BANGALORE: After the list of President's Police Medal was released, Express spoke to four persons on their tough days that made them proud and brought them the medal for gallantry.
Bangalore Police Commissioner Shankar Bidari, KSRP 4th Battalion's Reserve Police Inspector K K Vijaya Kumar, Mangalore KSRP 7th Battalion's Armed Head Constable Konjalatta Ramanand and Hassan's KSRP 11th Battalion's Armed Police Constable G K Dileep Kumar, who have been awarded the President's Police Medal, remembered their days of courage and bravery.
They had worked as a team to curb the activities of notorious forest brigand Veerappan.
The government had recommended the names of these four policemen in 1994, when the operations were taking place. But, they had requested the government to drop their names from the recommendation list as they had made up their mind to not receive any awards till the operation was completed.
After 17 years, they said they deserved what they have got now.
After the list was announced, they called each other and exchanged wishes.
Inspector Vijaya Kumar rushed to the police commissioner's office and met Bidari.
Kumar said it was an amazing experience to be part of the STF. "We all worked as a team and it paid off. A few encounters, especially the one in which we killed Veerappan's accomplices Mariyappan, his wife, Sethukuli Govindan's wife and others will never be forgotten," he said.
Bidari also expressed his happiness for being conferred the honour.