Cavalryman who rode into flames, not away: 28 years of Captain Manjinder Singh Bhinder's final charge
This excellence is what took Captain Manjinder Singh Bhinder to the elite 61st Cavalry - India's only serving horse-mounted regiment and one of the few operational ones left in the world. And it was the same fearless spirit that led him, at just 29, into the burning Uphaar Cinema in Delhi on June 13, 1997, where he died saving over 150 people.
He was watching 'Border' film with his wife Jyotroop Kaur and their four-year-old son when the Uphaar Cinema in Green Park, Delhi, caught fire.
As panic gripped the audience, Bhinder acted along with his junior, then Lt Rajesh Pattu.
He guided his wife and son to safety and turned back - entering the thick smoke and chaos to pull others out, making multiple trips. He did not return from the last one. His wife, 26, pregnant at the time, and four-year-old son also did not survive when they rushed to find him.
Colonel Sukhdev Singh still remembers the day they both joined The Punjab Public School, Nabha, on January 18, 1978. Their racks in the dormitory were side by side - R505 and R506 - and stayed that way through every year until they passed out in 1984. "All those years, our belongings were next to each other. We woke up, dressed, went to morning drills, and lived shoulder to shoulder through every day. His legs were always blue and bruised from riding, but he never bothered.
The day I joined NDA, he came a few days later and said, 'Lao, main vi aa gaya.' That's how he was- unshakeable."
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