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He used to chat with me for hours narrating stories of his tenure at Intelligence Bureau; shortened IB. Most of his stories were of his struggle in extreme conditions, especially around borders. Indo China Border, Jammu border, Arunanchal border and many more. For me those were hard days, whereas for him it was adventure! IB was not well equipped with modern machinery or techniques in those days. I am talking about an era of late 60’s. In spite of lack of technology or modern systems, our forces had manpower who were willing to lay their lives for the country. Their willpower, dedication, determination and honesty were the stumbling blocks for the agency. On the snowcapped mountains at the borders, when harsh weather and adverse conditions lashed them with all might, he often faced the challenge of navigating his way through knee deep snow between the bunkers and the watch stations. Just a walkie-talkie in hand was not always useful. Mountains and forests, even during summers were tough to navigate through.
With scarce natural resources and few manual equipment, they could rely on their instinct or gut feel for navigation.
“I stole a leopard’s food once,” he said and smiled, awaiting my surprised reaction.
“What! Really? But why? The leopard kills to survive. Why did you steal it? And how did you do that?” I exclaimed, while turning down the volume of the television to listen to him. I sat crossed leg on the sofa and leaned on the cushion. The story would be long I knew.
“Well you see, it was not intentional. I was patrolling the area, when my subordinate came running to me. He alleged spotting a snow leopard with a kill. It took us around 45 minutes to reach the spot from where the leopard had disappeared. Apparently the mountain goat was too heavy for the animal to pull, so he left his kill there. I shot in the air, tied the goat to our shoulders and moved at a higher distance instead to descending.”
I stared at him in sheer disbelief. “Why did you move higher?”
“Because the leopard would have pounced on us the moment we descended with the goat. The leopard watched us hiding somewhere. It’s safe to go on a higher distance and scare the leopard away. Inching higher, my subordinate realized we had lost our way. We kept moving and returned safely from the other side of the base camp.” He took a deep breath.
“How did you find your way then?”
“I had a fair idea of the altitude and had counted the number of trees on the way. Scaling the same height from the other side of the hill, I observed the declining number of shrubs, marking an end of the forest area. Since forests were cleared around the base camps, a complete round of the hill would bring us back to the same point. That’s how I navigated my way beta,” he said feeling nostalgic.
“Wow! You stole a leopard’s food, lost your way and returned safely to the camp. You are incredible dad!” I exclaimed.
He smiled with a calm expression.
“On another occasion we caught two terrorists who crossed Bangladesh en-route Pakistan. I was posted in NEFA, Arunanchal Pradesh. They claimed to be farmers and alleged crossing the border unknowingly. But I knew they were liars!” he said with his childlike enthusiasm.
He continued, “I asked them the routes they had crossed. They named a few. Then I asked them their village of origin. They said Bankura. My next questions cleared all doubts. I asked them the name of the road in Master Moshaai block and they ran a blank at me”.
“Who is Master Moshaai?” I asked him sipping my tea.
“Anybody from or around the village Bankura would know Master Moshaai, the school teacher who taught everybody for free. Master Moshaai’s statue was erected in the middle of the village and roads renamed after him. The adjoining village was Babu Graam with a river connecting Bankura. The two knew nothing, meant they did not belong to the place and were lying. They were handed over to IB head office, contemplating an attack.”
“We don’t need navigation in car if we have you,” I pulled his leg.
My father-in-law last narrated his stories in December 2015. An ode to the navigator who took his last breath on 15th Jan 2016.