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Family members of the helicopter crash victims at Palam airbase in Delhi on Thursday evening. (Anil Sharma) Surrounded by mourners, Kamla Devi raises a fist in the air and lets out a cry that cuts through the wails: “Vande Mataram!”.
Her grief over the passing of her son, Squadron Leader Kuldeep Singh, is mingled with a patriotic fervour. After all, serving the nation is something ingrained in the family.
Kamla Devi’s husband Randhir Singh Rao is a former Navy person. Their other child, Abhita Rao, is a Deputy Commandant in the Coast Guard with the Indian Navy. Abhita’s husband, Captain Satyendra Malik, is a doctor with the Army. The extended family, too, is dotted with people who are, or have been, in the armed forces.
“Bahut achi kamai kare hai mere bete ne (My son has earned his name),” Devi tells reporters in Jhunjhunu’s Ghardana Khurd village. Now, she says, she will send her daughter-in-law to serve in the armed forces. Kuldeep had married Meerut’s Yashwani Dhaka in November 2019.
Parents Randhir and Kamla live in Jaipur, from where they reached the family’s ancestral village on Thursday. The former officer’s last rites will be conducted here Friday.
“The village has lost its laadla so we have all decided to install a memorial in the centre of the village,” said former pradhan Harpal.
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