mt. Kun in the Union Territory of Ladakh. The expedition started on October 1 and the team hoped to conquer the peak by October 13. 

While fixing ropes on a snow wall, the team was struck by a sudden avalanche on October 8 at a height of over 18,300 ft, between Camp 2 and Camp 3 on the Fariabad Glacier. Four members were caught in the deadly slide. The expedition team made all efforts to rescue those who fell in the crevasse and got buried under large volume of snow. 

The bodies of the three personnel have been handed over to their families with “full military honours”, bringing closure for the loved ones, who had waited to bid the final farewell to them.