China-India border dispute: India moves to build military road along border

Indian army vehicles move in a convoy in the cold desert region of Ladakh. Nestled between India, Pakistan and China, Ladakh has faced territorial disputes. Photo / AP

India will build a road along more than 1600km of its border with China to strengthen military resupply routes, after renewed hand-to-hand clashes with Beijing’s soldiers.

The new two-lane “frontier highway”, which will stretch along the India-China border throughout the northeastern Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh, will be completed in five years, the Times of India reported.

The proposed road will run as close as 19km from the Chinese-Indian border, known as the Line of Actual Control (LAC), allowing Delhi to rapidly deploy troops and equipment to combat potential Chinese aggression.

Senior Indian Army figures told The Telegraph that People’s Liberation Army (PLA) soldiers have regularly entered Indian territory in Arunachal Pradesh over the last few months and Delhi is coming under increasing pressure from the Indian public to react.

Earlier this month, PLA troops, allegedly armed with clubs and stones, crossed the border into the Tawang district of Arunachal Pradesh and injured at least 20 Indian soldiers in hand-to-hand fighting before they withdrew.

The proposed road will also help prevent nomadic Chinese herdsmen from crossing into Indian territory and building settlements there. PLA troops are allegedly using the herdsmen as cover to cross the border and seize strategically important land.

Beijing has been rapidly scaling up infrastructure on its side of the LAC, building major roads, airstrips and heliports.

Last week, Delhi also successfully tested its Agni-V nuclear-capable strategic missile off the eastern coast of India, in what was seen as a message to Beijing. The weapon has a range of over 6400km.

Beijing and Delhi agreed to an uneasy ceasefire in 1962 after fighting a short war which ended in a humiliating defeat for India.

But Beijing still claims the region of Arunachal Pradesh in its entirety, arguing the Indian state had historically been part of South Tibet in China.

China has stepped up its aggression along the LAC in recent years. In June 2020, PLA troops killed at least 20 Indian soldiers during brutal hand-to-hand combat in the western Indian union territory of Ladakh, seizing over 50sq km of Indian land in the process.

Last week, one of India’s leading opposition politicians, Rahul Gandhi, warned that China was not just preparing for further incursions into Indian territory but for a full-out war. India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) dismissed his claims.