india

Updated: Jun 06, 2019 11:57 IST

Most children go to their grandparents’ during summer vacation but Hemlata Gurjar and Mukesh Gurjar were hosted by a judge in Rajasthan’s Pratapgarh as they took a break from school.

The children of Narayan Lal Gurjar, a CRPF jawan killed in Pulwama terror attack in February, were invited by Pratapgarh’s district judge Rajendra Kumar Sharma and his wife Asha Sharma to their house for three days.

Hemlata, 14, and Mukesh, 12, came to Pratapgarh with their uncle, Mahesh, on June 2. The two said they had never been out of their village Binol in Rajsamand, a neighbouring district.

They were treated to delicacies made by Asha Sharma as well as street food and taken for sight-seeing and a film. They also went to Deepeshwar Pond and took rides at Woodland Park before going home on Tuesday evening.

“We had a lot of fun,” they said adding they want to join the Indian Army when they grow up.

Gurjar was among the 40 soldiers who died during a terror attack on a Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) convoy in Jammu and Kashmir in February this year. Five of these soldiers were from Rajasthan.

Sharma visited each of the five grief-stricken families in the state and offered to look after the children of the soldiers killed in the worst terror attack in the restive state in decades.

“After the Pulwama tragedy, I visited families of all five CRPF soldiers from Rajasthan who lost their lives in the terror attack. I offered to look after their children, fund their studies and help the families in the wedding of girls,” said the district judge.

The Sharmas have been inviting Gurjar’s children to their house in Pratapgarh since their visit to the CRPF man’s house in Binol.

“We are happy that the family accepted our offer and send the two children to us to spend some time here. They have come after finishing their exams. We looked after them like a good host. We had a good time hosting them; I am sure they had a good time, too, staying with us,” said the judge’s wife.

The district judge said he has invited children of all the five CRPF soldiers, killed in Pulwama, to his house. “They should feel that the country is with them,” he said.

Sharma has a daughter and a son, who are law students and want to get into judicial services like their father.

After the Pulwama terror attack, Sharma had organised fund collection for the families of the slain soldiers and collected Rs 5 lakh.

“I visited each of those families and donated Rs 1 lakh each as our way of saying that the country stands with people who lay down lives for it,” the district judge said.