Army Captain from Bengaluru among two officers who laid down lives in J&K encounter

BENGALURU: Indian Army Captain M V Pranjal, who hails from Mysuru, is among the four Army personnel who laid down their lives fighting terrorists in Rajouri district of Jammu and Kashmir on Wednesday.

The firefight between the security forces and the terrorists entered the second day today. One Pakistani terrorist, who was a trained sniper and an IED expert, was killed in the encounter today.

Captain M V Pranjal belonged to the 63 Rashtriya Rifles batallion. The other officer who died in the ongoing encounter is Captain Shubham Gupta of the 9 Para Special Forces.

The mortal remains are still said to be in Jammu and Kashmir and is expected to arrive around midnight or early on Friday morning. The family members said they have no information about when the remains are expected and were awaiting word from the Army authorities.

A pall of gloom descended on the household of Captain Pranjal at Nandanavana Layout in Jigani on the outskirts of the city as news of his sacrifice came through. Relatives and friends were arriving at the house to offer their condolences to the parents M Venkatesh and Anuradha.

Relatives and friends started arriving at the house since early morning.

Captain Pranjal had visited his parents about six months ago when a religious ceremony was held and had stayed for a week. He had also visited them again during Dasara.

The Army officer had got married to Aditi of Bengaluru two years ago before he was posted in Kashmir. On getting to know about his death, Aditi too reached his parents house from Chennai where she is pursuing her studies.

Vacant land in front of Captain Pranjal’s house was being cleared to place the mortal remains for people to pay their last respects.

Hailing from Mysuru, Captain Pranjal did his schooling at Delhi Public School near MRPL in Mangaluru and pre-university education at Mahesh PU College. He then joined the National Defence Academy at Mhow, Madhya Pradesh, where he completed his engineering course with distinction. His father Venkatesh retired as administrative director at MRPL and he was the only son of the couple. His parents have been living in Jigani since 2014.