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Gen Vaidya was in the thick of the bloodiest battles of the 1971 war in the western sector. Tribune Archives: Photo by Yog Joy
Sujan Dutta
On a cold winter night when his men in the tanks were still waiting to weave a way through fields that could explode under their tracks, the Brigadier hustled from one machine to another. Stopping at the head of a column where a trawl tank was in the lead, he spoke a few words with another officer, a Sapper, on what the least risky path would be.
There was no guarantee that the least risky meant it would also be safe. This would be the third minefield in a row. The semi-official history of the war would later record it as 1,460 yards wide.