Srinagar: Indian and Chinese troops on Thursday exchanged sweets at several border posts along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in Ladakh on Diwali.
This comes after India and China undertook the disengagement process at the LAC in the union territory. Defence Minister Rajnath Singh said during an event in Arunachal Pradesh that the process was near completion.
Defence Ministry sources said that on Diwali, the Indian and Chinese armies exchanged sweets at several border points along the LAC.
Defence sources said the disengagement process between India and China on LAC in Eastern Ladakh was almost to be completed, after which the two armies started verifying positions and dismantling infrastructure.
Defence sources added that the dismantling of temporary structures in Depsang plains and Demchok is complete, and the verification process is taking place at almost all such locations on the two sides. The verification process is being done physically and using unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs).
Troops on both sides have been withdrawn to be stationed at depth in the rear locations as part of the disengagement process. Small parties of troops numbering around 10 to 15 soldiers will patrol to points hitherto inaccessible since April 2020.
India and China have been locked in a military standoff along the LAC in eastern Ladakh following Chinese incursions over four and half years ago.
Last week, four days after India announced that an agreement on patrolling in the Depsang Plains and Demchok had been reached with China, Beijing affirmed the same, saying that “the Chinese and Indian frontier troops are engaged in relevant work, which is going smoothly at the moment”.
Sources in the Army said that following the completion of the verification process, coordinated patrolling will begin within the next two days. Both sides will give prior information so that there is no danger of a face-off.
In the Depsang plains, Indian troops will now be able to patrol beyond the ‘bottleneck’ area, as the Chinese had been preventing them from accessing the patrolling points beyond.
Indian troops in Demchok should now be able to reach the patrolling points at Track Junction and Charding Nullah.
However, the large number of Indian troops rushed to Ladakh after the stand-off in 2020 will remain in place until a wider consensus on the border patrolling mechanism is reached with the Chinese.
“There are no plans to move back any troops from Ladakh in the near future till an atmosphere of mutual trust and verification is established,” defence sources said.
A similar arrangement is also being worked out in Arunachal Pradesh, where a stand-off developed in Yangtse, Asaphila and Subansiri Valleys had taken place, sources said.
–IANS
