Kolkata, April 26: The mortal remains of late Havaldar Jhantu Ali Sheikh, the martyr paratrooper killed in an ambush with terrorists in the Basantgarh area in Udhampur district of Jammu and Kashmir earlier this week, was brought to his native village on Saturday at Tehatta in Nadia district of West Bengal.
As the body of the martyr paratrooper reached his residence, the family members who had been holding their tears for a long time finally broke down. There was an air of mourning among the villagers who assembled at the residence of the martyr to pay their last tributes to the brave son of the soil.
The mortal remains of Havaldar Sheikh were brought to Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose International Airport in Kolkata on Friday night from Jammu and on Saturday morning his body was brought to his native village by road.
The villagers had assembled in front of the ancestral residence of the martyr since Saturday morning to pay tribute to the martyr paratrooper as well as to stand by his family members. The martyr’s elder brother Nazim Shiekh is also a non-Commissioned Officer of the Indian Army and he is also currently posted in Jammu and Kashmir.
The martyr paratrooper is survived by his wife Jhuma and two children, Tanvir and Rehana. The widow, along with their children, used to reside at the staff quarter at the Agra Cantonment in Uttar Pradesh.
However, they reached Tehatta on Friday to perform his last rituals at his native village. “I am unable to accept the fact that my husband will not return. Nation was his first passion. He was extremely dedicated to his duty. But he never used to discuss his professional life with us,” the martyr’s widow told media persons on Saturday.
Jhantu Ali Sheikh was posted with the 6th battalion of Para Special Forces. Soon after the killing of several tourists by terrorists at Pahalgam in Jammu and Kashmir, there was an ambush between the Army personnel and terrorists in the Basantgarh area in Udhampur district. The martyr was a member of the paratroopers’ team which was involved in the ambush.
During the ambush, he was shot and was ultimately killed. Three tourists from West Bengal were killed in the Pahalgam massacre. One of them was an officer of the Intelligence Bureau Manish Ranjan Mishra, a resident of Jhalda in Purulia district.
IANS