Kohima: President Pranab Mukherjee on Saturday remembered over 2,300 bravehearts of Kohima battle who had laid down their lives while fighting the Japanese forces. Mukherjee, during his visit here, laid a wreath at the ‘Kohima war memorial’ which has 1,421 burials.
Many of those who lost their life in the battle still remain unknown.
“It is an honour to have been able to visit the Kohima War Cemetery– built on the very site where hundreds of gallant British and Indian soldiers fought and achieved martyrdom. “There is no mistaking the meaning, significance and the enormity of this hallowed site where lie the mortal remains of those who distinguished themselves through their acts of conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty,” the President wrote in the visitor’s book at the memorial.
Army had lost 1,405 men, of these identity of 146 could not be known while Air Force had lost 15 personnel, all of whom were identified. Another man who lost his life in the war could not be found and put in miscellaneous category. In April 1944, the Japanese advance into India was halted, and Garrison Hill (where the memorial is situated) was the scene of most bitter fighting.
A small force held out against repeated attacks by a Japanese division. The fiercest hand to hand combat took place in the garden of Deputy Commissioner’s bungalow, around the tennis court, but the heaviest casualties on both the sides occurred after relieving forces reached the Garrison, in driving enemy off the ridge and so re-opening the road to Imphal. It is on the battleground of Garrison Hill that Kohima War cemetery lies.
No trace remains of the bungalow, which was destroyed in the fighting. (PTI)