“…he a young man of the strangest profession his century had invented, a Sapper, a military engineer who detected and disarmed mines… the knight, the warrior saint’ — Michael OndaatjeReading about the deep-set association of Lieutenant General PS Bhagat, VC, with the Sikh Light Infantry Regiment in The Tribune, my memory instantly homed in on Second Lieutenant PS Bhagat’s five days of solo and courageous performance, bordering on recklessness, like a man possessed. Unmindful of a punctured ear drum and flesh wounds caused by shrapnel, he remained engaged in neutralising and/or controlled detonation of mines in 1941 during the Karen battle in Abyssinia (now Ethiopia), and befittingly emerging from that crucible as the first Indian Army officer in World War II and perhaps the youngest to be conferred the Victoria Cross for valour.Serving in Sikkim in February 1964, I had the chance to spend a whole day in the presence of then Maj Gen PS Bhagat. He came visiting 17 Infantry Division’s ground-holding dispositions, soon after assuming the Chief of Staff appointment at HQ Eastern Command. He was focused on determining the most likely ingress routes of the PLA to the Siliguri Corridor (later-day Doklam episode) and how best to deter such potential intents.As the juniormost in the Operations Branch of the Division, I was tasked to carry a few maps for possible use of the two highly accomplished professionals, Generals Bhagat and Har Prasad (“Nadda” to his peers because of his short stature!), as they picked each other’s brains to satisfy that our combat dispositions in Sikkim were fail-safe against all aggression intents.On the return journey to Gangtok, it had begun to snow, which besides hindering visibility, also turned the erstwhile pony track and now a single-lane road into a slippery quagmire. As we reached the treacherous 3-mile stretch called the “Death Gallery”, the driver panicked somewhat.I had had a bona fide driving licence since the age of 14, as also ample experience in extreme hill driving in the 1940s’ vintage cars on the Kalka-Shimla road and seeking my GOC’s permission, shifted to the driving seat.After about an hour’s suspense-filled manoeuvring, the precious cargo was safely carried to the “Black Cat Lodge”! Stepping out of the Jonga, Gen Bhagat lifted the flap of his breast pocket, took out his gold-capped black Parker pen (most expensive of the era) and gifting it with a smile, said, “That was excellent driving, Baljit.”Shortly before his superannuation, following the prevalent uncodified custom, Field Marshal SHFJ Maneckshaw conveyed to the Government his pick of Lt Gen Bhagat as his successor, but sadly for India and her Army, he was superseded and appointed Chairman of the Damodar Valley Corporation, where with a “wounded heart”, just 10 months later, he succumbed to a freak illness.As Gen Bhagat had been commissioned into the Bombay Engineers Group, it was natural that post his demise, they would honour his life in uniform through an enduring memorial. They beseeched Mrs Bhagat for memorabilia of her choice, but in particular the much-coveted Victoria Cross medal. Mrs Bhagat promptly conveyed her consent to the proposal, but before that also gladly fulfilling a promise of showing all the medals to an acquaintance.On the chosen day, she set out with a small container of medals but en route to the destination, another friend overtook and waved her to halt by the curb-side.Mrs Bhagat pulled up, got out of the car, the container in hand, shut the door and placed the container upon the roof. After a pleasant tete-a-tete, Mrs Bhagat drove off, forgetful of the medals upon the roof which naturally slid off to anonymity for three days. Lance Naik SC Ghosh of the Signal Regiment per chance noticed the container under a shrub and handed it to his Commanding Officer.“We couldn’t stop smiling. We had gone through hell. At last we would be able to sleep again. The medals were restored to my mother and were duly presented at a touching ceremony on 1 February 1976 to the Bombay Engineer Group in Pune, where they remain on display for posterity,” recalled Ashali Verma, the General’s daughter, in her touching biography ‘The Victoria Cross, A Love Story: The Life of Lt Gen PS Bhagat’.And this brings me to another related memory flash about Booker winner in 1994, Michael Ondaatje’s historical fiction, ‘The English Patient’. Set in WW-II African desert and Italy, one co-protagonist is Lieutenant Kirpal Singh of the Indian Army. “Kip” was also a Sapper and especially trained in unravelling and neutralising minefield clusters much like 2nd Lt Bhagat was.“…Kip will probably get blown up one of these days. Why? For whose sake?… The British Army teaches him the skills and the Americans teach him further skills and are given lectures… You are being used, boy…. The armies indoctrinate you and leave you here and they.… off somewhere else to cause trouble, inky-dinky parlez-vous”.I had brought this book to the notice of the then Engineer-in-Chief, Lt Gen Gurbirman Singh, who agreed that Kip was likely modelled on 2nd Lt Bhagat though not quite “as wild as Bhagat was”! And Ondaatje goes on in the Acknowledgements section to thank the Directorate of Public Relations, New Delhi, for books on the Indian Army: ‘Martial India’, ‘The Tiger Strikes’ and ‘A Roll of Honour’.RIP in Valhalla, General and Mrs Bhagat.