It was 11 pm. Like any other evening, we were taking our dinner at our rented Janakpuri apartment in Delhi. The telephone rang. It was late but not very late for a trunk call or a late night prankster to ask how all we were doing and what we were having for our dinner. I received the phone. A low toned Goro meekly said 'Hello'. I instantly smelled something was not very right. And the next moment he broke the news that also broke my heart.

He said Deban, our good friend in the army, was killed in action at the border. It took me sometime to comprehend what he was saying. I didn't quite understand how to respond. I did not answer him at all. I was too shock to. He said a hello to check if I was still on my side of the line. I unsuccessfully tried to act calm and told him to go on. I couldn't hear him out completely.

We went to Palam airport to receive him the next day. We returned frustrated as we were told it would be the day after. A Major Kulkarni called me up from Leh in the evening telling how sorry he was and said he would be accompanying my friend the next day to Delhi and to home the same day. We went to the airport the next morning and we all were moved by the way Deban came. It was hard not to imagine how hard it must have been for him. We all melted into tears.

Procrastination further crept in and Deban's last home journey had to be postponed till the next day again. Army system was not without flaws.

Though he got commissioned last December, Deban was an army since his childhood. He was born to be an army officer. He was the proud Lt. L.D. Singh. I have never seen a more systematic and pragmatic fellow than him. He was soft spoken, reserve, spoke only when he had to, very exact about timings, sharp minded, honest and above all good mannered. Everybody loved him. When he said 6 o'clock, it was 6 o'clock. When he said he had to go, he had to go. Nothing on earth could stop him. So very exact and so very patient. This nature even earned him a nickname. We used to dub him "Robot". He possessed many admirable attitudes. Yet he managed to endure such a lazy and impatient fellow as me. Though he was a very good friend, he was always like a big brother to me - so caring, so protective and full of advice when he thought I needed some. He would send me cards for my birthday that would reach me exactly on my birthday no matter how remotely posted he was. It killed me time and again to think that I failed to send him a card on his birthday this time.

His smiling face keeps flashing every now and then. For the few days after Goro broke the news, I dwelt in the moments we shared together - the college days, early morning tuitions, the journeys, wild parties and the desperate days in Hisar. Especially the two years in Hisar when we were pursuing our Master's Degrees. He was known as "Bhai" among our friends in Hisar because he acted like a bhai straight out of a movie at times when he got high. It was at such times when his reserve and cool nature left him and our non-Manipuri friends were always afraid of that side of his personality.

I still remember the call he made to me from Allahabad on the last day of his SSB. He had cleared all the rounds but some parts of the health check up was due. But he still had that you-never-know-until-the-final-result-comes tone in his voice. But I knew he was happy anyway. After all it was the career he was dreaming for. It was a wonder how meticulously he planned for his SSB. I now wish he got a permanent rejection in that SSB.

He would proudly narrate to us every time he came back from the front - what it was like there, how inhospitable the snow-clad mountains of Batalik were and the likes. He would stay with me for few days every time he got leave for going home. He really relished the few days in Imphal this time more than at any other time.

I always presumed a good side of life was waiting for Bhai. For all the toils and boils during his training in the IMA, for all the restraints he exercised, for all the meticulous foolproof plans he made. There certainly was a very good life waiting for him. But Bhai just could not win the battle with destiny to savour it. I wish all these were just another bad dream from which I could wake up and wish away everything. I will miss him, his advices, his echoed calls somewhere from the Himalayas and his 'silence'. Even if I do not mention it, he would have understood that he would be there in my heart forever.

Bhai, rest in peace.