Across The ‘Chadar’ Trail on the Zanskar River, Ladakh: An Exclusive Interview with Lt. General Raghu Srinivasan, Director General, Border Roads Organisation (BRO). Don’t Miss ‘The Himalayan Frontier’, Part V on February 2, 2024, at 7 PM IST. The DG speaks to StratNews Global’s Amitabh P. Revi across the ‘Chadar’ Trail on the Zanskar River at Chiling near Leh in Ladakh.
SNG’s team of Amitabh P. Revi, Rohit Pandita and Karan Marwaha document their journey to Leh on the strategic third, alternate axis—the Darcha-Padam-Nimu (NPD) Road, in episode III and episode IV. The route provides critical connectivity for defence logistics to and civilian development around the Northern China-occupied Tibet border or Line of Actual Control (LAC), the Line of Control (LoC) and the Actual Ground Position Line (AGPL) in Siachen with Pakistan. It is shielded from both the India-China border and the frontier with Pakistan, unlike the other two axes. StratNews Global’s team travels during the fourth winter of India’s forward deployment post-Xi Jinping’s aggression that led to the deadly Galwan clashes in 2020. The freezing temperatures highlight one of the several challenges the BRO faces in recce-ing, tracing, drilling through the mighty ranges and building black-top roads on this route. India’s infrastructure development has seen a sustained thrust, especially after China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) salami-slicing tactics in border areas. In part II of this series, the Indian Army Chief, General Manoj Pande told StratNews Global Editor-in-Chief Nitin A. Gokhale in an exclusive interview, that talks with China are continuing at both military and diplomatic levels but India is maintaining a robust posture along the LAC. Then Northern Army Commander Lt Gen. Upendra Dwivedi , now Vice Chief of Army Staff also told Nitin Gokhale in Part I, that the “situation is stable but sensitive and not normal”.
Episodes III, IV and V document the BRO’s consistent infrastructure push in road connectivity, In our next episodes, we shift focus to the Indian Air Force (IAF) and its air bridges, and capture on camera how the Indian Army, the Border Roads Organisation (BRO), and the IAF’s women, men and machines are honing their all-weather readiness during another winter, against the two-front threat from China and Pakistan.
