Kuldeep Lakra

Biography

Sepoy Kuldeep Lakra was born on 17 June 1992 in Bishakha Tanga village in the Ranchi district of Jharkhand. He joined the Indian Army in 2014 and, after completing his training at the Danapur Cantonment in Patna, was posted to the 21 Bihar battalion of the Bihar Regiment and deployed to Jammu & Kashmir. In 2017 his unit was holding forward positions in the Batalik sector of Ladakh. In early April a western disturbance brought heavy rain and snowfall to the high-altitude posts. On 7 April 2017 a severe avalanche struck an advanced position, burying five soldiers, including Sepoy Lakra, under a heavy mass of snow. Despite specialised rescue efforts mounted in extreme conditions, he could not be saved and laid down his life in the service of the nation at the age of twenty-four.