'My Great-Grandmother Was With Laxmi Bai': Old Video Of Col Sofia Qureshi Surfaces
In a strong message to the world, two female officers briefed the media after India launched airstrikes in terror camps in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Jammu and Kashmir early Wednesday morning. The officers who accompanied Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri were Colonel Sofiya Qureshi of the Indian Army and Wing Commander Vyomika Singh of the Indian Air Force.
Colonel Sofiya Qureshi, from the Army's Corps of Signals, became the first Indian woman to command a military contingent at an international exercise, leading the Indian team at 'Exercise Force 18', the country’s largest foreign-hosted military drill in 2016. She was also the only female commander among 18 participating nations.
Now, an interview from 2017 has surfaced in which Colonel Qureshi talked about her Army background and how her parents wanted her to join the Indian armed forces.
"I am a Fauji kid, so I was exposed to the Army environment. My father was in the Army, my grandfather was in the Army, and my great-grandmother was with Rani Laxmi Bai. She was a full warrior. My mother wanted either of us (me or my sister) to be in the Army. My grandfather used to say that it's our responsibility to remain alert and defend the nation," she said in the interview.
Colonel Qureshi, who is from Gujarat, holds a postgraduate degree in biochemistry. She is married to an officer in the Mechanised Infantry. She has spent six years with UN Peacekeeping Operations, where she monitored ceasefires and supported humanitarian missions.
After the media briefing, her father, Taj Mohammed Qureshi, told ANI that they were very proud of her. "We are very proud. Our daughter has done a great thing for our country…Pakistan should be destroyed…My grandfather, my father, and I were all in the army. Now she is, too," he said.
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