Siachen: The Frozen Hell
Location: Eastern Karakoram Range in the Himalayas.
Altitude:6000 meters
Temperature: Around –50*C
"For a soldier, this is where hell freezes over, a 46-mile river of slow-moving ice surrounded by stupendous towers of snow. Temperatures swoon to 50 below, and sudden blizzards can bury field artillery in minutes. Men sleep in ice caves or igloos and breathe air so spare of oxygen that it sends their hearts into a mad gallop. Fainting spells and pounding headaches are frequent. They are prepared to battle on the roof of the world forever." While we prosper and grow in the safety and comforts of cities, there are some men who brave the worst conditions on the planet to keep our land safe. Guarding our land even at the cost of their life, there is a little appreciation they ever receive for the great task that they do for our Nation. Gross apathy and disregard from the masses is all they get from the country of a billion people they guard.
The Plan: Postcards to say we care
We the Volunteers of Sankalp® have planned to tell them that we care and send them a token of our love and appreciation by sending them some handmade postcards. We plan to prepare as many postcards as we can (planning one postcard for each soldier there) and send it to them so that they receive the message right in time for the Republic Day 2008. From what we understand, there are about 4000 soldiers posted at Siachen. Our target is to have a personal message for each one of them. We chose to send postcards for multiple reasons. From security point of view, a postcard would be the safest way to communicate. Secondly, we want the people who really feel for the soldiers to make the postcard by their own hands using their own creativity. This will make sure that there is no room for artificial emotions. Postcard is also something that they can keep individually. We can have each one of them receiving a special personalized message.
"I don't know if this is war. But it's definitely hell."
Join In - Express your appreciation
Please take this opportunity to show the soldiers in Siachen that we care for them and we value the great service they are doing. Please take postcards from us express your feelings on them. You may also wish to take this ahead to your friends and other acquaintances. To bring you closer to Siachen, we are including some information resources inside. Please go through them and join in!
Comments
The true heroes in this
The true heroes in this world are neither the ones in the films nor the mighty ones in animations ,the real heroes are the soldiers of this country who are serving the country with more devotion and love than with what a child would serve its mother!!!Not only are you serving your Mother but you are also protecting your brothers and sisters who are in great need of you.We being some among them would like to thank you whole heartedly for your selfless help.
THANK YOU VERY VERY MUCH!!!
MAY THE LORD SHOWER HIS BLESSINGS ON ALL OUR SOLDIER BROTHERS!!!
VANDE MATARAM
hi
We Care
Mission Siachen
This was probably one of the very few projects that i happened to witnessed. Its not that i have not seen them work on the projects but this one i saw extensively and also it was a privilege to me that i could contribute in whatever little way i could.....
The mission had started long back when i was on a vacation and i had never dreamed that it could take this shape....when i saw what was happening something infused me with hope energy and also the desire to bring smiles on those faces that have been selflessly guarding our motherland and have never deterred come what may.
The Indian Army, the Navy and our Naval forces are one of the largest and the strongest and i know why....they the bravados have always stood like the mighty mountains protecting us....one cant even imagine the conditions in which they are guarding us protecting us so that all of us can sleep peacefully and cozily in our beds.
it takes a lot of will and determination to do that and i guess whatever i say cant match or justify their contribution in making our lives secure and peaceful. Thus this mission was also about saluting those sons of our motherland.initially it was like limited to getting the postcards filled by students and whoever seemed interested in speaking their heart out through our efforts...
but as the days approached the real work began.. the task of trying to infuse the lives in those cards to add some smile to those faces up their...the colouring and packing began ........the response had been immense and heartening....the people came out with all their creativity their imagination to tell the fellow brothers out their how greatful they were for their service that they did for us....people from all genres all ages came and produced on these little cards their feelings for the soldiers...
I happened to read some of the messages while the screening was going on and it just simply touched my heart to the core.....they had written their feelings so beautifully some using their poetic skills and some their hand at art and the result were beautiful postcards....i just hope the soldiers also like our effort and they feel happy which is what we meant by doing this..the volunteers also came up and did some beautiful work of art with the postcards and they demonstrated the true SANKALP spirit
the volunteers i must say deserve a hats off and applause for the immense hard work they put in.....it was my dear friends a mammoth task....also the screening team did a good job these people sat up for nights together to give shape to a dream of theirs and to ensure that those faces gleam on seeing the postcards..care was taken in packaging the postcards and ultimately the volunteers saw their dream their project come to an end from their side as they went and handed over the postcards to that Army HQ in Bangalore
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My experience
We had one night to screenout some cards, color cards and pack them. All volunteers at the spot shared the work, few of us were coloring cards some screening them. There were few cards which had very good messages in them people's creativity was appreciable in few, we had fun reading few cards which had funny messages. Packing was done very systematically which anyone can understand.
All the work finished at 5.45am, we took a nap, in the morning also we got few cards which we packed properly. Now came the time for which we were working from past two months "DULHAN KI BIDAYEE". We went to Army headquateres and handedover the cards to concerned person.
We worked so hard to see smile on the faces of soldiers working in extreame conditions, we want to say them that we care for them, we are with them in all the conditions. Hope cards reach soldiers on time.
Jai Hind!
Happy Republic Day
In this whole big world, all you soldiers up there are the ones whom i LOVE the most. Wish you a prosperous and victorious new year. May all your dreams come true this year. You are the heroes and you will always remain as my altime favourite heroes forever.
JAI JAWAN
JAI HINDUSTHAN