Men who move mountains

Lop Singh Thakur, my 50-year-old Lahauli colleague, brimmed with confidence when he suggested in November 1980 that we ride up on horseback from Daulat Beg Oldi (DBO) to the 18,540 feet high Karakoram Pass, without a map.

His self-assurance was rooted in the certainty that all we needed to guide us were the scattered bones of merchants, traders and travellers and their pack animals that had perished centuries earlier along this stark and precipitous Himalayan trail, once part of the fabled Silk Route.

It was a 17-km ride through a series of black gravel promontories, and in the surrounding icy wilderness all that was audible was the howling wind and our laboured breathing and that of our sure-footed mounts. At the Pass, other than a cairn of roughly hewn stones, nothing else was visible in the austere white Himalayan landscape.

Astride the Pass, I recalled hoary tales of caravans that frequently travelled from Leh to DBO on their way to Yarkand and Kashgar on the Tibetan plateau, carrying the riches of Hindustan to Tibet, and returning with silk, pelts, and hashish.

I was also reminded of Sultan Said Khan of the Yarkand Khanate — now in southern Tibet — who died at DBO whilst returning from a proselytising military campaign to Ladakh and Kashmir in the early 16th century. Daulat Beg Oldi in Turkic means the spot where the great and rich man died.

A day earlier, I had ventured out from Leh to DBO by helicopter, to visit our thinly-manned detachments, protected by the Indo- Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) in northern Ladakh, that were cut off from the rest of India during many months of the year.

On landing, we spotted the remains of a Soviet-era Mi-4 transport helicopter that had been abandoned some years earlier, due to engine failure. Its shell lay beside the airstrip where Squadron Leader CKS Raje — later Air Marshal — had landed 32 Army personnel in his Fairchild Packet in July 1962, and then left with a plane-load of sick personnel.

Welcomed with a cup of hot chocolate, the Check Post Officer ceremoniously granted me use of his throne, which was the Mi-4 pilot’s seat, set up under the helicopter’s rotor blades holding up an improvised roof. Darkness descended early, and after an indifferent canned meal, I was escorted to the ‘grand suite’, in a corner of the bunker reserved for the Check Post Officer, to sleep.

With our trip to Karakoram Pass over the previous day, Lop Singh suggested we travel once more on horseback to the 17,500 feet high Track Junction, another encampment some 15 km to the south. As soon as we set off before dawn, it began to snow, covering the trail of bones that would unfailingly have directed us to our destination.

But despite this handicap, an unfazed Lop Singh faultlessly navigated us towards our objective, when the unexpected occurred. Without notice, my horse, spooked by the smoke from the encampment ahead, bolted, hurling me from my saddle but with one foot still trapped in the stirrup. Fortunately for me, Lop Singh dashed up and skilfully grabbed the bridle.

However, within hours of our arrival at Track Junction, inclement weather set in, postponing by two days the arrival of a helicopter to transport me back to Leh. Michael Xavier, the 30-year-old Check Post Officer from Kerala, more than made up for the setback.

For two evenings, he enthusiastically played his guitar and sang English songs, which though incomprehensible to his men, moved them enough to respond by clapping and gyrating enthusiastically. Xavier was truly an exceptional officer. Fluent in Ladakhi, he conducted frequent patrols on horseback, irrespective of the weather, and daily played volleyball with the men, who he also motivated to perform a series of unending arduous tasks.

Not only did Xavier volunteer at the time to serve two successive tenures of six months each, but he also studied in detail the Chiru or Tibetan antelope that is much sought after for Shahtoosh wool.

It is plucky individuals like Xavier and Lop Singh who, over decades, have been responsible for keeping high the morale of small contingents serving in these oxygen-depleted icy Himalayan regions to keep us safe. In an ironic sense, they are the modern-day descendants of the Silk Route travellers still wandering the unforgiving mountainous lands.