Last month, elements from the Pakistan Army walked across the LoC in the Rajouri sector in Jammu and Kashmir. They ambushed a Jat Regiment patrol and killed four troops. But the intruders werenât through. They chopped off the head of a slain Indian soldier and carried it back across the LoC as a trophy. The Pakistanis also took away a light machine gun that the Indians were carrying.
| They just love chopping off those heads. It's so... Islamic. |
The Indian retaliation was ferocious. Earlier this week, a battalion of the Jat Regiment shot dead nine Pakistani soldiers. And for gruesome impact, the Jats got the heads of two Pakistani soldiers. The Army brass, however, isnât saying anything about this macabre medievalism. âThereâs nothing to state officially. Weâre not making a statement,â says a senior officer at Army Headquarters.
| "Unofficially, I can say that taxidermists are a greedy lot. There really should be some sort of investigation..." |
Even during the Kargil war, bodies of some Indian soldiers, which the Pakistanis returned, were badly mutilated. One such posthumous humiliation was inflicted on Lieutenant Saurabh Kalia. Oberoi, who regards such competitive sadism as an aberration, argues that itâs primarily motivated by the intrudersâ quest for proof of inflicting casualties on the adversary. âSome may be considering an enemy soldierâs head a better evidence of a successful foray, compared to a captured weapon or some other material proof,â he says. The General, who interacted with Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, then Pak DG of military operations, as his counterpart in the mid-nineties, gives the benefit of the doubt to the Pakistani brass. He says the equation at the lower levels matters. âNot everything that unfolds on the LoC is policy,â he says. âWhat transpires is mostly prompted by local considerations.â |