tawang even after 50 years the memories of the 1962 sinoindian conflict are still fresh in the mind of septuagenarian kumar singh gurung gurung who was only 21 years old when he joined the assam rifles as a sepoy and was posted in bumla during the war could not hold back his tears when he paid his respects to the martyrs of the war during the shahid shraddhanjali yatra here gurung who was fighting the chinese forces before his bunker was captured by the enemies still believes that the indian army could have defeated the chinese if the government provided better facilities i was shooting at them with my machine gun but soon we went out of our ammunition we had no bullets neither food nor water to drink we were helpless we could hardly know what was happening in delhi and what nehru was discussing about the war all we knew was that the chinese forces in front of us were showering bullets on us and killing our friends gurung recalled along with gurung several others were arrested by the chinese and were taken to lhasa during the war the chinese had held me and my friends captive for nine months we thought we will be killed but later after discussions and deliberations they handed us over to india but i can never forget those days the memories still haunt me the septuagenarian said the war veteran is still very critical about the centres approach in improving the transportation and road connectivity to the bordering posts of indian army in arunachal pradeshchina border and it has been a major concern for the forces since then the roads to bumla and other posts in arunachal pradesh are still pathetic if china attacks us today it is going to be very difficult for us to carry out speedy movement we dont want repetition of the 1962 conflict but the government must be ready and act accordingly he added bumla is located 37 kms away from tawang and is also referred to as the pass from where the dalai lama entered indian after escaping from tibet the snowcovered area of bumla is located only 300 meters away from the line of control and is at an altitude of 16000 ft above sea level gurung was felicitated as a war hero by bjp national president nitin gadkari during the shahid shraddhanjali yatra organized by bjp yuva morcha he retired from the force as a hawaldar and is presently living with his family in tezpur