| Singapore | 25 Dec 2016 | Asia Samachar |
Singapore’s first naval commander Jaswant Singh Gill was among the large crowd that turned up for Naam Ras 2016, a four-day Sikh festival that ends on Monday.
The 94-year old veteran was accompanied by his eldest daughter Harcharan Kaur who lives in Malaysia and his granddaughter Gurpreet Kaur, a London-based dentist.
“It was a fulfilling journey,” he told Asia Samachar about his years in service.
In the 1960s, Lt-Col (Rtd) Jaswant Singh Gill was commander of the Singapore volunteer force in the 1960s.
Many reservists served during the Japanese invasion of Singapore and a few were on Royal Navy ships in the battle of the Atlantic, Jaswant was quoted in a media report.
In the same report, Jaswant, described as the most senior Singaporean naval reservist officer, recalled 1963 as a significant year when some 126 men and women naval volunteers were mobilised against Indonesian president Sukarno’s Konfrontasi campaign against Malaya and Singapore.
Some other Sikhs who served senior positions in the Singapore armed forces included Brigadier-General (Retd.) Kirpa Ram Vij – Singapore’s first army chief; Brigadier-General (Retd.) Sarbjit Singh, who retired as Commander of the RSAF’s Air Power Generation Command in 2014 and Lieutenant-Colonel (LTC) (Retd.) Daljeet Singh, one of Singapore’s pioneer army officers who saw action during the Konfrontasi.
[ASIA SAMACHAR is an online newspaper for Sikhs in Southeast Asia and surrounding countries. We have a Facebook page, do give it a LIKE. Follow us on Twitter. Visit our website: www.asiasamachar.com]
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