During the Corona period, when the then Chief of Defense Staff (CDS) General Bipin Rawat came to know that the health of former Army Chief General S Padmanabhan had deteriorated and he was living in a two-room house in Chennai, he immediately asked to shift him to RR Hospital. Even in that difficult time, General Padmanabhan refused to come to Delhi and said that the hospital beds should be given to other army personnel. Former Army Chief Sundararajan Padmanabhan died in Chennai on Monday at the age of 83. He was the commander of the 15th Corps in the Kashmir Valley from 1993 to 1995.
General Padmanabhan was known as Paddy and he was the Army Chief from 30 September 2000 to 31 December 2002. During his tenure, Jihadis were scared in Kashmir Valley. In 1996, the then Defence Minister Mulayam Singh had come to visit Siachen Glacier. He was doing an aerial survey of the glacier from above Kumar Post. Then the Pakistanis came to know that the Defence Minister of India was present in the plane. The Pakistani Army started firing on the Bharti Post in the glacier. Pakistani soldiers were present on the other side of the Saltoro Ridge. In such a situation, Yadav’s plane landed on the helipad of the base camp and General Padmanabhan ordered retaliation. General Paddy immediately called the Siachen Brigade Commander and ordered a counter attack. Pakistani soldiers were stunned by the counter attack from India.
In the 1990s, there was terror of Jihadis in the Kashmir valley. At that time, there was no dearth of discussion in the media in favour of the separatists. The side of the Jihadis was also presented a lot. In such a situation, it became difficult to even talk about terrorism in Kashmir. At that time, General Paddy worsened the condition of the Jihadis. At the same time, he also tightened the noose on infiltration from Pakistan. He never hesitated to order a counter attack.
During his tenure as Army Chief, many terrorist incidents took place in Kashmir. At that time, Pakistan was ruled by dictator General Pervez Musharraf and there was a lot of infiltration from across the border. Pervez Musharraf had a hand in the terrorists and the Pakistani Army worked for them. During his tenure, the Jammu and Kashmir Assembly was attacked in 2001. The Kaluchak massacre and the attack on Parliament also took place. The Army also launched Operation Parakram. General Paddy did not shy away from war, but the then Vajpayee government chose to solve the problem through diplomacy.