Kargil martyr Daljit’s father dead, leaves void at War Memorial event

Aakanksha N Bhardwaj

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, July 25

Kirpal Singh, father of martyr Sapper Daljit Singh, would attend the Kargil Vijay Diwas programme without fail for the last 25 years. He always vent out his emotions and share the cherished memories of his son, who laid down his life at 26. This year, the commemoration function will be incomplete as Sapper Daljit Singh's father passed away in February.

Until his last breath, Kirpal spoke often of the last time he saw his son, how Sapper Daljit Singh had taken his blessings at Jammu station and didn't look back. "He always talked about how my brother didn't look back. In his last days as well, my father would call me and talk about my brother," Kuldeep Singh, Sapper Daljit Singh's younger brother, told The Tribune.

He said now in the absence of his father, the mother also doesn't keep well, so he will go to attend the programme on Saturday.

Kargil Vijay Diwas is celebrated every year on July 26 at the War Memorial by the Kashyap Naujawan Dharmik Sabha.

Kirpal Singh had told The Tribune how he always remembered that in the last letter the family had received from Sapper Daljit Singh after his death, he had asked his wife to take care of the family as anything could happen to him in the war.

“He was not well and had come home on sick leave. When the war broke, he insisted on going back even though I asked him not to," he had told The Tribune.

Sharing the journey, Pawan Kumar, president of the sabha, said they first started organising the event in a mohalla and then they started holding it in palaces.

The president said, “When I am asked why I get so emotional for the families of the martyrs, even though nobody from my own home was in the Army or is a freedom fighter, I always reply that whosoever sacrificed their lives for the country are my family members," he said.

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Forgot illness and left for battle ground

“He was not well and had come home on sick leave. When the Kargil war broke, he insisted on going back even though I asked him not to," Kirpal Singh, father of the martyr had once told The Tribune.