They forgot to honour him

NC Bipindra / TNN / May 2, 2006, 02:41 IST

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The family lost Lamba to militants' bullets a fortnight ago. And now, they lost his martyrdom to official apathy.

CHANDIGARH: It was a proud moment for the family of Border Roads Organisation (BRO) officer Vijay Raj Lamba when his colleague brought the medals and certificates won by Lamba during his service in the danger zones of Jammu and Kashmir.
But it was also a moment of loss, double loss. The family lost Lamba to militants' bullets a fortnight ago. And now, they lost his martyrdom to official apathy.No one from the civil administration attended his rasm pagri.
Lamba was waiting to wear his first bravery award on his sleeves, literally.
If he was alive today, Lamba, a superintendent in General Reserve Engineer Force (GREF), would have been rewarded by BRO director general Lt Gen KS Rao for saving lives from the 3-km-long Jawahar tunnel, the only lifeline between Jammu and Srinagar after the spate of murderous avalanches in peak winter during January and February this year.

The avalanches had claimed the lives of over 150 persons and had holed up several hundreds in Kashmir. The Jawahar tunnel was covered completely with snow due to the avalanches that Lamba, along with his men, had extricated several persons from.
On January 19 this year, 52-year-old Lamba was decorated with a medallion and a certificate from the DG for his "devotion to duty and setting example to others in the force", and the commendation was entered in the record of his service.
Exactly three months later, the BRO officer fell to the militants' bullets at Patnitop area of Udhampur district, in a gruesome manner, even as he was on mobile phone talking to his wife.
"My father is a martyr, and we only expect that he be respected as one. A brave man, he defied militants," says Lamba's 25-year-old son Kuldeep, who dashed from UK, where he worked, to Chandigarh to perform his father's last rites on April 20.

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