Arunachal Pradesh has started building a five crore rupee war memorial to honor Rifleman Neelam Tebi of the 5 Assam Rifles. This project preserves the legacy of the only known soldier from the state to make the supreme sacrifice during the 1962 India China War on the 64th anniversary of his death. The memorial site is located in the Keyi Panyor district where local residents and the Neelam society donated the necessary land for the construction. The Hydropower Development Corporation of Arunachal Pradesh Limited serves as the executing agency for initial project phases. Military personnel from the 19th Battalion of the Jat Regiment and the 60th Battalion of the Indo Tibetan Border Police joined local dignitaries at the site on October 20, 2026, to pay their tributes.
Neelam Tebi was born on November 4, 1941, in Deed or Nyelam village to his father, Neelam Tath. He enrolled in the Assam Rifles on November 4, 1958, at the age of 17. By October 1962, his unit deployed him to the Khinzamane or Kinjamani Post located north of Tawang in the Kameng sector. Reports from the
Indian Army Spear Corps indicate that he faced a force of around 300 Chinese troops during the action. He sustained injuries while defending the post but refused evacuation. Historical records, including the Role of Honours, list his service number as 53135. The State Core Committee on Unsung Heroes and various researchers spent years verifying his service records. Primary documents including enlistment papers and death reports were procured from the
Assam Rifles headquarters in Shillong between 2021 and 2022. This formal verification allowed the state to move forward with the memorial project. The initiative aligns with the broader Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav objectives to recognise forgotten contributors to national security.
Design plans for the facility include a
cenotaph, a wall of fame featuring the names of martyrs, and a museum cum armoury hall. The site will also host a statue of Tebi along with an entrance gate, approach road, and landscaped gardens. Future phases of the construction might incorporate military hardware such as an armoured tank or a helicopter to enhance the visitor experience. The state aims to boost heritage and war tourism through this dedicated site of memory. It serves as a complement to existing memorials in Tawang and Walong. Military historians note that Tebi represents many individual acts of bravery that went undocumented due to communication failures and the remote nature of the 1962 conflict.
