Defence minister A.K. Anthony’s decision to institute a fresh inquiry into the mysterious death of Shaurya Chakra winner Capt. Sumit Kohli four-and-a-half years after the Army dismissed his demise as a “suicide” has given new hope to the officer’s widowed mother.
“I may finally have closure,” Ms Veena Kohli told this newspaper at her Chandigarh residence Tuesday showing a copy of Mr Anthony’s letter stating he had asked his ministry to reinvestigate the matter. The grieving mother, who also lost her husband just three days after the Army authorities cursorily informed them of Sumit’s death in April 2006, has consistently held that her son was “murdered” to cover up misdemeanours by his superior officers.
The defence minister’s communication has come in response to a representation Ms Kohli and her daughter Namrata handed in when they met him at Delhi last week. Agencies have quoted MOD sources to report that Mr Anthony has instructed defence secretary Pradeep Kumar to institute a fresh inquest.
29-year-old Capt Kohli, who was then serving with 16 Rashtriya Rifles in north Kashmir and had been decorated with the Shaurya Chakra just two months earlier, was found dead in his room at the officers’ mess with a single gunshot wound under his chin. An AK-47 rifle lay by the dead officer’s side.
On being told of his son’s death, the young officer’s father Mr Satish Kohli suffered massive brain hemorrhage and also died three days later in the Army command hospital at Chandimandir. “I could never come to terms with the Army’s version that Sumit had ended his own life. And their (Army’s) subsequent conduct in denying me access to the post-mortem report and other documents pertaining to his death, added to my suspicions,” Ms Kohli said. It eventually took more than four torturous years and directions from the Delhi high court for the mother to get hold of some of documents.
Veena Kohli said she is more convinced today than ever before that her son “was in fact murdered to cover up the gunning down of four civilian porters in a fake encounter.