Word: singh
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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India last week heard for the first time the full story of Constable Karam Singh. A stocky, moon-faced Sikh with a curly black mustache, Karam Singh. 49, was the commander of the Indian police patrol in Ladakh that was ambushed and cut to pieces by the Chinese last October (TIME, Nov. 2). Captured, Singh was treated with a mixture of brutality, buffoonery, cynicism and dishonesty, which indicates that Chinese methods with their prisoners have varied little since the Korean...
After a skirmish of several hours in which nine Indians died, Karam Singh and eight other policemen surrendered. Disarmed and searched, the Indians were ordered to carry the body of the one Chinese soldier who had been killed, as well as a wounded Indian constable named Makhan Lai. After a short march, the Chinese guards insisted that Constable Lai be abandoned on a river bank. He has not been seen since...
...Karam Singh's marathon interrogation began at 4 in the morning. He was asked to narrate the entire incident, but when he came to the point where the Chinese ambushers opened fire, the senior officer present "became wild and shouted back that it was incorrect, and that I must confess the Indians fired first." Singh at first refused. The Chinese threatened to shoot him, and "ultimately, they made me say that I could not judge at that time as to who fired first." After twelve hours of nearly continuous questioning, Karam Singh "was almost frozen and mentally and physically...
Allowed to sleep in an "unbearably" cold tent with insufficient blankets, Singh was awakened for another interrogation of 9½ hours and told he would not get adequate shelter until the examination was concluded to Chinese satisfaction. With this stimulus to speed and agreement, Singh gave precise details of the arms, function and organization of India's border patrols, his own operations prior to the ambush, and the location of Indian check posts throughout Ladakh. As a reward, he got some padded cotton clothing, which did not fit. At this point the Chinese set out to rewrite history...
...Reenactment. A cameraman arrived at the outpost, and the prisoners were twice taken to the scene of the fight for propaganda films. Once, said Singh, "I was given a handkerchief and asked to wave it as if to give a signal to the men to open fire." The second time, the body of the Chinese soldier was used in the filmed sequence. Between making statements and signing them, the prisoners were taken from their pit into the sunlight, served watermelon, and lectured on "Sino-Indian friendship...