He wanted to get Paramvir Chakra8217;

A short distance away stood Gopichand, a Lucknow-based cloth merchant, the father of Paramvir Chakra Lieutenant Manoj Kumar Pandey.

8220;If only the bullet had gone two inches above his head, my son would have been alive,8221; he said, fighting back tears.

Lieutenant Pandey did the country proud when he single-handedly knocked down lines of enemy defences on the Khalubar ridge, paving the way for the Army8217;s victory in Batalik sub-sector. 8220;My son always wanted to get the Paramvir Chakra. But look at what cost did he get it,8221; said the proud but grieving father. Gopichand lost interest in his business after Manoj8217;s death.

8220;Somehow I am getting along with my other children and their mother,8221; he said.

As he saw young Captain Balwan Singh and the other Kargil heroes, Gopichand felt how different it would have been had his son been there too, smiling to cameras, saluting senior officers and waiting to take the highest gallantry award from the President, instead of getting it posthumously.