Beyond the Horizon
By Pradeep Kumar
With tensions persisting on the Sino-Indian border, Delhi’s efforts to bolster its infrastructure in critical areas continues as Prime Minister Narendra Modi on March 9 had inaugurated the Sela Tunnel in Arunachal Pradesh in India’s northeast, close to the Sino-Indian border.
The tunnel, constructed by the Border Roads Organization under the Ministry of Defence at an altitude of 13,000 feet with an estimated cost of almost $100 million, is one of the critical projects.
The tunnel would facilitate all-weather connectivity to Tawang, across Sela Pass on Balipara-Chariduar-Tawang (BCT) Road,” linking Tezpur in Assam to Tawang in Arunachal Pradesh. The tunnel was built with an Austrian tunneling method and brings to bear the highest standards in terms of safety features. The tunnel will significantly enhance Indian troop and equipment mobility, thus augmenting overall defense preparedness vis-a-vis China, in addition to providing for more efficient and faster connectivity in the region.
The Sela tunnel project, including the tunnels – a main tunnel and an escape tunnel for emergency services – the approach and link roads is around 12-km. The tunnel brings many benefits. For one, it will reduce the distance between the strategically critical monastery town of Tawang and Dirang by 12-km and save around 90 minutes for travelers in each direction.
More importantly, the tunnel provides a huge relief from weather-related issues. For instance, the BCT road encountered blockages at Sela Pass during the winter months because of heavy snowfall. Such blockages disrupt the lives of locals, besides creating major logistical disruptions for the armed forces. Thirdly, without the tunnel, China could see all Indian troop movements aboveground, which was militarily a disadvantage for India. With the tunnel in place now, this tactical exposure to China has been removed.
China was not pleased with the tunnel project or India’s broader infrastructure push. For China, the existing infrastructure imbalance puts India at a disadvantage and is therefore preferred so that Beijing can continue to have an upper hand on the Sino-Indian border. China disapproved the Indian development of the Sela Tunnel, with Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) spokesperson Wang Wenbin saying that “India’s relevant moves only complicate the boundary question and disrupt the situation in the border areas between the two countries.”
Modi’s visit to Arunachal Pradesh to open the tunnel was also criticized by China, saying that it “strongly deplores and firmly opposes the Indian leader’s visit to the East Section of the China-India boundary.”
China claims the entire Arunachal Pradesh Territory as its own territory and calls it southern Tibet or Zangnan. In reaction to Beijing’s stance, the U.S. has expressed support to India and recognizes the state of Arunachal Pradesh as Indian Territory. That also did not please China.
Chinese MFA spokesperson Lin Jian said that “China strongly deplores and firmly opposes this. The China-India boundary has never been delimited. Zangnan has always been China’s territory, a basic fact that is undeniable. The China-India boundary question is a matter between the two countries and has nothing to do with the U.S. side. It is known to all that the U.S. has consistently spared no efforts to provoke and take advantage of other countries’ conflicts to serve its selfish geopolitical interests.”
The Sela Tunnel is part of India’s broader connectivity and infrastructure development effort to correct the infrastructure imbalance with China. The Ministry of Defence (MoD) in a press release said that the BRO has completed 330 infrastructure projects at a total cost of about $1 billion, although it was not clear if all the projects were in Sino-Indian border areas.
China has developed state-of-the-art infrastructure across the Sino-Indian border as well in the Tibetan Autonomous Region (TAR), which has had an important bearing in terms of troop deployment at the border. China has put in place an extensive road network in Tibet, which has been enormously beneficial in the strategic context, but it has established rail connectivity as well, which together will assist China’s troop mobilization by road and rail in a short time span once an order is given. China has developed a series of logistics and oil depots across the border areas and TAR that demonstrate systematic planning for a longer-term deployment of its military in the border areas against which India has fared rather poorly so far.
Given the adversarial nature of relations between India and China, which shows no signs of serious improvement in immediate future, New Delhi has doubled its efforts to build strategic infrastructure along the Sino-Indian border. The strategic requirements have pushed India to build a series of tunnels, bridges and roads in the NE region that will facilitate quicker troop movements.
The MoD in its 2023 Year End Review provided details of the various strategic projects the Govt has undertaken across the country, including those pertinent to Sino-Indian border.
The accelerated push has come along with better financial allocation and a sharper focus from the government. One of the other important projects from a strategic perspective is the construction of a 4.1-km tunnel under the Shinkun La pass in border area between Ladakh and Himachal Pradesh. When completed, this tunnel will provide an all-weather connectivity between Himachal Pradesh’s Lahaul Valley and Ladakh’s Zanskar Valley in Ladakh. That project is scheduled to be completed in a couple of years.
India’s border connectivity push is likely to stay strong given that both India and China have an ongoing confrontation at the border and there have been no signs of easing of tensions. The 21st round of corps commander-level talks took place at the Chushul-Moldo border in February this year. According to a statement of Ministry of External Affairs, the meeting took place on February 19 last and “built on the previous rounds, seeking complete disengagement in the remaining areas along the LAC in Eastern Ladakh as an essential basis for restoration of peace and tranquility in the India-China border areas.” Beyond the usual language of agreeing to maintain communication, the meeting produced nothing substantial. (Agency)
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