The 5th Battalion the 4th Gorkha Rifles (GR), was raised in January 1963, in the wake of the Chinese Offensive, in Arunachal Pradesh, and Ladakh, India, from bases in Tibet, in 1962.

In the centre of the Bakloh ridge, not far from St Oswald Church, is the old officer's mess, a low, modest stone structure, with a view of the plains, and on clear sunny days of the River Ravi as makes its way into Pakistan.

It contents, the remains of the Raj and the regiment, of mess silver, battlefield memorabilia, war trophies, billiards table, leather sofas, pieces of art, Persian rugs, hunting trophies of skins and horns, scores of old albums, and thousands of books, made famous by evocative description by John Masters in the Bugles and A Tiger,[5] had been crated off to Sabathu, following the move of the 4 GR Centre to Sabathu.

Their overseer, as the senior subaltern, was the handsome, affable, and popular Virendra K Dhawan, who loved three X rum, crumbling roller cigarettes, and KL Seghal's melancholy melodies.

The 1965 war, which consisted of three Pakistan offensives, and one Indian counteroffensive, began in Jan 1965, with the occupation of a large swathe of the territory in the North of the Rann of Kutch, by Pakistan Para-Military Units, in an area under the operational jurisdiction of somnolent elements of the Gujarat Reserve Police, under the command and control of Indian Ministry of Home Affairs.

[8][9][10] In response to the Pakistan incursions and occupations, the Indian army along the entire India-Pakistan border was placed on alert, and formation and units were deployed to their operational location.

Encouraged by the easy success in the Rann of Kutch, on 5 August 65 Pakistan launched Operation Gibraltar, the invasion of Jammu and Kashmir, by a 'guerrilla' force of some 30,000 men in mufti, led by regular army personnel.

The "bridgehead across the international Border" was to serve as spring board for launching India's main strike element, 1 Armoured Division, concentrated in Ramgarh.

[13][14] 5/4 GR, in Phase 1 of the 168 Infantry Brigade attack, was tasked to capture 'high ground' north of village Anula, East of Bajragarhi, on the Sailkot-Phagowal Road, in the Sailkot Sector.

[16] At 2300 hours, on night 7/8 September, as leading troops of Operation code named Nepal, 5/4 crossed the international border, as Phase I of the Brigade attack.

[17] The assault was conducted by A and D Rifle companies under the command of Captain Subash C Jolly and Maj Hem Chander Tiwari respectively.

[19] Following the capture of Anula, in the 'reorganization' phase of the attack, as the support weapons were being moved into place, and the rear echelons had started to arrive, the battalion came under intense uninterrupted artillery fire.

As the 1 Corps offensive petered out, the battalion occupied defensive positions, along the Aik Nallah Raja-Harpal, close to the Railway line to Sialkot, and the Phagowal area, in the face of Pakistan Air Force strafing and bombing runs.

[16] In Bajragarhi, Lieutenant Bhupinder Singh Khatri, while leading a patrol west of Aik Nallah, in Karupl, was seriously wounded in the stomach by Pakistani Medium Machine Gun fire.

[16] Lt Khatri, who retired as Colonel, in April 1992, was elected President of All India Gorkha ExServicemen Welfare Association(AIGEWA), Dehradun, for a term of five years.

After the first two UNSC resolutions went unheeded, U Thant, the UN Secretary-General, travelled to India and Pakistan from 7–16 September, 65, to urge the two countries to stop the fighting.

In some areas, the FDLs were a mere 20 meters apart, and C Company could hear Pakistan soldiers talking, and even smoking the hookah in their trenches and bunkers.

UNIPOM was in addition to the existing United Nations Military Observer Group in India and Pakistan (UNMOGIP) deployed in Jammu and Kashmir.

On 27 September 1965, the UN Security Council adopted resolution 214 which while expressing its 'grave concern' recorded that " the cease-fire agreed to unconditionally by the Governments of India and Pakistan is not holding".

"[22] On 10 January 1966 India and Pakistan signed the Tashkent agreement, which provided for the 'disengagement and withdrawal' of forces by the two sides to positions held prior to 5 August 1965, by 25 February 1966.

[24] Following the Tashkent Agreement the military commanders of India and Pakistan met in Delhi, facilitated by Brigadier-General Tulio Marambio (Chile), the Secretary-General's representative, on 22 and 25 January and finalised implementation plans for the 'disengagement and withdrawal'.

In Ferozpur cantonment, the battalion's responsibilities included the construction, maintenance, and siting of defence systems in the Khem Karan sector.

The construction of this vast system of interlocked defence works, which stretched across almost the entire Punjab border, was headed by Lt Gen PS Bhagat, VC, GOC XI Corps, in Jalandhar.

The aim of this long, linear, elaborate, ambitious, anti-tank obstacle, quite without precedence in the annals of Indian military history, and as extensive and expensive as the Maginot line, was to deter and defeat Pakistani armour invasion like the one it attempted in 1965.

[28] In March 2007, after protracted and tough vetting, Mingmar was selected as a member of the Indian Army Everest Expedition 2007, that consisted of 3 officers 4 JCOs and 13 other ranks(ORs).

[30] Havildar Dhan Bahadur Gurung, won the bronze medal for boxing in the Light Heavyweight category in 10th Asian Games held in Seoul, South Korea, from 20 September 1986 to 5 October 1986.

The Golden Jubilee program included: Wreath Laying by Rifleman Kaman Gurung, the junior-most Rifleman of the battalion, Guard of Honor, the release of First Day Cover by the Colonel of the regiment, Sainik Sammelan ( literally a conclave of soldiers: in practice a formal gathering, in spruced up uniforms, in which everyone sits in arrays, according to rank, and at which the senior-most officer present makes, usually, a brief speech, with some exhortation), Golden Jubilee Dinner, and Golden Jubilee Cultural Evening and Barakhana (literally, a big, semi-formal communal feast, with some dancing, singing, and music, in which all ranks participate, but eat at separate tables), on 20 October.

Over 200 Bhu Puus (bhut purva or former, an affectionate colloquial in Nepali language for Ex Servicemen),[33] attended the jubilee with their wives, children, and grandchildren.

The larger contingents came from Pokhara, in Nepal, Bukloh, and Dharamshala, in Himachal Pradesh, Dehradun, in Uttarakhand, Darjeeling, in West Bengal and Noida, in UP.

The officers who were with the battalion at the time of the raising who came included Prem K Gupta, Ram L Bhanot, S P Mishra, Baldev K Chatli, Bhupender S Khattri, Satinder Pal, and John Taylor.