DIMAPUR, JUNE 20 (MExN): Call it coincidence but for those who believe in numerology, the association of number 9 with the “Daring Ninth” (9 IRB (NAP), will definitely hold something of the “inevitability.”
According to battalion records, after receiving orders to tackle the Naxal menace in Chhattisgarh, the advance party of the 9 IRB consisting of a company along with all logistics and ration left Chumukedima on June 20, 2005 (2+2+5 =9) enroute Chhattisgarh by road in a convoy of 63 (6+3=9) vehicles.
The convoy finally reached the IRB camp at Barsoor in Dantewada district on June 28, after a 9-day road journey.
The rest of the battalion personnel who traveled by train arrived Barsoor on July 9, 2005. The Naga battalion launched one of its most successful operations against the Naxals on August 29, 2005. Codenamed “Operation Green Hunt,” scores of naxalites were killed, hundreds arrested and huge haul of arms seized by the Naga boys.
On April 6, 2006, the battalion suffered heavy casualty in a landmine blast during an operation in the thick jungles. Nine IRB jawans were killed and another 9 injured in the blast.
Recalling the tragedy, one of the battalion’s deputy commandants during that time, VZ Angami, said that when the bodies were being retrieved, they found out that the watch of one of the slain jawans stopped exactly at 9 o’clock while that of another stopped at 9.09 o’clock, indicating that the blast took place between 9.00-9.09 am.
Here’s the last …..the 9 IRB was raised in 1999.
