Set against the backdrop of pre-Partition India, Jungee is a literary fiction novel based on true events.¸

 

The story begins in Tandlianwala, now in Pakistan, where a mischievous tyke nicknamed Koogh leads a happy-go-lucky life of kites, marbles, and friendship. 

 

Tragedy strikes when his family and his community is brutally thrown into the blood-spattered reality of India’s Partition. His family, part of a straggling group of refugees, walks for days to cross the border into the newly formed India. Enroute, he must confront death, fear, hunger, and numbing exhaustion, finally settling into a makeshift life in an abandoned Musxalim home in Phagwara. After this, the changed fate of his family affects everyone, including him, and he must soldier on against abject poverty and insecurity.

 

But life moulds a core of steel for Koogh. He struggles with adolescence, until one day, destiny smiles down on him. He takes the plunge and joins the Indian Navy, looking for an escape from his circumstances, a chance to forge his own path, and the hope of a brighter future. 

 

Without any privileges of education, exposure and wealth that other recruits in the Navy have, Koogh joins as a sailor, a mere lower deck hand. But if his hardship has taught him anything, it's that sheer grit can take him very far. Koogh leaves behind his childhood moniker, growing into Inderjit Sharma, but struggling against the glass ceiling, dealing with discrimination and his own vulnerability, he rises through the ranks and encouraged by a few of his seniors, he dares to set his sights even higher, and takes the exams to become an officer.

 

When Inder marries the spirited Rekha, she fondly names him Jungee, for his defensive nature and hot temper. Their marital bliss is interrupted when he is required to take on an insignificant outpost in the southern waters between India and Ceylon, captaining a small patrol ship called INS Sharda, to keep in check the smuggling activities in the region. He feels miserable at the outset, but does his duty, leaving Rekha to live in a stranger’s house in Tambaram. 

 

When a terrifying cyclone, one of the worst that India has seen, strikes the waters of the Bay of Bengal in December 1964, Inder’s ship goes missing. Rekha, in the throes of grief, suffers a paralytic attack and mourns her handsome young husband. But Inder survives the storm, and due to loss of radio connectivity, initiates a rescue operation without NHQ's approval. Over a month-long operation, risking his own life, that of his men and of his ship, Inderjit saves over 3000 fishermen who are stranded in the region. On his return, he is awarded the Ati Vishisht Seva Medal. But nothing is sweeter than being able to return to Rekha and knowing that he is to soon be a father. 

 

The Navy sits up to notice this dashing young officer, and soon after, Lieutenant Commander Inderjit is sent away, this time leaving behind Rekha and his two little daughters, to Vladivostok on a top secret mission, along with a team of 300 officers and sailors. 

 

Why Vladivostok? For twelve long months, Inderjit and his colleagues live in the cruelly cold terrain, learning Russian and training in the art of maritime missile warfare. They return to India with 8 secretly commissioned missile boats, to form the deadly K25 Squadron. 

 

It was a move made just in time. On the 4th of December 1971, a day that is still commemorated as Indian Navy Day, Inder, as commanding officer of INS Nirghat, is the lynchpin in the top secret Operation Trident. Despite technical challenges, and with no prior experience, the Indian Navy's brightest and bravest must execute the most dangerous warfare campaign. 

 

In the darkest midnight ocean, while Karachi sleeps, INS Nirghat launches the first missile in the history of the Indian Navy sinking PNS Khaiber and most of her crew. The K25 Squadron decimates Karachi harbour, leaves the Pakistan Navy utterly shocked and handicapped. While Pakistan scrambles to retaliate, the Indian squadron silently retreats, bringing back her crew, without a single fatality. It is a victory of the highest order by the KILLER SQUADRON and India celebrates. 

 

And what happens to Lieutenant Commander Inderjit Sharma? He receives the prestigious Vir Chakra award. Even today, as a retired Commodore he attends Navy Week celebrations in Mumbai as a chief guest at Killer's Night, accompanied by his beloved Rekha. 

 

The story of Koogh's journey, spanning decades of Indian history, is a story that transcends boundaries and borders. It is a story that begins in a humble joint family, with uneducated parents, with the wolf of poverty always snarling at the doorstep. But it goes on to prove that even an underdog, armed with the courage, ambition and present mindedness that Jungee had, giving his best self to every life situation, can make his way to the top; that you can go through fire and emerge stronger than ever before.