The September War. The windows of memories

Written by: Sajid Hussain Malik

While writing about the 17-day Indo-Pak war of September 1965, the memories and stories of 55, and 60 years ago are getting fresh in my mind in such a way that my heart is starting to yearn to return to that era once again. I remember those summer days of 1965 like it was yesterday. I used to teach in a school of Rawalpindi Cantt Board those days. During that period, summer vacations were usually held in educational institutions from mid-June to the end of August. We often spent these vacations in the village. On September 6, at 7 o'clock in the morning, Radio Pakistan reported the news of the Indian attack on Lahore. Despite the passage of 6 decades, I remember the day of September 6, 1965, well. It was a nice day. There was some dust and fog in the air. I was in my village. The only source of news we had was Radio Pakistan news at 7 am and then for a short time at 11 am and with that, the morning broadcast of Radio Pakistan ended. Well, I was referring to September 6. I heard the news of the Indian attack on Lahore in my village. At that time, almost everyone had a radio set. There was no radio set in my house. To listen to news etc., one used to go to the shop of Malik Amir Zaman, a relative shopkeeper. On the morning of September 6, I was outside Ameer Zaman's shop with a few friends when I heard the news of the Indian attack on Lahore. A sensation spread in the body. My fists were clenched in a state of anger, enthusiasm, and revenge as if the enemy was in front of me and I would chew him raw. Shortly after hearing the news of the Indian attack, planes were heard, and when I looked in the sky, I saw that a group of at least 6 jets was flying from west to east at a high speed. Most likely, these were our Air Force's Saber fighter jets, which flew rapidly to reinforce our armed forces on the Lahore front and destroy the enemy's advance forces on this side of the BRB canal east of Lahore. Shortly after, it was reported on the radio that soon the President of Pakistan Field Marshal Muhammad Ayub Khan would address the nation. At 11 o'clock, President Field Marshal Muhammad Ayub Khan addressed the nation on radio and TV and said that India does not know which nation it has challenged. It was magic, there was such an effect that the entire nation stood up against the enemy like a leaden wall and showed such unity, unity and agreement, determination and courage, and sacrifice and sacrifice that all the dreams of the enemy were crushed. gone. A sudden and stealthy attack was made on the Lahore front on the night of September 6 in the dark, but after that, for 17 days he kept on trying to advance and the soldiers of the Pakistan Army stationed on this side of the BRB canal were in his way. I remained a Sadaskandari.

In the 17-day war of September 1965, the incidents of bravery, bravery, bravery, professional skills, and exemplary sacrifices of the armed forces of Pakistan are so widespread that it is not easy to mention them here. However, the account of the September War cannot be complete without mentioning some of the incidents. Here, the fact should also be kept in mind that in 1965, Pakistan's armed forces were less than one-third of India's armed forces in terms of manpower, weapons, war equipment, and military installations. Who can forget the bravery of Major Aziz Bhatti on the Barki front in Lahore? With a small force of his company, he held out against the enemy several times his own number for several days and continued to fire his cannons on the enemy's positions with such accuracy that the enemy rose to their feet. Ultimately, Major Aziz Bhatti faced martyrdom by becoming an enemy gunner and received the highest honor of Nishan Haider. On the Sialkot front, the enemy had attacked with the full force of the tank regiments of his First Armored Division "Pride of Hind" in the hope that he would trample everything up to Gujranwala and reach the GT Road behind Lahore. But one of our infantry brigades prevented the tank regiments of Fakhr-e-Hind from advancing towards Chonda railway station for three days. K. Sherman became a graveyard of tanks and his plan to move forward turned into a nightmare. In the Kasur sector, our armored troops reached the town of Khemkaran inside the Indian border when the enemy breached the embankment of the Madhopur Canal Due to this, the advance of our tanks stopped, otherwise nobody could have stopped us from conquering the Indian territory up to Ferozepur. Our advance continued on the Rajasthan front as well and several thousand square miles of Indian territory came into our possession up to the Munabau railway station across Khokhra.

The performance of our air force and navy in the September 1965 war was also commendable in every respect. The Indian Air Force's Nut, Mistier, Hanar fighter, and Canberra bombers attacked Pakistan's airspace a couple of days ago, but on the morning of September 7, the Indian planes attacking the Sargodha airport were intercepted by the squadron leader MM Alam. Targeted by the machine guns of the Saber aircraft and shot down five Indian attack aircraft within a few seconds, then the Indian aircraft did not have the courage to approach the Pakistani bases in daylight. The main centers of the Indian Air Force, Pathankot, Ambala, Jamnagar, Adampur, and Halwara were particularly targeted by our F-86 Saber, F-104 Starfighter, and B-57 bombers and Radio Pakistan Senior News Reader Shakeel Ahmed. There was a special style of reading the news, with its distinctive tone and loud voice when the news was told that our Shaheens had hit the enemy airfields, Halwara, Adampur, and Jamnagar with precision, the news listeners sitting around the radio. The slogans of Allahu Akbar used to be raised spontaneously on the tongues. Although the Indian Navy was many times bigger than our Navy, during the entire September war, its destructive battleships were afraid of our only submarine "Ghazi". The Indian naval base "Dwarka" located near the ancient temple of Somnath on the coast of Kathiawar, Gujarat, was targeted by our navy and was destroyed brick by brick. There are events that we can rightly be proud of. had made an epidemic, it failed miserably. While Pakistan and the armed forces of Pakistan forced the enemy to retreat despite having very few resources and small numbers.