Rajnath reviews ongoing infra projects along border regions
NEW DELH: Defence minister Rajnath Singh on Tuesday carried out an extensive review of India’s ongoing infrastructure projects in border areas, including the Ladakh sector, where military tensions between India and China have surged during the last two months.
“The state of forward connectivity was reviewed and the consistent need of boosting the ongoing projects and to expedite the construction of strategic roads, bridges and tunnels in the border areas was discussed,” the defence ministry said in a statement.
Some of these strategic roads and bridges, being constructed by the Border Roads Organisation (BRO), are coming up along the country’s border with China and are scattered across Ladakh, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh.
India is working on two key roads near the China border in eastern Ladakh to provide conof to an important forward area that the military calls Sub-sector North (SSN), as reported by Hindustan Times on June 9.
The first is the strategic Darbuk-shyok-daulat Beg Oldi road that provides connectivity to the country’s northern-most outpost, Daulat Beg Oldi (DBO). The second road being built from Sasoma to Saser La could eventually provide an alternative route to DBO near the Karakoram pass.
The ministry said that swift snow clearance works by BRO “ensured rapid and early movement of troops and logistics to forward areas.” It executed such works on 149 roads (a total length 3,965 kilometres) in Ladakh, Jammu & Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh.
“The BRO has worked incessantly even during the restrictions imposed due to Covid-19 without affecting the progress of various projects. Despite unprecedented snowfall breaking a 60-year record, all strategic passes and roads were cleared this year for traffic about one month before their average yearly opening dates,” the statement said.
The BRO has executed 30% more works in the financial year 2019-20 as compared to 2018-19, it added, highlighting how India’s focus on border projects continues to grow.
Trials have also been carried out successfully for indigenously produced modular bridges in collaboration with Garden Reach Shipbuilders and Engineers Limited under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ‘Make in India’ initiative. “This will revolutionize the bridge-laying capabilities in forward areas,” the statement said.