DEHRADUN: Doon valley will always remember the 1971 war hero Hanut Singh, 82, who passed away on Saturday. Besides being a valiant soldier, Singh was renowned for being a spiritual man. He was also known as the “saint-general”. Followers of the war veteran, hearing of his death on Saturday , gathered to pay obeisance at the Shiv Balyogi Maharaj Ashram Trust on Rajpur Road.

Hanut Singh had a spiritual bent from his youth. He was commissioned in the Indian Army on December 28, 1952, and led the 17 Poona Horse regiment during the 1971 war in the “Basantar battle,” successfully countering attacks from Pakistani forces.

Singh was conferred the Maha Vir Chakra and also honoured with the Param Vishisht Seva Medal for his bravery.

After retiring from the Army, he built a cottage behind Shiv Balyogi Maharaj Ashram in Doon. He started living there in the 1980s, leading the life of an ascetic and spending long hours in meditation.

Hanut Singh was born in 1933. He joined the Army as part of the first batch of the Joint Services Wing of the Indian Military Academy.

Nripendra Singh, his nephew told TOI, “The last message he gave was that God has given us this human birth to be able to realize Him. We must do our duties, but we must spend time in spiritual pursuit, to realize God. His cottage behind the ashram is like a ‘temple shrine’ for all his disciples.”

For the last 30 years, Hanut Singh lived on Rajpur Road in Dehradun. He was born in Rajasthan and went to school at the Colonel Brown Cambridge School in Dehradun. His followers say he started his usual meditation routine on Friday and fell into a deep state of “samadhi” on Saturday.

Thousands of disciples are expected to assemble at Haridwar to take part in the last rites, to be held on Monday.

