Lieutenant Colonel Dhan Singh Thapa, winner of the nation's highest gallantry award Param Vir Chakra for engaging an overwhelming Chinese attack in fierce hand-to-hand fighting in Ladakh during the 1962 India-China conflict, died in Pune on Monday night. A Gorkha battalion officer, Thapa was 77 and had been ailing for some time.
Wielding the famous Khukri, Thapa had charged out of his post when an attacking Chinese force vastly outnumbering the Indian defenders were on the verge of overwhelming the post in Ladakh's Chushual sector on October 20, 1962.
The Gorkha colonel, born in Shimla in 1928, was commissioned in the first battalion of the 8 Gorkha Rifles in 1949 and led the Param Vir Chakra winners' contingent at the Republic Day parade each year.
Thapa is survived by his wife, two daughters and a son, who is a serving Lt Col in the army.
Army Chief General J J Singh has condoled the death of the officer saying that his brave deeds were pathfinders for the forces.