The two soldiers who were a part of the group Yadav was leading that night were arrested by Pakistanis and returned last week. But four others, including Yadav are missing. Or so the mother wants to believe. She hopes that some positive information would be forthcoming from talking to the two soldiers now back in India.

Therefore even when her husband Captain (retired) Ram Singh Yadav, shows her the terse telegram from the Commanding Officer of Suneel's III Battalion of the Rajput Regiment, Colonel S B N Janardanan saying that Suneel was killed in action on August 30, she does not believe it.

Here the family is confused and feels neglected by the Army and the nation. When Yadav senior came to Delhi, ``neither the Chief of Army Staff (COAS) nor thevice chief had time'' to meet him. Though he met Lieutenant General R K Sahni, Director General of Military Intelligence, who was "most kind and helpful,'' there was no information about Suneel's body.

``Defence Minister George Fernandes has been claiming that his door is forever open for everybody but I could not meet him either and same was the case at the Prime Minister's House,'' Yadav told The Indian Express. Yadav senior who won a Sena Medal for bravery against Pakistanis in the 1971 war did not lose heart. DGMI and another officer of the Rajput Regiment in South Block told Yadav senior that his son was killed while patrolling near Sub-sector Haneefuddin in the Turtuk sector.

``They apparently strayed into Pakistani territory and while four of them were killed in an exchange of fire, two others were taken prisoners,'' he said. The Army told him that his son's body was lying some 600 feet deep in a gorge in the Pakistani territory and therefore could not be retrieved.But here again, Yadavrecalls a conversation with a fellow officer of Suneel who called from Turtuk to say on August 30 that Suneel was killed in an operation and Pakistani radio had claimed to be in possession of four bodies of Indian soldiers, including an officer.

Shakuntala Devi still does not believe Suneel is dead. ``First on August 31, senior officers and an army band came from Agra for Suneel's funeral but there was no body and some of them went back saying he was just missing.

Secondly his luggage and clothes have still not been sent back. And thirdly the Army has been saying through newspapers that Suneel and the three other soldiers are still missing in action,'' she says.

Not only the Yadavs but their friends and relatives too are disillusioned with the politicians who were swearing by the soldiers in Operation Vijay just a month ago but suddenly forgot all about them.

``Read the letter written by Colonel Janardanan. He letter says my son died in Operation Vijay but there is not a single person willing to tellme where his body is. Why are politicians and the government not putting pressure on Pakistan to return the bodies when we returned their soldiers and bodies so honourably?'' he asks and then holds his wife's hand.