Diwali - The Festival of Lights

Its Diwali today. One of the most quintessential of all Indian festivals, Diwali is the celebration of light and symbolises the importance of living a vibrant life.

India looks decked up like a Queen during Diwali time. Roads, streets, shops, homes everything is adorned with shining electric lights that add a totally different hue to the place. Busy thoroughfares through the city turn into a veritable feast for the eyes due to the multitude of colours that adorn the way. People put in a lot of time and effort to clean their areas, put shiny new lights around and wait for Goddess Lakshmi to bless them with her presence. In Hindu mythology, Lakshmi is the Goddess of wealth and prosperity and almost all Indians look forward to enjoying her blessing during this period.

This time during Diwali, I decided to do something different. Instead of blowing up a few thousand bucks on firecrackers and polluting the environment and lead to high decibel levels, I decided to spend my time with a few special people, soldiers of the Indian Armed Forces who'd lost their limbs or arms or both during the course of duty.

It was an emotional experience for me to be amidst these brave guys. Even though they had had lost a part of their body, their spirit was indomitable. Having given their best to the nation and to their unit, these guys showed the steadfast resoluteness to bash on regardless in life. Come inclement weather, loss of limb or arm, these guys were ready to brave any storm. A majority of these soldiers had lost their appendages in J&K where we are fighting a proxy way. In military parlance we call it Low Intensity Conflict / Counter Insurgency Operations. There were a few casualties from the North East also. Additionally there were a few paramilitary chaps who were involved in anti Naxalite operations in the hinterlands of India.

It felt really good to have spent time with these brave people. Not even once did I feel that they were any different than me. The typical fauji mood prevailed everywhere. There was a light hearted banter going on, a corny joke was being shared somewhere, somebody was using the very colourful fauji lingua franca with finesse while someplace else chaps were planning out things for the weekend.

People in the swish civvy streets have always asked me what faujis do when there is no war going on. It is very difficult for them to understand why we need to have a military even when we are not fighting a war. For these people, it is an alien proposition to understand how someone can be given a salary without being given a sales target for the month or for a quarter. Everybody is not money minded or profit driven but who will explain it to these people.

When I go home, people ask me, "Hey you, why do you do it man? Are you some kind of a war junkie?". I wont say a God damn word. Why? They wont understand, they wont understand a God damn word as to why we do it. Its about the men next to you. That’s it, that’s all that it is.

People think that we fight a war because we want to be heroes. No. Nobody wants to be a hero. It just sometimes turns out that way. Somebody has to do the job, somebody has to get their hands bloodied.

Soldiers are not taught to sacrifice their life for the country. Rather, they are trained to kill the B@$&@^] on the other side of the trench. A soldier doesn’t feel himself any superior to his civilian counterpart. That’s a wrong notion carried by people outside the uniformed services. A soldier, by virtue of his training and the regimented discipline that is ingrained into his psyche knows that he is supposed to carry out his duty without fail.

At the end of the day, its all about belonging to the Brotherhood of Hero’s...soldiers carry out their allotted tasks and many a times go beyond the call of duty. This is what makes soldiers different from the people outside the armed forces, maybe this is what makes them special.

It was with such people that I spent my Diwali this year and more than I making them smile, they touched my life in a very special way.