The Naga Regiment

Sixty-Nine Men from the Camps

Lieutenant Colonel R.N. Mahajan of 14 Kumaon went looking for his first soldiers in the rehabilitation camps for underground Nagas, and enrolled 69 men there. He selected another 107 from across the state. General S.H.F.J. Manekshaw had chosen him to raise the battalion, and the Central Government had agreed to one on the understanding that as many of the former hostiles as possible would be absorbed. Surrendered rebels also came in directly as JCOs and NCOs. No Indian infantry regiment had been raised as the outcome of a political settlement before.

A Naga unit in the defence forces had been among the demands of a Naga convention in 1957. Nagaland became a state in 1963, and the idea was revived by the Chief Minister, Hokishe Sema. The 1st Battalion was raised on 1 November 1970 at the Kumaon Regimental Centre at Ranikhet. The plan called for half the troops to be Nagas and the other half equal numbers of Kumaonis, Garhwalis and Gorkhas. Alfa and Charlie Companies were entirely Naga. The first Subedar Major, Yimchat Sung Ao, was drafted from the Assam Regiment.

The new men had to learn Hindi to get through training, and recruitment closed only in April 1971, when the battalion reached full strength. The regiment was affiliated to the Kumaon Regiment for regimental matters, but it was given its own dress and flag from 15 June 1971. T.N. Raina had become its Colonel a week earlier. It shares the Kumaon motto, while its badge carries crossed Naga spears and a dao over a shield with the head of a mithun.

Shikarpur, 12 November 1971

Its training was not finished when orders to move forward reached the battalion in mid-August 1971. By 20 October it had concentrated at Behrampore under 4 Division in 2 Corps. In early November it moved to Shikarpur in Nadia district to guard the Bheramara axis.

On 12 November a company under Major Ian da Costa caught two Pakistani companies in an ambush, the regiment's first action. The battalion lost four killed and five wounded, and six men were captured after their ammunition ran out. The action brought one Vir Chakra and two Sena Medals, of the battalion's total of one Vir Chakra and three Sena Medals for the war.

The rest of the campaign was less direct. Under Lieutenant General Raina's deception plan, the battalion used dummy tanks and trucks without silencers to simulate an offensive. The enemy pulled out of Meharpur without a fight. It then cleared mines and built a Class 9 bridge over the Mathabhanga from salvaged Pakistani material. On 14 December it secured the west bank of the Madhumati for the divisional attack, and Bravo Company held there under heavy shelling until the east bank surrendered the next day.

Dras, May 1999

1 Naga reached Dras on 11 May 1999, the first battalion inducted into Kargil according to the account of Lieutenant Colonel Amit Shukla. In June it provided a firm base for 2 Rajputana Rifles during the Tololing attack. It secured the Pimple complex by mid-July, and that ground was afterwards named Naga Hill. It cleared Point 5060 in a daylight attack, at a cost of 10 killed and 52 wounded. Sepoy Asuli Mao and Naik Khushiman Gurung received the Vir Chakra, Mao posthumously.

Captain Neikezhakuo Kenguruse, the Naga officer who received a posthumous Maha Vir Chakra for the night of 28 June at Drass, is often associated with the regiment. He was an Army Service Corps officer attached to 2 Rajputana Rifles.

Twin Bump

2 Naga, raised at Haldwani on 11 February 1985, went into the Mushkoh Valley on 27 June 1999 after counter-insurgency duty in northern Kashmir. Its target was a Pakistani mortar position on Twin Bump, part of the Point 4875 complex, at about 15,000 feet.

The assault group went in on 7 and 8 July. Sepoy Imliakum Ao approached the sentry on the outer perimeter in broad daylight and killed him, then killed a second man and joined the rush on the position. He was wounded. The raid took three 120 mm and two 81 mm mortars along with a large stock of ammunition and documents, and an ammunition dump was destroyed. He received the Maha Vir Chakra in January 2000, the only one in the regiment. Eight soldiers were killed when shells struck the firm base, and the battalion's dead in the operation numbered 18.

The war also brought 2 Naga a Chief of the Army Staff's Unit Citation. The battle honours are Dras for 1 Naga and Mushkoh for 2 Naga, with the theatre honour Kargil for both.

At a glance

• Raised: 1 November 1970, Kumaon Regimental Centre, Ranikhet
• Regimental centre: Ranikhet, Uttarakhand
• Motto: Parakramo Vijayate (Valour Triumphs)