AFVOA Newsletter 03 of 2020

Section 4 – War Diary CV 2 No. 03 / 2020 Page 50 of 167 6 CHALLENGES OF WAR- HOME FRONT Mrs Sulochana Krishnaswami Genre: Life in the Forces uring the last E Connect Meeting of the AFVOA, the President made an appeal to Members for contributing more articles to the forthcoming “ VIJAY DIWAS NEWSLETTER ”. I thought that I would write not about WAR, but about the HOMEFRONT that is securely held by the soldier’s wives. Whereas the soldiers are engaged on the borders to fight for the honour of our country, the wives silently support the cause in their own way. The brave face that they put on keeps the “Fear Factor” away from the children and they proudly say “Papa has gone to the war front to protect the Country. I got married to “ KRISH ” in Oct 1961 when he was a young Captain with three years of service with the first battalion the Jammu and Kashmir Regiment. I can say that I grew up in the milieu of an Infantry Regiment as much as he did. Our first “Peace Station” tenure was at Mount Abu, a picturesque location for honeymooners. Our first home was romantically named “Roop Mahal”. Little did I realize that winter up north would be so cold and so different from the Sunny South, where Ooty was the coolest place that I had ever been. I had only a smattering knowledge of Hindi let alone Dogri, the ‘Regimental’ language of the battalion. Krish is a linguist and the Jawans were baffled that the “Memsahib” could not speak, let alone understand what was being said. I must share about the experiences at the “Lady Welfare” meetings where we interacted with the Jawan’s wives. They were so pretty, fresh from the villages of Himachal Pradesh and Jammu. For them, this was the first outing away from their mundane chores at their homes. They had nimble hands and could knit a baby’s sweater set in two hours flat. Their hand embroidery was simply exquisite. Never had I felt so inadequate in their presence to match their skills. The young wives could barely spend six months with their husbands due to the paucity of married accommodation in the station and the requirement of turn over to accommodate the other families. I would never forget the great camaraderie amongst the battalion officers and their wives. It was like a big extended family. D