India operationalised its strategic ITBP command in Jammu and Kashmir’s Leh-Ladakh district on Monday after moving it from Chandigarh as part of a plan to counter the ever-increasing Chinese military build up in the region.
The North West (NW) frontier of the Indo-Tibetan BorderPolice (ITBP), tasked to guard the 3,488-km long Sino-India border in peacetimes, is headed by an Inspector General (IG) of Police-rank officer, which isequivalent to a Major General in the Army.
“We are operational from the Ladakh region beginningApril 1 and the force headquarters in Delhi has been informed,” ITBP IGArvind Kumar told PTI from Leh.
The Indian tricolour and the force flag were unfurled toherald the new move and the frontier will be operating from the existingpremises of the ITBP sector headquarter, another official said.
Sanctions have been received to create more buildings andlogistics for the new command and Director General (DG) S S Deswal, the forcechief, is expected to visit the formation soon.
PTI had first reported in January that the frontier has beenordered to move from its base in Chandigarh ‘lock, stock, and barrel’ to beoperationalised at the new location from April 1. The distance betweenChandigarh and Leh is 960 km.
Leh district in the mountains of Jammu and Kashmir is thebase for the 14 Corps of the Army headed by a Lt General-rank officer and thenew shift will allow a better interaction between the two forces “forstrategic and defence planning”, the official operations blueprint hadsaid.
“We have to be on the border and that is why thefrontier is being sent to the forward area,” DG Deswal had earlier said.
As per the blueprint of deployment approved by thegovernment for the ITBP, the Leh frontier of the border guarding force willhave three sectors that will be based in Leh, Srinagar and Chandigarh and eachof these will be headed by a Deputy IG-rank officer.
The new ITBP frontier will have command of about a dozenbattalions deployed along the Chinese border that runs along Jammu and Kashmir,official sources said, adding more battalions would be inducted in order toenhance the presence of the mountain-trained force on this icy, blizzard-pronemountainous border.
The ITBP has recently inducted a mechanised column of vehiclesand communication equipment and all the weapons, artillery and combatparaphernalia that are being moved to Leh, that has both road and airconnectivity.
The force also has sanctions to create and refurbish 40Border Out Posts (BoPs) in these icy heights of Ladakh, where personnel have toface hostile weather as the mercury slips to as low as minus 40 degrees Celsiusand the altitude ranges from 8,000-14,000 feet.