NSG Commando Suresh Chand Yadav was a man I never knew, but on the day his body arrived at his village, and I was sent to cover the cremation, I felt I had known him for quite some time. Rigor mortis had set in and his body was stiff. That was the reason why his eyes were still open. His eyes peered into mine, as if searching for answers.

There were slogans of ‘Suresh ka yeh balidaan, yaad karega Hindustan’. But who was going to tell him that this was a blatant lie! No one really cares about his ultimate sacrifice for the nation. For, if we did, we wouldn’t just keep counting our dead as if they are potatoes and not men. If we did, we wouldn’t send them to combat without basic life-saving amenities like bulletproof vests, helmets, good weapons and modern communication sets.

If we did, we wouldn’t let his decaying body lie in the scorching sun, waiting for Mr Politician to land his chopper down fashionably late as if attending a fashion show, to lay a wreath, to make a political statement, to mouth promises and get out of there — never to return!

I always wanted to join the defence forces, to serve my country. I’ve always been jealous of all those who are a part of it. I was declared medically unfit, so I joined the media. Now I think it’s thankless to die for a nation that has forgotten to express its gratitude. Kargil saw 523 men die, Kashmir has seen nearly 3,000 defence personnel die — the numbers just keep adding up, the bodies keep piling up. Death ceremonials have become routine.

If there is frustration in the armed forces, we will never know. There is too much discipline and pride that prevents a public exhibition of it. So now the onus is on the common person, the bystander, to defend the dignity of the armed forces and to make their sacrifices worthwhile. Let’s begin by not playing with their emotions.

To understand those emotions, attend a burial or a cremation of a dead soldier. Listen with your heart and you will hear Suresh’s daughter Sunita in hysterics, his ex-serviceman father in shock, as he found out how his son died. This, from Major Rajesh Sharma, who himself was on the verge of a breakdown.

The government’s claim is that Rs 100 crore is spent on NSG annually. Is this really true? Outdated equipment, outdated weapons, limited bullet-proof vests, no bullet-proof helmets, pathetic pay scales — do the numbers really add up? Meanwhile, the number of the dead keeps rising.