Next round of India-China talks soon: Naravane
LEH: Army chief General MM Naravane on Saturday said that the 13th round of dialogue between officials of India and China to discuss the ongoing border dispute could take place in the second week of October, as he expressed “firm opinion” that a resoltuion could be reached soon.
Naravane said that the increase in deployment by Chinese troops across the border was a matter of concern. India, however, as made matching deployments in terms of troops and infrastructure in its areas along the Line of Actual Control and there was no way anyone would be able to behave in an aggressive manner.
“The situation at friction points has been normal for the past six months. The talks have been going on. We had the 12th round of talks last month, and also hopeful of having the 13th round of talks, maybe by the second week of October,” Naravane, who is in Ladakh for a two-day visit, said.
“When the talks had started, people were doubtful whether talks would resolve anything, but I am of the firm opinion that we can resolve our differences with dialogue and that is what has happened in the past few months,” he said.
The two sides have been engaged in a 16-month long military tension along the LAC in eastern Ladakh, which has plunged Sino-India bilateral ties to the worst chill in decades.
A brutal clash in Galwan Valley on June 15 last year, which saw troops from both sides fighting each other for several hours with rocks, rods and clubs covered with barbed wire, resulted in the first fatalities on the LAC in 45 years. The Indian side lost 20 soldiers while China has acknowledged four deaths.
The army chief said, “The Chinese have deployed (their forces) in considerable numbers across Eastern Ladakh and up to eastern command. There has been an increase in the deployment and it is a matter of concern for us. We are also carrying out matching developments in terms
NEW DELHI: Nearly 50 million households have been provided with water connection since the launch of Jal Jeevan Mission in 2019 and now tap water is reaching every household in about 125,000 villages, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said Saturday.
He also asserted that today’s India has done more work on this front in just two years than what was done in seven decades.
Speaking after interacting with gram panchayats and village water and sanitation committees (VWSC) on the Jal
Jeevan Mission, Modi said the mission was village-driven and its vision was not just to make water accessible to the people, but it was also a big movement of decentralisation. In an apparent dig at previous Congress dispensations, Modi said those who had the responsibility of policymaking for a long time lived in abundance of water.
“In the places where these people lived, they had never seen such a problem with water. They did not even know what the pain of life without water is. They had water in the house, water in the swimming pool, an abundance of water,” he said.
“These people should have strived for an ideal village but they kept liking the shortcomings in the village,” Modi said. He said that the vision of Jal Jeevan Mission is a village-driven and women-driven movement, and its main base is mass movement and public participation.
Pointing out that from the time of independence till 2019, only 30 million households in the country had access to tap water, he said since the launch of Jal Jeevan Mission in 2019, 50 million households have been connected with water connections.
“Today, water is reaching every household in about 1.25 lakh villages in about 80 districts of the country. In the aspirational districts the number of tap connections have increased from 31 lakh to 1.16 crore,” he said, asserting that in just two years, more work has been done than was done in the last seven decades.
LUCKNOW : The All India Congress Committee (AICC) has appointed Chhatisgarh chief minister Bhupesh Baghel as the senior observer for 2022 assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh.
AICC general secretary KC Venugopal, in a press statement, said Congress president Sonia Gandhi had made the appointment with immediate effect.