What happened to the ‘‘Missing 54’’?

I Mallikarjuna Sharma

[54 Indian POWs in Pakistan languishing or died in prison since 1971! India released 93,000 Pakistani POWs but could not get released its mere 54]

People know that so far India and Pakistan in the Indian subcontinent have fought 4 major wars and several other battles so far–mostly on the issue of Kashmir–but the third war in 1971 was fought mainly on the issue of genocidal violence on the East Pakistanis (East Bengalis) and it ended in complete victory for India in the eastern sector with considerable gains in the western sector too–most important, it has led to the liberation of East Pakistan from the yoke of Punjabi-dominated West Pakistanis and creation of an independent republic of Bangladesh. Unlike the wars in 1948, the issue of the 54 Indian prisoners of war (POWs) believed to be held in Pakistan since the 1971 Indo-Pakistani War remains a deeply emotional and unresolved matter. Here’s what is known based on available information from various internet sources/channels like GROK, Deep Seek etc.

The 1971 Indo-Pakistani War resulted in the repatriation of most prisoners of war under the Simla Agreement of 1972, but 54 Indian defence personnel were declared missing in action and are believed by the Indian government and families to have been secretly held in Pakistan, despite denials from Pakistani authorities. The 2007 film 1971, directed by Amrit Sagar and a winner of the National Film Award for Best Feature Film in Hindi, was inspired by the real events surrounding these POWs, depicting a fictionalised account of six Indian soldiers attempting to escape from a Pakistani POW camp. Below is the complete list of the 54 individuals, including ranks where available (service numbers and units are noted only where specified in sources). The list comprises 22 from the Indian Army, 30 from the Indian Air Force, 1 from the Indian Navy, and 1 whose branch is unspecified.

1. Major SPS Waraich, 2. Major Kanwaljit Singh, 3. Major Jaskiran Singh Malik, 4. Captain Kalyan Singh Rathod, 5. Captain Giriraj Singh, 6. Lt Sudhir Mohan Sabharwal, 7.Captain Kamal Bakshi, 8. Lt Paras Ram Sharma, 9. Major S.C. Gulari, 10. Major A.K. Ghosh, 11. Major A.K. Suri, 12. Sq. Ldr Mohinder Kumar Jain, 13. Flt Lt Sudhir Kumar Goswami, 14. Lt Cdr Ashok Roy, 15. Flt Lt Harvinder Singh, 16.Fg Officer Sudhir Tyagi, 17. Flt Lt Vijay Vasant Tambay, 18. Flt Lt Ilyoo Moses Sassoon, 19. Flt Lt Ram Metharam Advani, 20. Flt Lt Nagaswami Shanker, 21. Flt Lt Suresh Chander Sandal, 22.Flt Lt Kushalpal Singh Nanda, 23. Wg. Cdr Horsern Singh Gill, 24. Flt Lt Tanmaya Singh Dandass, 25. Captain Ravindra Kaura, 26. Sq Ldr Jal Miniksha Mistry, 27. Flt Lt Ramesh Gulabrao Kadam, 28. Flg Officer Krishan Lakima J Malkani, 29.Flt Lt Babul Guha, 30. L/Naik Hazoora Singh, 31. Sq Ldr Jatinder Das Kumar, 32. Flt Lt Gurdev Singh Rai, 33. Flt Lt Ashok Balwant Dhawale, 34. Flt Lt Shrikant Chandrakant Mahajan, 35. Flt Lt Kottiezath Puthiyavettil Murlidharan, 36. Captain Vashist Nath, 37. L/Nk Jagdish Raj, 38. Sep Madan Mohan, 39. Sep Pal Singh, 40. Sep Daler Singh, 41. Lt Vijay Kumar Azad, 42. Sujan Singh, 43. Gunner Shyam Singh, 44.Sep Gian Chand, 45. Sep Jagir Singh, 46.Subedar Kali Das, 47. Flt Lt Manohar Purohit, 48. Pilot Officer Tejinder Singh Sethi, 49. L/Naik Balbir Singh, 50. Sqn Ldr Devaprashad Chatterjee, 51. L/Hav Krishan Lal Sharma, 52. Sub Assa Singh, 53.Capt OP Dalal, 54. SBS Chauhan.

For one thing Pakistan was a founding member of two Cold War-era military alliances formed under the U S leadership in the 1950s–SEATO (Southeast Asia Treaty Organisation) established in 1954 with limited effectiveness during Vietnam War and other international conflicts but Pakistan withdrew from it in 1973 due to lack of assistance in its conflicts with India; CENTO (Central Treaty Organisation, initially known as the Baghdad Pact but renamed in 1959 due to withdrawal of Iraq from it), which included Pakistan, Iran, Turkey, and the UK with US support which dealt with regional stabilities including the 1979 Iranian Revolution. However, SEATO and CENTO were formally dissolved on 30 June 1977 and 16 March 1979 respectively and there is no news of any other military alliance in the region (South Asia and the Middle East) taking its place later. So, it is quite possible that Pakistan actively aided and abetted the main terrorist actions held in Indian Kashmir or other places of the country.

As regards these missing Indian POWs it is remarkable that the admission of the same was prominently published in a Pakistani newspaper ‘Pakistan Observer’, then published from Dhaka reported on 05 Dec 1971 (in its Sunday edition) that five Indian pilots had been captured and one of them was Flt Lt Tomboy, a presumed distortion of Tambay. Later his wife Smt Damayanti during her search for her husband found many leads/evidences that gave credence to the fact that Flt Lt Tambay was being kept as a POW in Pakistan. Pakistan, however, never acknowledged the presence of Flt Lt Tambay in a Pakistani jail. Presently, Flt Lt VV Tambay’s name features on the official list of the ‘54 Personnel Missing in Action’, tabled in the Lok Sabha in 1979 by the then Minister of State of External Affairs Shri Samarendra Kundu–may be the same list given above.

It is interesting to note that Mrs Damayanti Tambay gave an extensive interview (available on YouTube–https://youtu.be/zL2DFOeLaxw?si=GqG-KlOHCvAdPVbE Premiered Oct 7, 2023 #NDTV #TodayNews #BreakingNews–a must watch in which she graphically describes her woes and utter loneliness she has been experiencing since all these five decades but firmly facing and countering them all along and how all her efforts to find the whereabouts of her husband in Pakistan and through Indian diplomatic and government channels have failed. NDTV describes: She is “a triumphant 6-time badminton champion and an Arjuna Awardee, she conquered the sports arena with her skill and determination. However, Damyanti Tambay’s life took an unexpected turn when her husband was captured during the tumultuous 1971 India-Pakistan war and never returned. In the face of this profound personal loss, Damayanti’s strength and courage shone even brighter as she embarked on a new journey. Damayanti Tambay’s life story is a testament to the power of the human spirit to overcome challenges and make a lasting difference in the lives of those around her.” This writer deeply sympathises and commiserates with her but also feels she and her colleagues in JNU, a leftist student stronghold for decades, especially in those days till 2004 or so, failed to organise and conduct any concerted agitation in this regard and shake up the portals of power and wake up the entire nation to this horrible tragedy. This writer itself was in JNU Campus more than 2-3 times during those years with wide contacts among leftist student leaders and even faculty members but though Damayanti Tambay was there in the faculty as a Sports’ Director, he never heard of her even, and even this shocking news of 54 Indian POWs missing this writer came to know only quite recently!

Well, be as it may, it seems there should be some good closure to this development with central government–now of BJP led by Mr. Modi but of any other party in near future for that matter–The government must exert full efforts to get these POWs–to the extent they are still alive, because by now they may be around 75-95 years ages if still alive–repatriated to the country and even approaching the International Court of Justice as India did in the case of Kulbhushan Jadhav–said to be a RAW agent, operating in Iran and border areas of Pakistan, captured and sentenced by a Pakistani military court to death–and temporarily succeeded by averting his hanging and the matter is still pending therein Also, social activists and intellectuals should exert their best efforts in this regard without any further negligence on the ground that none of them may be alive now.

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Vol 58, No. 14 - 17, Sep 28 - Oct 25, 2025