Havaldar Gaya Prasad’s family will receive his body with mixed feelings on Wednesday. The soldier was declared “missing dead” 18 years ago while serving in Siachen Glacier and an Army patrol found his body just three days ago in a crevasse there.
His son is now in Chandigarh to receive the body and take it for cremation to their native village Kuraria in Mainpuri district, Uttar Pradesh. The martyred soldier will be given full military honours, including a 21-gun salute with senior military and district officials paying their respects.
Gaya Prasad of 15 Rajput Regiment was deployed at a high altitude post near Kandha drop zone in Siachen, the world’s highest battlefield where armies of India and Pakistan are deployed since 1984. He went missing while trying to recover supplies, including rations dropped from a helicopter. The officials said most probably the soldier fell into a crevasse and got buried in the snow.
The Army carried out extensive search and rescue missions for days together. After it failed to find Gaya Prasad, the Army finally declared him dead and a battle casualty. In military parlance it means he died in action, which entitled his family to all benefits including pension and other facilities.
However, the soldier’s body was found three days back by an Army patrol in the northern part of Siachen Glacier close to the Kandha drop zone. The patrol party saw a hand jutting out of the snow and the body was then dug out, officials said adding it was more or less intact due to the intense cold and snow.
The body was then shifted on to a snow ledge and airlifted by a Cheetah Helicopter to Siachen base camp. After due identification, the soldier’s body was then airlifted to leh and will be flown to Chandigarh on Wednesday. His son will then receive the body and take it to their village. Prasad’s 90-year-old father reportedly said:
“I can rest in peace once I see my son’s body.” Siachen Glacier, where temperatures sometimes dip to minus 50 degree Celsius, has so far claimed the lives of more than 850 Indian soldiers since they were deployed there in 1984. Most of the casualties were due to harsh weather and dangerous terrain including crevasses and deadly avalanches. The main reasons for deaths are hypoxia and high altitude pulmonary edema (or “altitude sickness” in mountaineering lexicon).
Incidentally, the situation is the same for the Pakistan Army and reports indicate that nearly 100 soldiers die on an average every year. In one of the worst tragedies on April 7, 2012, an avalanche hit a military camp situated at Giyari sector burying 129 Pakistani soldiers and 11 civilians. Their bodies are yet to be recovered.