Former Army Chief Field Marshal Sam Manekshaw passed away at Military Hospital in Wellington, Tamil Nadu late on 26th June, 2008.The Padma Vibhushan and Military Cross awardee who was admitted in the hospital for some-time ‘for progressive lung disease’, had slipped into a comaearlier in the day and the end came just after midnight at 00·30 a.m. He was 94.
A soldier’s General Field Marshal Manekshaw crafted India’s greatest military victory in the 1971 Indo-Pak conflict that created just not history but also a new nation, Bangladesh.
Affectionatively called ‘Sam Bahadur,’ Manekshaw was the architect of many a military triumph but his finest hour came when Pakistani forces were vanquished in 14 days flat and Bangladesh was born.
Manekshaw assumed charge of the Indian Army, as the 8th Chief of Army Staff, on June 07, 1969.
Born in Amritsar, Punjab in April 1914, he completed his scholling in Amritsar and Sherwood College, Nainital. He then joined the first batch of 40 cadets of Indian Military Academy(IMA) Dehradun on October 01, 1932. He passed out of the IMA in December 1934 and was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant in the Indian Army. Thereafter he held severalassignments of responsibility until he succeeded General Kumarmanglam as Chief of Army Staff in June 1969.
His distinguished military career spanned four decades from the British era and through five wars including the Second World War.
For his distinguished services to the nation, he was awarded the Padma Vibhushan in 1972 and was conferred the honorary rank of Field Marshal in January 1973. He retired afortnight later on January 15, 1973 (although technically Field Marshals of the Indian Army never retire because the rank is conferred for life).
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