Rajnath Singh heads to Ladakh post crucial corp commanders meeting over disengagement

NEW DELHI: Defence minister Rajnath Singh is heading to Ladakh on Friday and is expected to visit forward areas in Kashmir as well, days after progress on further disengagement was made at a crucial corps commander meeting at Chushul.

The minister will meet soldiers deployed in Ladakh and is expected to be given an operational demonstration, including para dropping of troops, and will be review the security situation on the ground. Sources say that the minister will spend half a day at Ladakh and could visit the Pangong Tso lake as well.

It is learnt that the corps commander-level meeting on Tuesday, which lasted over 15 hours, discussed the way forward to more disengagement in Eastern Ladakh, particularly at the Finger area along the Pangong Tso lake, with clear timelines being discussed.


A series of senior-level meetings were undertaken in the national capital on Wednesday to discuss the terms of disengagement, with the high powered China Study Group also reviewing the situation in the evening.

“Consensus has been built on the previous three rounds. Draft notes on the sector wise thinning of troops have been exchanged between two sides. Both sides have agreed on the next rounds of talks based on progress and implementation of relevant work in promoting further disengagement and de-escalating tensions,” sources said.

An official statement on the talks has not yet been released but sources said that ‘significant progress’ has been made and the two sides decided to revert to the political leadership with a set of proposals to defuse the situation.

The Chinese foreign ministry also said that the talks were positive and there has been progress on “further disengagement between troops and de-escalation of tensions”, without going into any details of the plans.

Financial Powers increased A special meeting of the Defence Acquisition Council convened by defence minister Rajnath Singh has delegated financial powers for urgent capital acquisition cases to the armed forces, in view of the tensions along the China border.

The ministry has delegated powers to procure equipment up to Rs. 300 crore directly to the armed forces to meet “emergent operational requirements”.

Officials said that this will “shrink the procurement timelines and ensure placement of orders within six months and commencement of deliveries within one year”.