Adding a new dimension to the maze of complexity that is the India-China border, Arunachal Pradesh Governor Lieutenant General K.T. Parnaik (Retd) said on Friday that the agreements and protocols currently in place actually favour China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to the disadvantage of India.
Gen Parnaik said: “We have a peculiar situation with agreements and protocols being mainly framed to suit the PLA with no settlement of boundary cartographic invasions and an invisible non-designated line to defend.”
“With ‘no use of weapons’ we are disadvantaged along the LAC (Line of Actual Control)… Frequent intrusions by PLA violating the agreements is a critical and sensitive issue needing a firm sense of ‘reciprocity’.”
”The MEA (foreign affairs ministry) and MoD (defence ministry) need to be prepared with a new set of agreements that can be implemented with clarity and also create arguments to dispel Chinese dynastic claims with our civilizational counter claims,” he added.
Gen Parnaik was speaking in New Delhi at the second edition of the “Lieutenant General PS Bhagat Memorial Lecture” that was jointly organised by the Indian Army and United Services Institution of India (USI).
It was attended by the top brass of the Indian Army including the chief General Manoj Pande. Several former chiefs were also part of the audience.
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Mutual understanding and stated terms of engagement between India and China mandate that no guns are to be fired on the LAC come what may. Border patrol teams are either unarmed or carry the gun with its barrel pointed downwards.
China claims Arunachal Pradesh as its own, calling it ‘Southern Tibet’. Arunachal Pradesh shares a 1,125 km-long border with China.
On Pakistan, the Governor said an “aggressive punitive deterrence policy needs to be continued”.
With obvious reference to the recent unrest in Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir (PoK), Gen Parnaik said: “Unrest in Pakistan provinces allow us space for political manoeuvre while opposition to CPEC (China Pakistan Economic Corridor) would keep the Chinese tentative.”
He advocated: “Focus on re-integration of PoK through peaceful voluntary means. Finally avoidance of a two-front war needs to be strategized and ensured.”
(With Agency Inputs)
