Chandrakanta Pradhan, SM

Biography

Sepoy Chandrakanta Pradhan was born on 2 March 1992 in Beerapanga village in the Kandhamal district of Odisha, into a humble farming family. He enlisted in 2014 at the age of twenty-one and was inducted into the 16 Bihar Battalion of the Bihar Regiment, an infantry unit renowned for its brave soldiers and distinguished record. During June 2020 the unit was deployed near the Line of Actual Control in Eastern Ladakh as part of Operation Snow Leopard, as tensions rose over the Galwan Valley along the route to Daulat Beg Oldie. On the night of 15 June 2020 the commanding officer of the 16 Bihar Battalion, Colonel Santosh Babu, led talks to defuse the standoff, but these turned into a brutal hand-to-hand clash as Chinese troops attacked with iron rods and clubs. In the fighting that raged for several hours along the freezing river, he and nineteen other soldiers laid down their lives for the nation. Twenty-eight years old, Sepoy Chandrakanta Pradhan was awarded the Sena Medal on 26 January 2021 for his courage, devotion to duty and supreme sacrifice.