Captain Vikram Batra Led the Capture of Point 5140 on 20 June 1999 and the Assault on Point 4875 on 7 July, Was Awarded the Param Vir Chakra, and Is the Subject of the Film Shershaah

Captain Vikram Batra of the 13th Battalion, Jammu and Kashmir Rifles (13 JAK Rif), was awarded the Param Vir Chakra, India’s highest gallantry decoration, for two actions in the Kargil war: the capture of Point 5140 in the Dras sector on 20 June 1999, and the assault on Point 4875 in the Mushkoh valley on 7 July 1999, in which he died at the age of 24. The Press Information Bureau (PIB) counts four Param Vir Chakras for the whole war, and two of them went to 13 JAK Rif: Batra’s and Rifleman Sanjay Kumar’s.

Vishnuvardhan’s film Shershaah, released on Amazon Prime Video on 12 August 2021, later won a Special Jury Award at the 69th National Film Awards and seven awards at the 67th Filmfare Awards. This article sets out the record first, from the citation, the PIB and a published account by Major General Ian Cardozo, and then puts the film beside it. The campaign around Batra’s battalion is told in the piece on Kargil.

A twin from Palampur who had been picked for the Merchant Navy

Batra was born on 9 September 1974 in Palampur, Himachal Pradesh, one of twin sons, according to Honour Point, a memorial site for fallen soldiers, and to Cardozo. Both say the brothers, Vikram and Vishal, watched the television series on Param Vir Chakra winners as boys. At DAV College in Chandigarh he was named best NCC Air Wing cadet in the North Zone, Honour Point records. He had also been selected for the Merchant Navy, with tickets booked to join a ship in Hong Kong, before he chose the Army.

Cardozo gives his commissioning date as 6 December 1997, into 13 JAK Rif, and Honour Point gives his first posting as Sopore, in Baramulla district. By April 1999 the battalion had finished its tenure there and was preparing to move to a peace station, Honour Point says, when the Kargil intrusion was detected in early May and the move was cancelled. Cardozo writes that the battalion was ordered to Dras on 6 June.

Two companies, two success signals, one night

On 14 June the brigade commander chose 13 JAK Rif to take Point 5140, which Cardozo describes as the highest peak on an extension of the Tololing ridge. The PIB’s 2025 summary calls it Gun Hill. The commanding officer, Lieutenant Colonel Yogesh Kumar Joshi, briefed Batra, who commanded Delta Company, and Lieutenant Sanjeev Jamwal of Bravo Company. They were to climb in the dark from different directions and take the peak before first light.

Each officer was also asked for a radio success signal to send when the objective fell. Jamwal chose “Oh! Yeah, Yeah, Yeah!”, the slogan of his squadron at the National Defence Academy. Batra chose “Dil Mange More”, Cardozo writes. Honour Point renders the longer form of the phrase, Yeh Dil Maange More, as “My heart asks for more!”

The climb began on the evening of 19 June, with artillery fire covering the approach. Batra decided to reach his objective from the rear, a near-vertical route, so that the defenders would not expect him. As Delta Company neared the top, Cardozo writes, an enemy commander shouted “Why have you come here Sher Shah?”, using the code name that had become Batra’s nickname, and Batra replied that within an hour they would see who held the summit.

The citation says that on 20 June Batra reorganised his column, urged his men to assault the positions and, leading from the front, killed four intruders in a hand-to-hand fight. At 4:35 am, as the sun reached the peaks, Cardozo writes, he radioed his signal and raised the Indian flag on the summit. Cardozo adds that neither company lost a man. Honour Point gives a longer version of the message that begins with the word Chanakya and ends with Yeh Dil Maange More.

From a rest halt at Ghumri to the ledge below Point 4875

The battalion rested at Ghumri and then moved on 30 June to the Mushkoh valley, Cardozo writes, to take Point 4875, a feature that overlooked 30 to 40 kilometres of National Highway 1A between Dras and Matayan. The assault on the ridge began on the evening of 4 July. The PIB records that on 4 July Rifleman Sanjay Kumar, one of the lead scouts sent to capture a flat-top feature in the valley, killed three intruders in a face-to-face fight despite serious wounds, then turned an abandoned machine gun on the fleeing enemy. He received the Param Vir Chakra, and the Tribune quoted him in January 2000 describing the action as the assault on Point 4875.

Cardozo writes that Joshi fired two Fagot anti-tank missiles at the bunker holding up the attack, and that by 1 pm on 5 July two companies had linked up on part of the objective, with more bunkers still lying deeper along the ridge. Joshi received the Vir Chakra, and the Journal of the United Service Institution of India (USI) says the battalion was given the title “Bravest of the Brave” for its two Param Vir Chakras.

On the night of 6 to 7 July, 17 days after Point 5140, a close look at the enemy position showed a long, narrow ledge held by several sangars, stone-walled fighting positions, one behind the other. Delta Company under Batra was told to clear it. Cardozo writes that Batra had a fever and volunteered to lead, and that Joshi hesitated before letting him go.

The citation gives the rest in its own terms: to speed the operation, Batra decided to assault along a narrow ridge, engaged the enemy in a fierce hand-to-hand fight and killed five at point-blank range. Grievously injured, he crawled towards the enemy and hurled grenades, clearing the position. The troops, inspired by him, fell on the enemy and captured Point 4875. The PIB’s 2025 summary says he fell in battle after ensuring victory.

What the citation says

Honour Point reproduces the citation in full. It opens with the ground: in the Dras sector the enemy held fortified positions with automatic weapons, with approaches dominating the Srinagar to Leh road, “the lifeline of supplies to Leh.” It then gives the two actions above, with the figures four and five, which the PIB summaries published in 2025 repeat. It closes by saying that Batra “displayed the most conspicuous personal bravery and junior leadership of the highest order” and “made the supreme sacrifice in the highest traditions of the Army.”

Republic Day 2000

The Tribune reported on 23 January 2000 that four soldiers would be given the Param Vir Chakra on Republic Day, the first in more than a decade. They were Batra and Manoj Pandey of 1/11 Gorkha Rifles, both posthumously, and Yogendra Singh Yadav of 18 Grenadiers and Sanjay Kumar. With them the total since 1947 rose from 17 to 21.

The paper’s report of 27 January described the parade in New Delhi. The four awards were given there, and “their fathers walked up to the dais to receive the award” for Batra and Pandey. Among the 17 earlier awards was one to Flying Officer Nirmal Jit Singh Sekhon, a Gnat pilot, for the defence of Srinagar airfield on 14 December 1971, as the PIB records and a separate article tells.

Shershaah, the film

Shershaah is a Hindi film directed by Vishnuvardhan, written by Sandeep Shrivastava and produced by Dharma Productions and Kaash Entertainment, with Sidharth Malhotra as Batra and Kiara Advani as Dimple Cheema. It came out directly on Amazon Prime Video on 12 August 2021, without a theatrical release, and Bollywood Hungama’s review puts its length at 135 minutes. The Quint reported on 31 August 2021 that Shershaah had become the most-watched film on Prime Video in India, and that the platform said it had been streamed in more than 4,100 Indian towns and cities and in more than 210 countries and territories. In IMDb’s 2021 list of the Indian titles most popular with its users, reported by The News Minute, the film ranked second, behind Jai Bhim.

At the 69th National Film Awards, announced on 24 August 2023, the PIB list shows a Special Jury Award for Shershaah, with a Rajat Kamal (Silver Lotus) and Rs 2,00,000 (Rs 2 lakh), and the director’s name given as Vishnu Varadhan. At the 67th Filmfare Awards, Filmfare’s winners page lists Shershaah for seven awards: Best Film, Best Director (Vishnuvardhan), Best Music Album, Best Playback Singer Male (B Praak, for Mann Bharryaa), Best Playback Singer Female (Asees Kaur, for Raataan Lambiyan), Best Editing (A. Sreekar Prasad) and Best Action.

One scene has Batra’s brother Vishal speaking about him, and The Quint’s Stutee Ghosh wrote that much of what the character says comes from a speech Vishal Batra actually gave. She also noted a scene in which a TV journalist interviews Batra and he says his famous line. That fits the record: in a letter to his parents from Ghumri, which Cardozo reproduces, Batra says he had been interviewed on line by the media after Point 5140. Bollywood Hungama notes that the end credits run for almost 11 minutes and list soldiers of Batra’s regiment and the honours they won, and that Shataf Figar plays Lieutenant Colonel Joshi. J. P. Dutta’s LOC Kargil (2003) had put Batra on screen earlier, played by Abhishek Bachchan according to Honour Point.

The film also adds to the record. Bollywood Hungama’s synopsis has Batra, in his first posting at Sopore, capturing a militant called Attaullah and later killing the gang leader Haider, with a local family helping him. The citation, the PIB summaries, Cardozo and Honour Point mention no gang led by a Haider or a man called Attaullah, so those scenes should be read as the filmmakers’ storyline. Ghosh wrote that Vishnuvardhan and Shrivastava “remain mostly faithful to the material at hand” and gave the film 3 out of 5. Bollywood Hungama gave it 3.5 and called it a well-made war saga.

Where the accounts differ

The accounts give different counts at Point 5140. The citation and the PIB say Batra killed four in hand-to-hand fighting. Honour Point’s narrative says he alone killed three in close combat, and Cardozo writes that Delta Company killed six and that three more fell into a gorge as they fled.

The citation also calls him Captain on 20 June, while a Tribune piece of 9 September 2024 says the promotion to captain followed Point 5140, as does Honour Point. On his death, the citation has him hurling grenades and succumbing to his injuries. Cardozo and Honour Point both add that he was shot in the chest while going to a wounded soldier. Cardozo writes that a junior commissioned officer offered to fetch the man and Batra moved him aside to do it himself, and Honour Point has him moving the soldier together with a junior commissioned officer, Subedar Raghunath Singh. All the accounts agree that Batra died on 7 July and that Point 4875 was taken.

The date of the award is also given two ways. The Palampur college’s page says 15 August 1999. The Tribune’s January 2000 reports describe the awards as still to be given and then given on Republic Day, and this article follows them.

The 2024 Tribune piece calls the victory at Point 5140 the capture of Tiger Hill. The Tribune’s 2000 report records the 18 Grenadiers attack on Tiger Hill on the night of 3 to 4 July, and the PIB credits Point 5140 to Batra.

Where his name is carried now

Point 4875 is known as Batra Top. On 7 July 2021 Lieutenant General Y K Joshi, by then Northern Army Commander and the officer who had commanded the battalion in 1999, flew over it in a Sukhoi 30 MKI, the Tribune reported. In January 2022 a bust of Batra was unveiled at the Palampur military station by his parents, with Joshi present, PTI reported. The government college in Palampur carries his name. The Tribune reported in 2000 that a post on the Siachen glacier had been named after another Param Vir Chakra winner, Bana Singh, and that story is in the article on Siachen.

On 23 January 2023 the Prime Minister’s address at the naming of 21 Andaman and Nicobar islands after Param Vir Chakra awardees said that a hill in the Andamans was also being dedicated in Batra’s name. The Param Vir Dirgha at Rashtrapati Bhavan, inaugurated by President Droupadi Murmu on 16 December 2025, honours all 21 awardees, a list that includes Major Shaitan Singh, whose company stood at Rezang La in 1962. The PIB’s account of the Dirgha describes Batra’s 7 July action at Point 4875.