GENERAL S M SHRINAGESH (HARDCOVER)
Satyavant Mallanah Shrinagesh rose to the very helm of the Indian Army at the astonishingly young age of 54. With the reputation of a scholar soldier he was subsequently hand-picked to establish India's pioneering institution for training professional administrators. The first-ever military officer to be appointed governor of a state, his innings as governor of three different states, including the Naga-troubled Assam, was the capstone of a distinguished career of service to the nation. Shrinagesh's schooling in England left a deep imprint in forming his personality and values. He forsook Cambridge in order to join Sandhurst, convinced that a free India would require trained Indian officers. He belongs to that earliest group of Indian military officers whose success shattered the myth then prevalent that Indians were incapable of providing military leadership. As overall commander of the Jammu and Kashmir operations in 1947-48, Shrinagesh master-minded the audacious stratagem of over-coming well-entrenched Pakistani defences at Zoji La by the use of tanks.