By: Agha.H.Amin
Brigadier Siddique Khan Satti was from Kotli Sattian Rawalpindi District, he had been commissioned from Dehra Dun in 1936, he had commanded a battalion in the Kashmir war in the Poonch Sector, and was commanding 102 Brigade at Bannu in February 1951. He was from later 9 FF.
Sadiq Khan Satti was a brave warrior against a set of hopeless politicians who dared not step into Kashmir during the entire time that 1947-48 war was fought, although Nehru was roaming around in Kashmir as if it was a market place behind his house in Delhi.
It was through the memorable poetry of Ex Brigadier Siddique Satti MC of the Pindi Conspiracy fame that I discovered what the Indian Army had gone through in the First World War. "My brother was blown to bits in Flanders, my cousins died of Maggots in their wounds at Kutalmara" so ran Siddique's verses. He had spent some years of his life incarcerated in the notorious Mach Jail and it was a treat to spend an evening with him. His anecdotes, recollections and Yarns were a finer substitute for a chemical substance of another kind. It was through Siddique that I discovered that the Indians had done something at the Suez Canal in the First World War. Saddique wrote brilliantly, His writings contained that pain and bitterness which only a political prisoner can discover in the ice cold cells of Mach Jail, A jail where the sunlight never reaches many cells.
When Pakistan came into being,Brigadier Sadiq Satti was attending Staff College Course at Camberly (England). An Indian General met him there and
offered him early promotion, if he joined the Indian Army. In response, Brig Sadiq posed him a question: "Sir, my village is located at a hill top. Do you know what I would do, if the whole of my clan decides to jump down?"
The Indian General thought that being an educated man, Brig Sadiq should have persuaded his men to refrain from such a suicidal action but he was shocked when Brigadier Sadiq Satti told him, "Sir, I would jump with them. It is Immaterial whether I survive or die. This is how we live. My village has Decided to join Pakistan. I am with them."
I met Brigadier Saddique Satti in Islamabad in 1981. He was then busy translating Iqbal’s verse in English. Man never suffers defeat , without perishing he goes into retreat , so Saddique translated Iqbal's thoughts. He translated Dr Allama Muhammad Iqbal's "Baang-e-Dara" in English, which was published in 1984.
He lived in Islamabad’s F7 sector and later shifted to the E sector. Islamabad was dripping with US Dollars of the Afghan war and was being Transformed from a ghost town with few cars into a dirty rich capital of a state whose policy has always been to sell its soul and its soldiers for US Dollars. Saddique Satti was a spirited old man, Old in years but young in spirits. He had much to share about how the Pakistani state was buggered and destroyed right from the early years by its own politicians and generals. His nephews had been my father’s class fellows and friends at the Gordon College Rawalpindi. It’s a tragedy that Saddique Satti did not leave any reminiscences .These would have been a first rate source for initial military and political history of Pakistan.
The Sattis that I saw in the military were nowhere near Saddique Satti in caliber or elan . But then Saddique Satti was a great man not beacuse he was a Satti but because he was great. I am extremely skeptical about the assertion that belonging to a tribe can make a man great, A typically flawed assertion.
I was particularly impressed by one Major Zohrab from 15 SP in August 1984, He was a member of a court of inquiry and supported me fearlessly. He also Was my commander in 15 SP with whom I was attached from 09August 1984 to mid october 1984 at Kharian and Qila Sobha Singh. Zohrab was an Abbasi from the Abbasi clan of Murree and had some qualities of the Abbasi rebels of 1857. Zohrab was bitter about the manner in which the army dealt with its officers welfare and was convinced that if anything happened to him his family would be the loser and no one in the army will bother. This is what happened to the families of the Kargil soldiers. A sad and disgraceful chapter of Pakistani military history, Although the architects of that disgraceful failure Musharraf , Aziz , Javed Hassan and Masud Aslam did extremely well, But war is hell. And the only ones who Discover this are the families of those killed in action and they dont deliver lectures in Harvard or Yale So the lies remain in circulation and the truth is buried in obscure unknown rocky wilderness.
It was ironic to hear from NLI friends that some of the widows of the Kargil war were literally forced to do follow most undignified courses in life. But Who cares in this half dead state called Pakistan about to crash into total oblivion. In the Pakistan Army as one officer put it you have to be a general or dead to get any benefits. I would state that the widows of the Kargil soldiers from ranks were even denied this privilege.
Sadique Satti was a great man.
Although few know him today, May God Bless his soul..
