Page 13 - Seniors Today - Vol1 Issue 3
P. 13
was to find a way to make the jeep path drivable With everything in place for the final assault,
for these heavy tanks. Anyone who has been Gen Thimaya and senior officers reached
to Zoji-La knows that though it is one of the Baltal in the third week of October to oversee
lowest passes in the Himalayas at 11572 ft., it the operations. At Baltal there was a two-room
receives the highest amount of snowfall. I have forest hut which became the headquarters of
personally driven through walls of about 93 ft Gen Thimaya for the Zoji-La operation. The hut
of snow here. Usually the snow starts by the had been used in 1916 by Pandit Nehru and his
beginning of October, and under extreme cold wife Kamala for their honeymoon. Gen Thimaya
conditions this is one of the most inhospitable was able to retrieve the tourist register with
areas. Nehru’s comments and signatures. Thereafter,
The question of the road between Baltal and there has been no trace of the register.
Zoji-La continued to be a problem till an officer
of the Engineers came forward to complete the
task within the timeframe. Eight kilometres had
to be cut, widened and made fit for movement
of tanks. So the work was started in the middle
of September, and additional labour force
was available only a month later. Due to the
enemy being able to watch everything from the
heights, work could be undertaken only in the
dark. It took more than 30 days to make a road
of 9-mile length with a comfortable gradient,
which could take the tanks with tracks. The
task was accomplished by good coordination KL Shara, Mr. Lazarus and Sati Sahni ( author) at Baltal
under the able and inspiring leadership of One of the two rooms was used by Gen
Major M.A. Thangaraju. Appropriately, this Thimaya; the other room was kept for visiting
road was named after him, and continues to be commanders. For the crucial days of the tank
known as such. Now only traces of the original breakthrough, three war correspondents were
road are left. On this road, ultimately eleven allowed to stay there. Apart from me, were K.L.
Stuart tanks of the 7th Cavalry went up to Sharma of AIR and Wilfred Lazrus of PTI (API).
Zoji-La and beyond to Gumri Basin. The tank Gen Thimaya had a Second World War vintage
drivers were brave, courageous soldiers, and the Helicrafter Radio Receiving Set and was fond of
commanders were able to provide leadership, surfing. On the night of 1st November, he picked
inspiration and good coordination, teamwork up the local enemy commander of Zoji-La
and total commitment, which resulted in the reporting to the Pakistani Brigade Commander
complete success of the venture, and created that Indians had brought tanks and dislodged
history. them from heights. The Pakistani Brigadier
disbelievingly told him that it was impossible,
these must be camouflaged jeeps. The General
immediately decided that in future briefings
and signals, they would use only this phrase for
tanks and this façade would be kept up till the
end of the operations. The war correspondents
were also told to avoid use of words like tanks
and armour. In the meantime, the first-day
dispatches had gone across and some were
published in London newspapers. We were
informed later that the Indian High Commission
13 The Thangaraju road SENIORS TODAY | Volume 1 | Issue 3
