Woman officer from Mohali shines at OTA

Vijay Mohan

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, May 29

A newly commissioned woman lieutenant from Mohali has stood third in the overall order of merit in her course which passed out from the Officers Training Academy (OTA), Chennai, today.

Lieutenant Mani Mehtab Dhaliwal was awarded the bronze medal at the passing out parade that was reviewed by Lt Gen YK Joshi, General Officer Commanding-in-Chief, Northern Command.

She has been commissioned into the Corps of Signals. According to OTA sources, Mani had excelled in marksmanship, cross-country and sports during the training period. In the academy, she held the appointment of Battalion Cadet Adjutant.

Earlier, she had stood second in the order of merit among women candidates in the Combined Defence Services Examination conducted by the Union Public Service Commission for entrance in the OTA.

She has studied in Chandigarh and represented her school as well as Panjab University in a number of state and national-level swimming championships, winning several medals.

She is among the seven cadets from the tricity who became Army officers today. The others are Mantash Singh, Amarbir Singh Bajwa, Sahiljeet Mann, Pooja, Aneesha Mann and Saloni Kasana.

A total of 167 gentleman cadets of the 111th Short Service Commission Course and 31 woman cadets of the 25th Short Service Commission (Women) Course were commissioned into the Indian Amy today in addition to five gentleman cadets and seven woman cadets from Bhutan.

The Sword of Honour and Gold Medal for standing overall first in the order of merit was bagged by Lt Abdesh Katoch from Palampur in Himachal, who has been commissioned into the Armoured Corps. The Silver Medal for standing second went to Adarsh Pratap Singh from Allahabad who has been commissioned into the Rajputana Rifles.

The parents of the cadets were not able to attend the event because of restrictions imposed due to the pandemic and the ceremony was live streamed on the social media.