Shaurya Chakra awardee officer's wife debunks his ''suicide''

Bhopal, Apr 29 (UNI) ''Madam, the Captain is no more'' were the words that forever changed the life of Ms Deepika Kohli who simply refuses to believe that her husband Captain Sumit Kohli (IC-61014), who was decorated with the Shaurya Chakra after confronting the Al Qaeda terror network, committed ''suicide'' on April 30 last year while posted in Kashmir.

At about 1530 hrs on that fateful day, a shot rang out at the Army quarters in Lolab. Moments later, Capt Kohli was found dead with his service weapon -- an AK-47 Assault Rifle -- at his side. A probe followed and in June Army spokesman Major-General Raj Sujlana said that the wound was self-inflicted.

''He was a brave soldier. If they are saying it was an AK-47 shot then how can someone's throat and tongue remain intact if he shoots himself in the throat? How can there be no multiple fractures? There was a three-inch gash in his neck'' Ms Deepika told UNI over telephone from her mother's residence in Patiala where she lives with Karamveer -- her toddler born on September 19, 2006 -- whom the Captain never saw as Ms Deepika was pregnant when her husband died.

The shock of losing his son led to Mr Satish Kohli suffering cerebral haemorrhage and he passed away on May 4.

''We received nothing in writing from the Army about the cause of Sumit's death,'' says the officer's wife while adding that the family did not have any postmortem conducted.

Ms Deepika and her mother-in-law Veena Kohli allege that the Captain was killed by Army officers to stop him from revealing their role in the murder of four porters in a ''fake encounter'' in the frontier district of Kupwara. The Army ordered a probe into that encounter.

In June 2005, Meso Devi -- a resident of Jammu and Kashmir's Chatha village -- received a letter alleging that her husband Ram Lal had been killed in an encounter along with three others hired as porters. The letter was signed ''Aap ka sainik, insaniyat ka pujari (your soldier, a worshipper of humanity).'' More UNI