Ladakh stalemate: BRO expedites work near India-China border

Helicopters have landed heavy road-building machinery in the tough Himalayan terrain of Uttarakhand's Johar Valley to help speed up construction of the strategic Munsiyari-Bugdiyar-Milam road near the India-China border. The project gains speed amid standoff with China in eastern Ladakh.

Pithoragarh:Following the unprecedented violent clash between Indian and Chinese troops at the steep rocky heights of the Galwan river gorge, the Border Roads Organisation (BRO) have landed heavy equipment to expedite work of strategic Munsiyari-Bugdiyar-Milam road in Uttarakhand.

According to reports, the move is aimed at expedieting road building projects near the Indo-China border.

Once completed, the Munsiyari-Bogdiyar- Milam road, which is being constructed in the high Himalayan region of Johar Valley in the state's Pithoragarh district, will be a link to the last posts on the Indo-China border.

After connecting Lipulekh to the road, the BRO has now accelerated the road cutting from Milam to China border.

For this, heavy road-building machinery is being delivered to Laspa with the help of helicopter from Munsiyari. The absence of heavy stone cutting equipment at Laspa near the alignment site of the 65-km road had delayed its construction.

Read:Major General-level talks end in Galwan, military negotiations may be over for now

At present, the work of cutting of hard rocks along the 22 km road from Milam to Laspa is going on.

Meanwhile, Major-General ranked officers of the Indian Army and the Chinese PLA at the divisional commander level met for three consecutive days in “emergency mode” in eastern Ladakh but this process of talks may have ended on Thursday after "certain immediate issues" had been addressed, multiple sources told ETV Bharat.

The military talks were part of a de-escalatory process of negotiations to ease off ongoing standoffs between the two armies in several points near the LAC.

The standoffs have been marked by physical brawls from Ladakh’s Pangong lake on May 4-5 to north Sikkim on May 10 although the most violent one has been the Monday night fight at Galwan Valley.