Page 122 - Leadership in the Indian Army

ammunition, but a corresponding increase in innocuous items to make up
the tonnage that was being sent to Pakistan.
On 31 January 1948, a day after Mahatma Gandhi’s assassination, Thorat

was promoted Major General and appointed GOC Delhi Area. Conditions
in Delhi were disturbed, and refugees from Pakistan were still pouring in.
Thorat also had to provide protection to the Muslims in Delhi, as well as in
the surrounding areas of Punjab, and several princely states in Rajasthan. In
addition, he had to assist the establishment of civil administration in Alwar,
where the Maharaja had been taken into ‘protective custody’. This was also
done in Bharatpur, where the ruler accepted his arrival with grace, inviting

Thorat to the annual duck shoot, for which Bharatpur was famous. During
winter, millions of migratory birds from Siberia arrive at the lake in
Bharatpur. No shooting was permitted till the annual duck shoot, when the
Viceroy and hundreds of other guests were invited. Thorat had heard about
these shoots, but never seen one. After a few months, he accompanied
Lieutenant General Rajendra Sinhji and several other guests, including a

few maharajas, to Bharatpur. Thorat shot almost a hundred ducks, with the
total bag running into several thousand. Fortunately for the birds, this was
one of the last of the ‘royal shoots’, and conservationists soon prevailed
upon Parliament to make laws banning them altogether. The lake has now
been converted into a sanctuary, and visitors can shoot birds only with a
camera.
During this period, a large number of refugees were housed in refugee

camps around Delhi. Colonel A.B. Jadhav has an interesting anecdote to
relate about Thorat in this regard. To cater to their needs, a large number of
DTLs (deep trench latrines), such as those used by troops in the field, had
been set up in the camps. During one of his morning walks, Thorat found
that the refugees were not using the DTLs, but defecating in the open.
Diseases such as cholera and hepatitis were already on the rise, and Thorat

was alarmed. He tried to persuade the refugees, through his staff, to use the
DTLs, but they continued to go to the fields. As a result, conditions in the
camps soon became unhygienic, and Thorat knew that he would have to do
something quickly. One day, he collected all the children in the camp and
told them that if they found anyone answering the call of nature in the field
instead of the DTL, they should surround him, raise their hands above their
heads and chant: ‘Oye, Oye, Oye’. He promised them each a four-anna (a

rupee had 16 annas) coin everyday for this chore. The children agreed and