Secret history?

The explosive banner headline “Unit set up by V K Singh used secret funds to try and topple J&K govt, block Bikram Singh: Army inquiry” in the IE today is backed by this story:

Misusing secret service funds to destabilise the Omar Abdullah government in Jammu and Kashmir, to pay off an NGO to try change the line of succession in the Army top brass, to buy off-air interception equipment, to conduct “unauthorised” covert operations — a string of alleged irregularities by the Technical Services Division (TSD), a controversial Military Intelligence (MI) unit set up by former Army Chief General V K Singh in May 2010, should come under the scanner of an external agency like the CBI.

There is also a disclaimer of sorts in the article:

Officials in the MoD and PMO familiar with the Bhatia inquiry report told The Indian Express that with such details, the Army could well have initiated action against serving and retired officials but it has instead submitted the original records to the Ministry, leaving the final decision to them.

Indeed, when contacted, the Army spokesman said: “The case (the Bhatia report) has been closed from our side.”

Said a top PMO official: “The problem confronting us while dealing with the TSD report has been two-fold. One, those running the TSD appear to have covered their tracks well and destroyed crucial evidence; two, the statements contained in the inquiry report have no legal sanction. In fact, if they are faced with a court martial or CBI inquiry, these officials can turn around and deny everything they have admitted before General Bhatia.”

Given that General V. K. Singh is gadfly at large, this news needs to be verified over the coming days. However, the newspaper also carries a box with the meta-story:

To confirm the email’s receipt and to again try and reach Singh, The Indian Express contacted Kunal Verma, a photojournalist commissioned by Singh — when he was Army Chief — to write a set of three pictorial books on the North-East.

On September 19, Verma called this reporter early in the morning with an offer to fix a meeting with Singh. A few hours later, he said Singh had told him to convey that “he does not wish to speak to The Indian Express and should the newspaper write anything about me they will get it in the neck”.

Since this is the first time that there are detailed allegations of some people in the Indian armed services trying to subvert a democratically elected government, this story is worth reading in full.

DNA reports that the General defends himself saying this is a political move, and that two politicians defend him:

Reacting to the reports, Gen VK Singh said, “This is simple vendetta as some people are not comfortable with me sharing the dais with Narendra Modi to espouse the cause of ex-servicemen in the country.”

Senior BJP leader Balbir Punj and former IPS officer Kiran Bedi have questioned the timing of the recommendation of probe against Gen Singh.

“When VK Singh was at the helm, speaking up for integrity, he was a hero! Now that he has spoken as an insider, efforts will be to shoot him down,” Bedi tweeted this morning.

Speaking to a news channel, Punj said, “The timing of this report is questionable. Gen Singh has been a whistleblower against corrupt practices. He is being punished for speaking against the Centre and for his links with Modi.”

The end of Sindhurakshak

JUNE 23, 2012. INS Sindhurakshak, Indian diesel electric submarine, comes off the slipway at the Zvezdochka shipyard after a two-year overhaul and modernization programme.

China Radio International reports:

An Indian navy submarine has caught fire after an explosion and sunk at a port in Mumbai, according to media reports.

The Associated Press quoted Indian Navy spokesman Narendra Vispute as saying efforts were being made to ascertain the safety of about 18 navy personnel on the diesel-powered submarine.

NDTV carried the full text of a news release by the Indian Navy:

An explosion resulting in a major fire took place on board INS Sindhurakshak, a Kilo class submarine of the Indian Navy, shortly after midnight on 14 August 2013. Fire tenders from the Naval Dockyard as well as the Mumbai Fire Brigade were immediately pressed into action. However, due to as yet unknown damage suffered as a result of the explosion, the submarine has submerged at her berth with only a portion visible above the surface. About 18 persons were on board the submarine at the time of the accident and efforts are on to ascertain the safety of the personnel and salvage of the submarine.

A Board of Inquiry is being instituted to investigate into the causes of the accident.

Outlook reported:

The explosion resulted in a major fire breaking out on board INS Sindhurakshak, a Russian-made Kilo class submarine of the Indian Navy, shortly after midnight, they said.

The fate of 18 persons on board the 2,300 tonne submarine, powered by a combination of diesel generators and electric batteries, is being ascertained, a defence spokesperson said. The Navy has ordered a board of inquiry to probe the explosion and subsequent fire in the submarine, he said.
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Navy Chief Admiral D K Joshi is on his way to Mumbai. The submarine had returned after a major upgrade programme in Russia 3-4 months ago and was capable of carrying a potent weapons package including the anti-ship ‘Club’ missiles.

INS Sindhurakshak was not on active duty at the time of the accident, Navy sources said.

The incident has come at a time when the Navy is faced with a depleting submarine fleet.

Commodore (retd) Uday Bhaskar, a former IDSA director, said since the rate of induction of new platforms has not kept up with the kind of wear and tear that a submarine would undertake, the net result is that the Navy’s submarine fleet is depleting and the operation load is increasing.

India Today reported:

The explosion on board the INS Sindhurakshak was possibly a result of the buildup of volatile hydrogen gas during a battery charging. Sources told India Today that the submarine had faced a similar explosion when she was docked in Visakhapatnam in February 2010 which killed one crew member.

The navy’s Board of Inquiry in 2010 pinned the cause to a faulty battery valve that leaked hydrogen. The submarine was lightly manned at the time of the accident and later sent for a 2.5-year refit to Russia that year. It had returned to the naval dockyard on April 29 this year after the refit that cost approximately $80 million.

Conventional submarines like the Sindhurakshak are powered by a combination of diesel generators and electric batteries. The 2300-ton Sindhurakshak has 500 batteries. These have to be ‘over charged’ once every few months during which process each cell is manually checked. The presence of a large crew early in the morning points to a supervised battery overcharge.
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Sindhurakshak is the ninth of a series of ten ‘Sindhughosh’ class submarines that were bought from the erstwhile Soviet Union beginning in 1985. India and China, with ten submarines each, are the world’s largest operators of the Soviet-designed Kilo class submarines. Seven Indian Kilo-class submarines have been given mid-life refits in Russia. Refits of two other Kilo-class submarines, Sindhukirti and Sindhushastra, are underway at the naval dockyard in Vizag.

August 15, 2013

HT reported:

Navy divers have entered the Sindhurakshak submarine hit by twin explosions, but have yet to reach any of the 18 sailors who are feared dead inside the vessel, a naval official said Thursday.

IBN Live reported:

The defence ministry late on Thursday released the names of the 18 sailors and officers who were aboard the submarine INS Sindhurakshak that sank here the day before after explosions.

The three officers are Lt. Commanders Nikhilesh Pal, Alok Kumar and R. Venkitaraj.

The sailors are: Sanjeev Kumar, K.C. Upadhyay and Timothy Sinha (all POUW-I), Kewal Singh (LSUC-I), Sunil Kumar (SEA I UW-III), Dasari Prasad (Mech-R 2), Liju Lawrence (LEMP), Rajesh Tootika (LME), Amit K. Singh (STD-I), Atul Sharma and Vikas E. (both SEA-I), Naruttam Deuri (ME-I), Malay Haldar (EMR-II), Vishnu V. (RO-II) and Seetaram Badapalli (LS RP-I).

No UFOs says the Indian Army

I found this story to be a marvel of what accurate observations can reveal. The Kolkata Telegraph reported:

{Indian] army personnel had until February 2013 documented 329 sightings of the unidentified objects seen over Thakung near Pangong Tso, a high-altitude lake shared by India and Tibet.
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Army personnel have been posted at the height (above 13,000 feet) to function as a sentry/observer. All along the LAC (as also on the LoC with Pakistan) troops from either side try to set up observation posts on dominating heights to monitor movements on the other side of the undefined frontier.

Eastern Ladakh in particular is a sensitive region. Developments on this frontier led to the India-China war of 1962. Even as recently as last month, Chinese troops on horseback were reported to have crossed the LAC into India-claimed territory.

Over the past 10 years, with advances in surveillance technologies, both armies have been using pilotless aircraft with sensors and high-resolution cameras to watch each other. In the last three years, the number of transgressions reported has spiralled. There were more than 500 between 2010 and 2012. Transgressions are not only over land but also in airspace.
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The [unidetified] objects were perceived to have violated the Line of Actual Control (LAC) that India shares with China 155 times.

The first object, viewed from a location about 4,715 metres above sea level near Thakung, appeared in the horizon at about 6pm and remained visible until about 5am. The second object appeared at 4am and faded away at 11am.

Army lance naik Sheminderpal Singh — a regular observer at Point 4715 — told the astronomers that he had noticed a delay of four minutes in the appearance of one of the objects each consecutive day. Singh also told [Indian Institute for Astrophysics personnel stationed at the high-altitude telescope in Han Le] that the object seemed to be the brightest light in the sky and always appeared to move with respect to the stars.

The IIAP team told the Indian Army to use an instrument called a theodolite to record the horizontal angle and vertical elevation of the two objects. Army personnel performed these observations between February 17 and 22 and submitted the data to the IIAP.

The astronomers have concluded that the object observed from Point 4715 is Jupiter as the observations coincide with the planet’s diurnal motion and the apparent motion of the object due to the rotation of the Earth.

The description of the second unidentified object that appeared early in the morning suggests that it is Venus, which is currently moving behind the Sun and will in the coming months appear as an evening object.

The IIAP team said stars and planets over the horizon in Ladakh appear very bright because of increased atmospheric transparency at the high altitude and both Jupiter and Venus at the time were the brightest planets in the sky.

The astronomers also clarified that objects that rise in the east may appear to be moving across the LAC and approaching the Indian side.

I love this story, since it recapitulates my own introduction to science. Months-long nocturnal observations of Jupiter with a home-made theodolite, using parts cannibalized from my school “geometry box” gave me my first insight into the incredible usefulness of prolonged and accurate data taking.

The two critical observations reported here by Mr. Singh were the fact that the objects moved with respect to the stars, and the regular 4 minute delay in the appearance of the object: beautiful observations that amateur astronomers cut their teeth on. I would not mind having a meticulous observer like this working with me.

It is interesting that professional astronomers had to be brought in to finish the story. That points up a rectifiable gap in training. Perhaps a basic course in astronomical observations and the use of ephemerides of planets and known artificial satellites should be provided to observers in the armed forces. I would think that a month should suffice for instruction and exercise.

Manipur in the Supreme Court

Kangla Online reported:

The Supreme Court, which relentlessly strove to bring to book perpetrators of the fake encounter killings of Sohrabuddin and Tulsiram Prajapati in Gujarat, has an explosive situation on its hands as the National Human Rights Commission informed it that 191 fake encounter killings took place in the country in the last five years.
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In response to Manipur`s alleged unaddressed extra-judicial killings, the NHRC in an affidavit said in the last five years, from 2007 to 2012, it had received 1,671 complaints/information regarding fake encounters.

“The commission in the last five years has awarded monetary compensation to the tune of Rs 10.51 crore in 191 cases,” it said in an affidavit. The commission awards compensation in the range of Rs 5-10 lakh to the kin of victims if it comes to the conclusion after inquiry that it was a fake encounter.
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NGOs `Extra-Judicial Execution Victims Families Association of Manipur` through Neena N and `Human Rights Alert` through Babloo Loitongbam had requested the court to set up a Special Investigation Team to inquire into the extra-judicial killings in the state. Another petition by Suresh Singh through advocate S Biswajeet Meitei alleged that continuance of AFSPA had led to a spurt in extra-judicial killings and sought its withdrawal from Manipur.

The NHRC gave its response to the 71 cases of alleged fake encounter complaints it had dealt with relating to Manipur of which only three have been closed. In one case – killing of Thanjam Manorama Chanu on July 12, 2004 – the commission had recently recommended payment of Rs 10 lakh to the kin of the victim but the defence ministry is yet to comply with it.

Though the commission`s guidelines require states to complete mandatory inquiry reports within three months, many cases of alleged extra-judicial killings reported from Manipur have been pending with the NHRC since 2007 as the state has not provided the key investigation reports. Of the 68 pending cases, five incidents dated back to 2007, 17 to 2008 and 19 to 2009, the NHRC said.

To enable it to deal with such cases expeditiously, NHRC said, “It would be appropriate if the Supreme Court directs all the states to strictly comply with the guidelines/recommendation issued by the commission without fail, both in letter and spirit.”

DNA quoted a PTI report:

The Supreme Court on Thursday said a proper probe is needed into various encounter killings in Manipur and suggested formation of a Special Investigating Team to probe into some of those cases, a proposition opposed by the NHRC and Centre.

Observing that situation in the state is not normal, a bench of justices Aftab Alam and Ranjana Prakash Desai said further investigation needs to done as in some cases judicial enquiry came to conclusion that people were killed in fake encounters.

“Why there should not be a proper investigation? There is more than meets the eye. So many encounters took place. Situation is not normal. We are concerned about the failure of constitutional scheme,” the bench said.

One of the petitioners contended that CBI can be directed to inquire into those cases but the bench said it might not be practical solution as agency would take years to complete the probe. “What would CBI do? It would take years and years to complete the probe,” the bench observed.

The proposition of setting up SIT was opposed by the Centre and the NHRC (National Human Rights Commissions). The Commission said it would not be possible for SIT to probe such a large number of cases.
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The apex court expressed surprise on how a 12-year old boy, said to be a militant, was killed in the state. “How can a 12-year old boy be a terrorist?,” the bench said adding “We expect NHRC to be more effective in dealing with such cases.”

The counsel appearing for NHRC, however, submitted that the commission can not enforce its guidelines as it lacks penal powers. “SIT may not be a proper solution as the number of incidents are so high. What requires is a proper guidelines and its effective implementation,” the commission said.

The Centre, meanwhile, contended that a one-sided picture has been portrayed by the petitioner before the apex court and the situation is not so grim in the state. “The petitioner has tried to present a very gloomy picture of Manipur, as if people of the state are completely alienated. It is submitted that this is not the correct position. While the state of Manipur is facing the insurgency problem and the police and armed forces are dealing with that problem to the best of their capabilities, the common man is not generally affected by such counter-insurgency operations,” it said.
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The association said in all, over 2000 odd extra-judicial killings have taken place in the state, but no one has been held guilty till date. It alleged innocent people with no criminal records have been killed by security forces and no proper investigation has been done in such cases. “Not only were there no criminal investigations and prosecutions of the guilty, even departmental enquiries were not conducted and no policemen or personnel of the security forces were punished departmentally for their actions.

“The magisterial enquiries that took place sometimes were conducted by the executive magistrates under the cover of secrecy and most often without intimation to the eyewitnesses and the members of the families. They were conducted as an eyewash,” the petition said.

Cheering news

Amidst all the angst about Gadkari, Naipaul and Irom Sharmila, some indication that India has not changed comes from Z News:

The Army troops deployed along the China border from Ladakh in Jammu and Kashmir and Arunachal Pradesh in northeast have reported more than 100 sightings of “Unidentified Flying Objects” (UFOs) in the last three months.

Agencies including the Army, DRDO, NTRO and the ITBP have not yet been able to identify these luminous flying objects.
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Reports suggested that these yellowish spheres appear to lift off from the horizon on the Chinese side and slowly traverse the sky for three to five hours before disappearing.
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They said Army had also moved a mobile ground-based radar unit and a spectrum analyser to verify the identity of the object but could not detect the object that was being tracked visually, indicating it was non-metallic.

Army officials expressed concern over the inability of agencies to identify the object which some believed could be a Chinese surveillance equipment.
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Sources said similar reports had emerged about five-six years ago about sighting of such objects but the matter was not taken up at higher levels.

Reports suggested that a group of mountaineers had seen a UFO in 2004 in Lahaul and Spiti valley in Himachal Pradesh and investigations were launched into the incident by various agencies.

Duh

ET has a chilling report:

Despite a ban, use of pen drives has emerged as the main threat to cyber security in defence forces as it is responsible for over 70 per cent of such breaches in the three Services.

The use of pen drives as an easy-to-carry storage device has increased in the recent past and internal reports have confirmed that over 70 per cent cyber security breaches in the armed forces are due to their unauthorised use, Army officials said.

“These pen drives, which are mostly manufactured in China, have emerged as a big threat to our cyber security systems,” they said.

Defence Intelligence should not be an oxymoron. Someone out there should know about isolating sensitive networks, using monitoring software, controlling access, personalizing document views and decrypting on the fly. Would they want us to import pen drives from friendly countries only?

Cries and whispers

The Deccan Chronicle points out a problem which is not discussed enough:

The state of morale in the armed forces in general, and the Army in particular, should be a cause for worry because of the latter’s rapidly declining combat capability. Moreover, an Army with low morale, insufficient manpower and lacking in the required combat equipment is a recipe for national disaster at the hands of foreign invaders.

The recent Supreme Court ruling giving “rank pay” to those officers who were in military service between 1986 to 1996 following a 25-year-long court battle by a few retired officers shows how this rank pay, given by the fourth Central Pay Commission (4th CPC), had been withheld by unaccountable bureaucrats, who had issued the final implementation orders. Even if the rank pay is finally given in the coming months, many of those eligible have passed away or are bed-ridden, and, many had received lower pension also. Today, there are 39 unresolved anomalies from the 6th CPC, which gave its award in 2008.

As India marks the 50th anniversary of the disastrous war with China in 1962, the signs are ominous. India is faced with threats from within and outside. Apart from the economic slowdown, scams and ongoing Naxal insurgency, recent media reports have indicated a couple of mutinies in Army units, where soldiers have risen against their officers. More worrying is the news that from 2003 till now 1,018 soldiers have committed suicide. Last month, defence minister informed Parliament that the “causes for these suicides were domestic problems, mental discord, stress and financial problems”. The enormity of this “suicide tragedy” can be fully understood if we see that between 1984 and 2012, a total of 846 officers and soldiers have died in Siachen.

Part of the reason why the defence forces are not discussed in the press has to do with the general goodwill that the armed forces enjoy in non-border regions of India. Most articles and documentaries about the armed forces are positive, in a media which has little space for continuous positive coverage. The downside of this lack of media attention is that systemic problems have been neglected. The article is worth reading in full precisely because of this.

South China Sea

In their quest for oil in East Asia, China and India had reportedly almost come to a military engagement in South China Sea. Both sides backed down, but did not give up their claims. China and Vietnam have also faced off in the region that the English-speaking world calls the South China Sea and Vietnam calls the Eastern Sea. After the US entered the game, India has backed off a little, but the situation has warmed up a notch.

Eurasia Review has a long and well-argued comment on the goings on in the South China Sea:

For reasons that are conceptually weak and militarily untenable, the top Chinese military decision making body—the Central Military Commission—took a surprising decision last Sunday to post about 1,200 PLA soldiers in the so-called Sansha City; a collection of a few huts on an island with an area of about 2.13 square kilometres in the Paracel group of islands located in the South China Sea. The nearest Chinese territory is Hainan Island, but that is about 350 kilometres away. The communication links are tenuous with a ship making a journey twice a month from the Chinese mainland to supply the residents with needed supplies in order to enable them to survive. … Not unsurprisingly a small Chinese Communist Party unit was also established within the Municipal Office and this was telecast live by CCTV. As Xinhua reported, the attempt is to ‘safeguard China’s sovereignty.’

What has propelled the Chinese to undertake such a step? The reasons are not far to fathom. Having just got over the internal convulsions caused by the sacking of the Chinese Politbureau member Bo Xilai, the present Chinese leadership did not want to give the impression that it was ‘weak-kneed.’ It wanted to refurbish its nationalist credentials.
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China also wished to send a message to all other contenders in the South China Sea dispute that while it would wish for a diplomatic solution, it would react militarily to defend its position in the South China Sea. It also wanted to demonstrate that the United States would not necessarily militarily intervene in each and every occasion and that the countries of South East Asia might like to reconsider and keep this fact in mind. China has had some diplomatic success in this regard when at a recent meeting ASEAN members could not agree on a joint communiqué on this issue for the first time ever; thanks to Chinese obduracy.

The South China Sea is a huge area covering nearly 3.5 million square kilometres, where countries such as China, Vietnam, Philippines, Malaysia and Brunei are in serious contention. At stake are huge under water oil reserves estimated at 28 billion barrels and nearly 20 t/cm of natural gas reserves, with the latter reportedly having the potential to rival the gas reserves of Qatar. In addition, the South China Sea is the main artery for significant maritime shipping. The main East Asian economic power houses—China, Japan and South Korea—are heavily dependent on the safety and security of the South China Sea- lanes. By establishing its static military presence on the Paracel group of islands, China wishes to reinforce its claims and ensure that the others are ousted from the region.
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Nevertheless, this ‘forward’ policy has pitfalls all on its own as India discovered to its cost when it tried to do the same many decades ago in Ladakh. Firstly, China will find it extremely difficult to maintain the security of its garrison. It will have to deploy considerable elements of both naval and air power to ensure security, apart from the logistical nightmare. To satisfy nationalist sentiment at home based on tenuous military strategy is asking for trouble. Secondly, the other contenders will probably come even closer together and unite to oppose Chinese claims in the area and to that extent would welcome US presence and military help. Thirdly, such garrisons are totally exposed, militarily untenable and can be eliminated at one stroke. All that is needed is one laser guided missile fired from below the sea for the Chinese garrison to go up in smoke. They would never know which belligerent fired it. So against whom will the Chinese then retaliate?
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For India, this is a splendid opportunity to wait and watch and not get embroiled in these quarrels. The more the Chinese ensnare themselves in the South China Sea disputes with other countries, the lesser will be their pressure on India along the Sino-Indian border. As the Chinese told India on 16 May 1959 in a Note Verbale, which had all the imprints of Mao’s thinking, ‘the enemy of the Chinese people lies in the east…China’s main attention and policy of struggle are directed to the east, to the Pacific region.’ And in a profound statement emphasized that ‘China will not be so foolish to antagonize [at the same time] the US in the east and India in the south-west.’

One tends to forget that Mao De Zong was a general before he became a head of state. India seems to be using his strategic idea. China, on the other hand, has gone beyond that: its troops on our borders can checkmate any move we contemplate in South China Sea.

Kashmir killing

Kashmir valley is again in a turmoil over the killing of an youth by the army. Telegraph carries news of the defence ministry over-ruling the local command, perhaps for the first time:

Defence minister A.K. Antony today ordered a probe into the killing of a young Kashmiri, hours after the army’s Valley chief had ruled out an investigation.

The Omar Abdullah-led state government ordered a separate probe even as separatists planned a march towards the UN office in Srinagar tomorrow and called for a shutdown on Saturday.

Hilal Ahmad Dar was killed in Bandipora, north Kashmir, on Tuesday night during a search. Local people said the 25-year-old was innocent and was killed in custody, though army sources claimed the youth was a militant and a weapon had been found on him.

Not a moment too soon, because public order is already disrupted, as TOI reports:

Police said they had to fire teargas shells to quell the protesters, who were demanding action against Hilal Dar’s killers. Earlier, police lodged an FIR and started investigations into the killing.

The Army maintained that the slain was a militant while the Jammu & Kashmir government on Wednesday ordered a probe into the killing.

But Dar’s family insisted that the slain was innocent and worked for a cement factory in Srinagar. His father, Ghulam Mohi-ud-din Dar, said some unknown caller had asked his son to meet him before he was shot dead.

Rivals, not enemies?

Rivalry between India and China is inevitable, given that they carry the majority of the world’s population, and are growing at the same time. Since the world’s resources are already divided badly in an order stacked against Asia, both countries have to try to buy their share out of the remaining resources, while also trying to encourage a more equitable global sharing. If this natural rivalry escalates into active enmity, then our countries’ growths can be affected very negatively. Signs that both governments realize this danger come from two recent news items.

IBN Live reported:

After a gap of six years, four Indian warships are on a visit to China, docking at Shanghai on a four-day port call, even as another set of warships are preparing to leave on a long deployment to cover the entire Indian Ocean region.

The four warships in Shanghai are guided missile destroyer INS Rana, stealth frigate INS Shivalik, missile corvette INS Karmukh and fleet tanker INS Shakti. They are under the command of the Visakhapatnam-based Eastern Fleet Flag Officer Commanding Rear Admiral P Ajit Kumar, according to navy officers here.

The ships are on overseas operational deployment on the eastern seaboard of India, covering Indian Ocean and northwest Pacific Ocean, visiting nations along the way, including Vietnam and Japan.

The warships covered South China Sea too that has witnessed naval flare-ups in the recent months over conflicting territorial claims of nations in the region.

Prior to reaching Shanghai, the four warships participated in the first ever bilateral maritime exercise between India and Japan. Jimex-12, as the Japan-India Maritime Exercise was called, coincided with the commemoration of 60 years of diplomatic relations between India and Japan.

China.org reported:

Four Indian navy ships dropped anchor at port along the Huangpu River in Shanghai on Wednesday to begin a five-day visit described by one of the Indian commanders as an effort to strengthen ties between India and China.

The four ships, the Guided Missile Stealth Frigate Shivalik, the Guided Missile Destroyer Rana, the Guided Missile Corvette Karmuk and the versatile Fleet Tanker Shakti are currently on deployment in South and East China Seas under the command of Rear Admiral P. Ajit Kumar who was warmly welcomed by Chinese officials at a welcoming ceremony Wednesday morning.

Vice Admiral Anil Chopra, Flag Officer Commanding-in-Chief of Eastern Naval Command told a press conference Wednesday that during the visit, the ships will be open to visitors and Chinese and Indian crews will visit each other’s ships. A number of meetings will also be held between the two sides.

The visit coincides with the “Year of India China Friendship and Cooperation,” which was announced by both Chinese President Hu Jintao and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in March. Vice Admiral Chopra commented that the timing of the visit added to its importance with regard to bilateral relations between the two countries.
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After the visit, the Chinese and Indian navies will conduct joint exercises in communication verification and ship formation movement.

Neither side is saying too much, but it is a clear attempt to play down the confrontation in the South China Sea. On India’s part, perhaps it is also an attempt to demonstrate a cautious approach to the suggestions from the US of an Indo-US military axis.

The other report is from BS:

Armies of India and China today held a flag meeting in eastern Ladakh to discuss the situation along their boundary and agreed to maintain peace and tranquility there.

The meeting was held at the level of Brigadiers at Spanggur Gap in eastern Ladakh where the two sides discussed the situation along the boundary and agreed to maintain peace and tranquility, army officials said here.

They said the meeting between the delegations of the two armies was part of Confidence Building Measures (CBM) between the two sides. Such meetings between the two sides are held at regular intervals, they said.

Defence ties between the two countries have shown progress with New Delhi mulling joint exercises with Beijing next year after the just-concluded naval drills in Shanghai held after a gap of six years. India is planning military exercises with China which will also include army-to-army exercises.

The armies of the two countries last held counter- insurgency and counter-terrorism wargames called ‘Hand-in-Hand’ in 2009 in Belgaum in India and prior to that in China in 2007.

India and China had agreed to enhance defence exchanges and communication for better understanding and mutual trust during the fourth round of Annual Defence Dialogue (ADD) held here in December last year after choppy military ties for two years.

New Delhi had suspended military exchanges with China in August 2010 after it had refused to grant permission to a senior Indian Army Commander to proceed on an official trip to Beijing.