When Suraj Bahadur Thapa of the Eastern Frontier Rifles started writing this love letter to his wife Laxmi he would have never thought that anything so personal meant only for his beloved Laxmi’s eyes would be read by the whole world. Suraj was one of the 24 West Bengal policemen killed by Maoists on Monday evening in Silda. In the seven-and-a-half-page letter, which remained unfinished and unposted, he told her he loves her.
“Meri pyari pyari Laxmi, meri pyari pyari mithi mithi patni, I love you,” Thapa wrote in a green diary with a rose on its cover. “Main jahaanbhi rahunga tumhe pyar karta rahunga, saaton janam tumhe pyar karta rahunga, mar bhi gaya to bhi tumhe pyar karta rahunga.” “Laxmi, main tumse bahut pyar karta hun,” Thapa wrote. “Tumne mujhe ek beta aur ek beti diya hai. Mere jivan ka sab se sukhad samay tha 15th December 1988, jab tumhari mujhse shadi hui thi.” “Agar main na rahun… tum beta beti dono ki achchhi tarah parvarish karna,” Thapa wrote to Laxmi. “Mera yahaan har samay jaan ka khatra rahta hai, kab kahin kuchh bhi ho sakta hai… duty pe jaan haath mein leke chalna parta hai…” “My dear Lux, main tumhare bina ek pal bhi jee nahin sakunga. Tumse mera jo sambandh bhagwan ne jora hai, shayad kuchh soch samajh ke hi jora hai… Sang-sang chalunga ban ke tera sajan, aa teri maang bhar doon o meri dulhan…”
Translation: “My beloved and sweet Laxmi”, Thapa wrote in a green diary with a rose on its cover. “I’ll keep on loving you from wherever I’ll be. I will keep on loving you even after I die. Laxmi, I love you, Thapa wrote.You gave me a son and a daughter. 15th December 1988, was the happiest day of my life, when we got married. If I die, you rise our children well. Any moment anything can happen here on duty. My dear Luxmy, I wouldn’t be able to live a single moment of my life without you. I’ll always be with you.”
“I know that I cannot do much for my family, and it is you who has to bear all responsibilities. I always want to see you happy. When I see you happy, I get peace of mind… Laxmi, the love you have given me, I have never got from anyone since I was born. Very few fortunate people get a wife like you.” “Abhi desh ka haal-khabar theek nahin hai,” (the country is not in a good position)he wrote. “I love you a lot, but I also love my country. The situation in our country is getting worse with every passing day.” For this situation, Thapa held the politicians of India responsible. “The party-politics of a few people has endangered the existence of the country. We are also suffering…”
This unfinished letter was found among the charred remains of the camp this morning. Next to it was found a picture of Laxmi and him with their two children, a boy and a girl. On the back of the picture, Thapa had written, “My Wife Laxmi Thapa, My son Rohon Thapa, My dotar (daughter) Isha Thapa but this diary also had a very grim reminder of the state of affairs it had a bullet hole.
Whether Thapa had a prmonition that he would be one of the 24 policemen killed in Maoists attack on Monday evening would never be known but through his diary he has given a rare insight of the thoughts which go through the minds of policemen when they have to fight their own countrymen. As he had rightly written it was all the party politics of few which was responsible for sufferings of a common man.
Thapa is dead but what will not die is the grief which his beloved Laxmi have to suffer for the rest of her life, the loneliness of his beloved children who will never see their father again and what will not die will be the question of which there will be no answer
“Why?”
