The bravest guy I knew!
By ANI | ANI
Bangalore, Nov.25 (ANI): I must have been in the fifth
grade in Frank Anthony Public School. Lunch break in school was always an
extremely crowded time of the day with loads of kids running around on the field
and multiple games of football and cricket being played side-by-side.
A bunch of us were playing cricket at the far corner of
the ground near a cluster of trees and another couple of matches were going on
using the neighboring trees as wickets. It was the usual confusion with fielders
from one match regularly running across the 'pitch' of the other matches while
chasing the ball down.
As the ball from our match went on the off-side and
towards one of the other trees, the fielder running after the ball was
accidentally struck on his forehead by the swinging bat of the other game's
batsman.
Within minutes his forehead sprouted a lump the size of
a golf ball and the matches were abandoned while we took him to get some medical
attention.
Despite the lump taking a life of its own and turning a
weird shade of pink, the injured fielder insisted on staying on in school for
the remaining classes of the day, during which time, as any dutiful friend
would, the rest of us pulled his leg about how he was looking.
Eventually, we all went home that evening assuming that
we wouldn't see him for a few days - afterall, a hit like that deserved a few
days at home with comics!
But to our surprise, he turned up at school the next day
- with the lump on his forehead and all - like it was any other day.
Our class teacher (Mrs.Ross...?) brought him up to the
front of the class to let us know how she thought it took a brave person to come
to school despite such an injury and not take the easy way out by staying back
at home.
We were all asked to clap for him. And, though we were
being made to clap for him, I guess somewhere, we all knew that no one else we
knew would choose to go to school when you had such a reason not to!
Over years, he and I started hanging out with different
people, we chose different courses and moved into the
'he-used-to-be-in-my-class' mode. He was always among the brighter ones our
school had - a top ranker in academics, excelled in sports and took part in
extra-curricular activities as well.
Which is why, when many years later he got in touch with
me to congratulate me on the birth of my daughter, I was surprised to find out
that he'd chosen to join the Indian Army.
Surprised, because this was someone who had the grades
and aptitude to choose any course in any university of any country he wanted. He
could have gone on to study medicine or, become an engineer, write a code or get
into management - all the things a lot of our batch-mates did, but instead, he
chose to stay back and join the Army!
It definitely takes a brave one to make that kind of a
choice these days! And certainly, no one else I knew, had made such a
choice!
A few months after we reconnected, during the terrorist
attack on Mumbai, Major Sandeep Unnikrishnan of the National Security Guard was
killed in action while fighting the terrorists inside the Taj Mahal Palace and
Hotel. And, just like that, that fielder, the bright one, the one who chose
differently....the brave one, was no more....
In the days to follow, I watched an interview where a
member of his squad described how while fighting the terrorists inside the
Hotel, Major Sandeep Unnikrishnan arranged for the evacuation of his severely
injured colleague first, and while chasing after the terrorists, told the other
injured member, "Do not come up, I will handle them".
Despite not having known Sandeep closely towards the
latter part of his life, when I thought about it, his choice of words and
actions did not surprise me - afterall, he was the bravest guy I knew!
Attn: News Editors/News Desks: The views expressed in
the above article are that of Mr. Ritesh Purohit (ANI)
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