Diplomats, academicians & experts to meet in Assam to discuss borders issues with China

|HT|

Senior serving and retired Indian Army officers, diplomats, academicians and experts are in Assam for a two-day seminar beginning Thursday with focus on China and the evolving threat on the northern borders. Over 200 officers of the Indian armed forces including senior military leadership and ground commanders will be part of the seminar organised by the Army’s Eastern Command at the head-quarters of IV Corps or Gajraj Corps, which covers Assam and Western Arunachal Pradesh.

“The seminar is aimed to refine understanding the diverse contours of Sino-India boundary dispute over decades, Chinese strategic thought process and military transformation, implications and way ahead for India,” Lt Col AS Walia, PRO (defence), Tezpur, said in a statement issued on Wednesday. The Army’s Eastern command is responsible to safeguard India’s long frontiers in the north-east across some of the most difficult and inhospitable high-altitude and jungle terrains found anywhere on earth.

Lt Gen RP Kalita, GOC in C, of Indian Army’s Kolkata based Eastern Command, who was on a tour to the forward areas in north-east, arrived at Tezpur on Wednesday to take part in the seminar.

The seminar will include talks and panel discussions by eminent subject matter experts including senior diplomats, academicians like former Indian ambassador to China Ashok Kantha, author and China expert Professor Srikanth Kondapalli, president of Centre for China Analysis and Strategy Jaydeva Ranade, researcher and academician Dr Amrita Jash and French author and Tibetologist Claude Arpi.

Several senior Army officers like former army commander Northern Command Lt Gen, Ranbir Singh (retd.), former army commander Army Training Command Lt Gen Raj Shukla (retd.) and member of the National Security Advisory Board Lt Gen SL Narasimhan (retd.) will also be part of the seminar.

“The continued push for operational preparedness along the northern borders has received a shot in the arm with high priority fast-paced infrastructure development in the border areas, infusion of latest technology in Army and a vigorous discourse on doctrine and strategy,” said Lt Col Walia’s statement.

(Except for the headline and the pictorial description, this story has not been edited by THE DEN staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)