By Lt Gen PJS Pannu (Retd)
The Valley of Words (VoW), founded in Dehradun as a celebration of literature, ideas and intellectual dialogue, has steadily evolved into a much wider platform for national discourse. Among its distinctive knowledge verticals, the Military History and Strategy (MHS) has acquired a special identity. It brings together military veterans, historians, authors, diplomats, strategists, academics, policymakers, journalists and the younger generation to examine war not merely as an event on the battlefield, but as an experience that shapes societies, institutions and nations. I am very happy to have been heading this vertical since the unusual circumstances of 2020. It has grown into a platform where military history meets contemporary strategy, leadership, technology, geopolitics and national security. Its conversations have demonstrated that remembering wars is not about glorifying conflict — it is about understanding the past so that nations can make wiser choices about the future.
The 2020 edition marked an important beginning for VoW’s engagement with military history and strategy. Even as the COVID pandemic disrupted conventional festivals, VoW experimented with a ‘phygital’ model which combined physical and digital participation. The Military History and Strategy vertical began establishing itself as a forum for serious discussion on India’s security environment. The wider VoW-USI association also produced a special programme on “150 Years of USI – A Road Map for the Future” which was recorded in October and broadcast in November 2020.
The military discussions at VoW that year included subjects ranging from the valiant Dogras and India’s northern boundary to the changing world order, defence self-reliance and the importance of introducing military history to schools. Sessions such as “The Northern Boundary – History & Management”, “The New World Order – Great Game 2.0”, and “Can India be Self Reliant in Defence?”, made the idea clear: military history must move beyond regimental memories and become part of India’s larger strategic conversation.
The defining MHS initiative of 2021 was the two-day MHS Vertical on the 1971 War, organised at the United Service Institution of India (USI), New Delhi, on 9–10 October. It marked the 50th anniversary of the Bangladesh Liberation War and brought together veterans, diplomats, authors and experts from India and Bangladesh. The event examined the war through multiple dimensions, including military operations, air operations, geography, diplomacy and the liberation struggle. It demonstrated one of VoW’s enduring strengths: bringing together people who had experienced history and those who study it.
The event also acquired special poignancy with the valedictory address of General Bipin Rawat, then Chief of Defence Staff. His subsequent tragic demise in December that year made his association with VoW a particularly memorable part of its history.
The 1971 programme established an important template for the MHS vertical: commemorate, interrogate and contextualise history.
In 2022, MHS moved from the history of wars to the human stories of those who fought them. The session “Grit, Glamour and Valour” united living legends of the Indian Army, including Lt Gen Shakti Gurung, Self, Brig JNS Bisht, Brig PS Gurung and Col DPK Pillay. A second important strand was the launch of Nitin Sathe’s War Stories: 1971–1999, reinforcing the MHS commitment to military literature as a means of preserving institutional memory.
The 2022 discussions particularly connected with younger audiences. The veterans did not merely recount battles; they spoke about values, adversity, duty and the motivations that sustain soldiers in difficult circumstances.
There was no dedicated MHS programme in 2023. Yet the vertical continued to mature as part of VoW’s broader intellectual ecosystem. The pause also reflected the larger evolution of the initiative: military history and strategy was no longer an isolated theme but increasingly a bridge connecting literature, national security, technology and public policy.
By 2024, MHS had become a recognised VoW knowledge vertical. The 8th edition of the festival explicitly positioned military history and strategy alongside politics, science, medicine, literature and culture. That year’s programme included “For a Fit Fighting Force: The Best of the Brave,” with Maj Gen Sanjay Sharma, Vice Admiral Vinay Badhwar, Capt Yashika Tyagi and AVM Deepak Gaur, and as moderator. The discussion reflected a widening definition of military capability. A modern fighting force is not built only through weapons and technology; physical fitness, mental resilience, leadership, training and human capital remain fundamental. This was also emblematic of the MHS vertical’s evolution—from remembering military history to asking what history teaches us about the future force.
The year 2025 marked perhaps the most expansive phase of MHS. The vertical addressed military leadership, spirituality, diversity, international relations and contemporary warfare. The session “India–Korea: From Humanitarian Assistance to Strategic Partnership”, featuring Admiral Aarti Sarin and moderated by Col DPK Pillay, explored the remarkable trajectory of India–South Korea relations—from India’s role in mediation, peacekeeping and humanitarian assistance to the emergence of a strategic partnership. With RIMC and the Forum for Awareness on National Security as institutional partners, the programme demonstrated how military history can illuminate contemporary diplomacy.
Two further MHS sessions examined leadership through military memoirs. Gen VK Ahluwalia’s A General’s Odyssey: Giving Up Is Not an Option and Gen Shakti Gurung’s Breaking the Glass Ceiling offered complementary perspectives on perseverance, professional excellence and overcoming institutional and social barriers. The latter was particularly significant as it chronicled the journey of the Indian Army’s first ethnic Gorkha Lieutenant General.
Another pair of sessions—Gen Ajai Kumar Singh’s Beyond the Battlefield: Spirituality as an Enabler of Military Leadership and Gen Balraj Mehta’s Commanding Excellence—examined leadership from both spiritual and practical perspectives. As I moderated these conversations, MHS demonstrated its ability to connect military experience with universal questions of leadership, character and human potential.
One of the year’s most significant initiatives was the 60th anniversary commemoration of the 1965 India–Pakistan War, organised in New Delhi by VoW in collaboration with the Chintan Research Foundation on 9th September 2025. Importantly, this conference did not treat 1965 simply as a historical anniversary. It examined the war’s lessons against today’s emerging security environment—where conflict increasingly extends into cyber, space, information, climate and critical-resource domains. This is perhaps the defining characteristic of VoW’s MHS approach: history is used not merely to remember yesterday, but to understand tomorrow.
From its early programmes in 2020 to the sophisticated strategic conversations of 2025, VoW’s Military History and Strategy vertical has travelled a considerable distance. It has created a rare public space where the soldier, scholar, diplomat, journalist, author and student can sit together and ask difficult questions.
Its reach has also extended beyond Dehradun. The 1971 commemoration at USI demonstrated the potential of pan-India programming, while the 1965 anniversary conference in Delhi reinforced VoW’s role as a convenor of serious national-security dialogue. VoW itself describes its larger festival as a pan-Indian celebration that has brought together more than 1,000 authors, artists and other participants, with hundreds of sessions across its various knowledge verticals.
The participation of war veterans, government officials, historians, academics, journalists, filmmakers and international voices has enriched this conversation. Personalities associated with India’s military and strategic discourse, alongside public intellectuals and media figures, have helped make military history accessible beyond the armed forces.
The MHS journey therefore represents something larger than a series of panels and book discussions. It is an effort to create a living archive of India’s strategic memory—one that connects the sacrifices of earlier generations with the challenges of the future.
As warfare changes from the battlefield to the network, from tanks to satellites, and from kinetic force to cyber, information and cognitive influence, the need for informed public discourse becomes even greater. VoW’s Military History and Strategy vertical has begun to occupy precisely that space: where memory meets strategy, experience meets scholarship, and the lessons of war become lessons for peace and preparedness.
