Colonel Navjot Singh Bal, recipient of India’s third highest peacetime gallantry award Shaurya Chakra, recently passed away after succumbing to cancer. And his family is now travelling from Gurugram to Bengaluru by road due to lockdown, to perform his last rites. 

They were denied a flight in a military aircraft.

A report from the The Quint stated that Colonel Bal’s parents were not granted permission for the same by the Indian Air Force, and are now travelling 2000 kilometers by road to perform the last rites of their son who passed away on April 9.

The Ministry of Home Affairs granted them permission to travel, though, and their vehicle has been allowed to pass in Karnataka during the lockdown.

Colonel Bal was diagnosed with cancer in 2018, following which his right arm had to be amputated. Showing great valour, he learnt how to use weapons with his left hand but things soon got worse and he had to quit from his position in the Army.

He was commissioned in the Army in 2002 and played a huge role in an operation in Jammu and Kashmir, for which he won the gallantry award.