China freed 10 Indian troops after 3 days of hectic parleys
Air Force Chief Bhadauria inspects Ladakh airbases, fighters fly sorties
China’s People’s Liberation Army on Thursday night released 10 Indian soldiers, including four officers, captured by it during the skirmish in Ladakh’s Galwan Valley on June 15.
It took three days of hectic negotiations between Leh-based 3 Infantry Division commander Maj. Gen. Abhijit Bapat and his PLA counterpart before the Chinese agreed to release the captured Indians. Sources said that on Wednesday the Chinese major-general even showed photographs of the captured soldiers to the Indian side to demonstrate that they were safe.
All 10 soldiers walked back Thursday evening, after which their medical checkup was done. They will be debriefed about their stay in Chinese custody. The Indian Army had said Thursday that there were no Indian troops missing in action in the Galwan Valley.
“As far as I know, China is not detaining any Indian personnel at present,” a spokesperson of China’s foreign ministry said on Friday.
Some 20 Indian soldiers, including 16 Bihar’s commanding officer Col. Santosh Babu, were killed and 76 others injured during the bloody clash with
Chinese soldiers in the Galwan Valley on Monday night.
The Indian soldiers were outnumbered and attacked by Chinese soldiers using sticks with barbed wires, iron rods and stones. The clash began as a party led by Col. Babu had gone to ask the Chinese to remove a tent at Patrolling Point 14 in Galwan, at a height of 14,000 feet, and within Indian territory.
The Ladakh situation is still tense. Air Chief Marshal R.K.S. Bhadauria, Chief of Air Staff, was on a visit to the Leh and Srinagar airbases, which will be important for any action in eastern Ladakh. He was in Leh on June 17 and in Srinagar on June 18. He visited some forward locations too, where he reviewed operational readiness. The IAF has deployed Sukhoi-30MKI, Mirage 2000 and Jaguar fighters to advanced positions. A number of IAF warplanes were seen doing sorties in Ladakh on Friday.