This collection of short stories has been mostly written while I was still serving in the Army, over a period of a decade. Other than being an outlet to handle stress bought on by years of operating in a hostile environment, they were meant for my parents to read and enjoy. In a sense they were a substitute to keeping a daily diary.

In the year 1988, I was commissioned into the Madras Regiment but volunteered for probation to a Special Force Outfit. Somewhere along the way in the Military Academy, I was seized with the romantic notion of joining the elite. It was my weapons instructor in the Academy, Havildar Joginder Singh, who kindled that fire in me to volunteer for the SF. While all other instructors would scream and punish, Joginder would just stand there with an amused smile, challenging you with his eyes. A slim handsome man, who survived Sri Lanka and various other operations, to die later in an ambush in the northeast.

 Life as a Special Forces Officer was filled with adventure, thrills, and scars. I was fortunate to get the opportunity to serve in all the conflict regions in the sub-continent where the army was deployed – Sri Lanka, Assam, the Northeast, and Kashmir. It was my great regret that I missed out a tenure of the Siachen. Our work was physically vigorous, morally as well as emotionally turbulent, at times, often blurring the easy questions of right and wrong. Moreover, unmindfully it would often pose tough questions about men in action.

Most of these stories have been written sitting in ambushes, in tents, under lantern light and walnut trees. My zest for reading and a passion for writing provided an escape from the tremendous pressures associated with my profession as a Special Forces soldier. It aroused my curiosity and sensitivity and in hindsight, was one of the reasons responsible for my leaving the Forces after an action-packed decade long stint.

While this collection is a work of fiction, it would not be too off the mark to claim that most of the stories are real life experiences, personal or they happened to friends and family. I have in the bargain exercised caution to dramatize and tried to be as faithful to the core of the original incident without disturbing the flow of the narrative. It would be fair to say, that I have followed what Marco Polo said

 “Things seen as seen and things heard as heard. And I penned it all down”. Names have been changed in a few cases, again for obvious reasons. The choice of stories covers a gamut of experiences – from the humorous to the emotionally disturbing. They often expose the hard choices and decisions of life and death one must make at a tender youthful age, rarely ever faced by even the senior most and experienced CEOs in the corporate world.

During my tenure in the military, I had the opportunity to travel to some exotic places in this vast country and meet some bizarre and strange characters – from gentlemen and cowards to sadists and killers. But the breed that always fascinated me were those who were brave in combat and would very easily cross the line of violent activity with great ease and balance of mind, relishing every second and collecting no emotional scars in the process. They were the gentlest of husbands and fathers, but a complete antithesis in a combat situation. Some went to an early grave. A pity, for they were exceptionally fine officers and men. An old term from the Wild West sums them up- “killing Gentlemen”

In the stories, Pine to Palm and An Appointment in the Lolab Valley, I have tried to project the progressive maturing of an officer over the number of years he spends in combat. They also communicate the sensitivity that one develops as one matures, so absent in youth, yet so essential, I believe in counter-insurgency operations. Most officers with similar experience would agree with my sentiments. In the other stories,

I have tried to bring out the flavour of soldiering in some of the back of beyond areas that the Indian Army must operate in.

If you think some of the stories are not gentle, then in defense I can only say that neither was the environment where I spent all those years.

– Abhay Narayan Sapru