It was May 1999. Pakistani troops had occupied several mountain ridges on India's side of the Line of Control, overlooking the Kargil valley in Ladakh. The Kargil War is a story of how Indian troops painstakingly took back those heights. The Battle of Tololing was India's first major victory in the war. But it wasn't an easy one...

The first reports of infiltrators in Kargil came in the first week of May. Tashi Namgyal, a resident of Garkone village in Kargil's Batalik sector, was looking for his lost yak. He went looking for it, following its tracks up a narrow stream. "I had binoculars with me. The area was covered in snow, and when I reached the top, I saw six men dressed in black, breaking rocks and clearing snow. It appeared to me that they were up to something suspicious," Tashi still remembers vividly. He was the first to spot the intruders and reported the matter to the army officials.

Veterans who fought the Kargil War recall that when the initial attack on Tololing was launched on May 22, Indian troops were under the impression that the intruders were terrorists. It emerged later that the peak had been captured by a company of over 100 Pakistani soldiers. It took the Indian forces completely off guard.

Perched at 16,000 feet atop the Tololing peak, Pakistani soldiers had an advantage.First, Tololing peak offered them a clear view of the Srinagar-Leh highway, a crucial supply line for the India army. Second, with the enemy well placed at all vantage points, Indian soldiers were mere "sitting ducks" for the Pakistani forces.

And so, it became the utmost priority of the Indian Army to clear Tololing, despite the treacherous terrain, icy heights and harsh weather conditions posing serious challenge. Initial attempts by the Indian troops to evict the enemy yielded no breakthrough. And then, India did the unthinkable...

Video Producer: Shohini Bose
Video Editor: Abhishek Sharma