PTI

Bijapur, May 22

Two commandos of the Central Reserve Police Force’s jungle warfare unit CoBRA were injured in an encounter between security forces and Naxalites in Chhattisgarh’s Bijapur district, police said on Monday.

Two to three Naxalites also received bullet injuries in the gun fight which took place at around 8 pm on Sunday in Bijapur, located around 400 km from the state capital Raipur, they said.

A joint team of the District Reserve Guard and the CRPF’s Commando Battalion for Resolute Action (CoBRA) launched a search operation from Pusnar camp on Sunday evening after getting information about an improvised explosive device (IED) planted between Pusnar and Hiroli villages under Gangaloor police station limits, an official said.

At around 8 pm, the gun battle broke out between the security personnel and Naxalites in the area.https://461e04da7390369e2ec343d80b6850b0.safeframe.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-40/html/container.html

After a brief exchange of fire, Naxalites escaped into the dense forest, he said.

Constables Nakul and Mohammad Shahid, belonging to CoBRA’s 202nd battalion, suffered injuries on their hands and legs in the face-off, the official said.

They were were shifted to the Bijapur district hospital and their condition was stated to be out of danger, he said. 

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Take a look India’s first AIR FORCE HERITAGE CENTRE is set for inauguration in Chandigarh An Indian Air Force heritage centre, the first of its kind in the country, has come up in Chandigarh’s sector 18 & its inauguration on 8th May 2023(monday). The centre demonstrates five vintage aircraft and provides visitors with cockpit exposure and an experience on flight simulators. “It is the first heritage centre of the IAF and reflects the role of IAF in all the wars as well as equipping itself with modern paraphernalia like augmented reality, virtual reality, hologram, simulators & electro mechanical enclosures. The most interesting part is that it’s the only heritage centre where the first IAF-made patent aircraft, Air Force Kanpur 1, (made by Air Vice Marshal Harjinder Singh in 1958) is positioned,” a senior officer said.

Tribune News Service

Ajay Banerjee

New Delhi, May 9

In an important decision, the Army officers in the rank of brigadier and above will now have a common uniform irrespective of the regiment or corps they were inducted into.

The decision was taken after detailed deliberations during the recently concluded Army Commanders’ Conference and extensive consultations at all levels, sources said.

The headgear, shoulder rank badges, gorget patches, belt and shoes of senior officers of flag rank — brigadier and above — will now be standardised and common. The flag-rank officers will now not wear any lanyard.

The changes will be implemented from August 1, sources said.

In the Indian Army, brigadier and above officers are those who have already commanded units or battalions and are mostly posted at headquarters establishments where officers from all arms and services work and function together. A standard uniform will ensure a common identity for all senior-rank officers, sources added.

There is no change in the uniform worn by colonels and below-rank officers, sources added.

Different types of uniform and accoutrements have specific association to respective arms, regiments and services in the Indian Army. This recognition with distinct identity within the arms or regiment or services is essential for junior leadership and the rank and file to

further strengthen regimental ethos which is the bedrock of soldiering.

The move to have a common uniform for brigadiers and above is aimed at having a common identity and approach in service matters amongst senior leadership, which goes beyond the boundaries of regimentation.

Tribune News Service

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, May 8

Minister of Defence Rajnath Singh today stressed the need for ensuring a secure environment and providing quality education to citizens to enable holistic development and progress of the country.

“The development of any nation and society depends to a great extent on the security system there. Rather, I would say security is the first requirement for the development of human life,” he said, while speaking at the inauguration of the Indian Air Force Heritage Centre, Sector 18, here.

“If a man does not have education, he can move towards education by making efforts. If someone does not have employment, he can gain employment by learning some skills. But if he does not have security, he is unable to do anything for society, even if he is endowed with education and employment, or money and wealth. Therefore, security is one of the first needs of human life,” he said.

Experiencing the thrill

Besides regular ticket, visitors can purchase an immersive experience ticket, giving them a chance to experience an aircraft simulator, AR/VR interaction, motivational theatre and holographic display. A maximum of 75 persons are allowed per day in three time slots (25 persons each) of 10 am, 12 noon & 3 pm.

Asserting there were no fixed dimensions of security, the Defence Minister said: “As time is changing, civilisation is moving forward, and science and technology are developing. The scope of security threats is also increasing in the same proportion. New weapons have come in the hands of anti-social elements, which may not be even visible to public but are capable of causing great harm.”

Rajnath said if Chandigarh was taking steps towards preserving the legacy of the past, it was also keeping an eye on future goals i.e. betterment of citizens and upgrading their quality of life. “It will happen by strengthening the health, education and security system in the city,” the minister said, adding Chandigarh was one of the top cities of the country that was making strong strides in all these areas and moving forward step by step in the direction of preparing healthy, educated and skilled human resource.

Guides, café & more

• Tourist guides are available at the heritage centre for assistance
• A café is open to visitors as well as general public at centre
• Visitors can get memorabilia from souvenir shop managed by Chandigarh Tourism

The heritage centre was a testament to the courage and dedication of all those who had served in the IAF, a tribute to their sacrifice and a reminder of their invaluable contribution in protecting the nation, said the Defence Minister while recalling the role of the IAF in the 1948 war, Goa Liberation War in 1961 as well as the 1962, 1965, 1971 and Kargil wars that showcased the force’s strength, commitment and professionalism.

IAF Heritage Centre Sector 18

Timings: 10 am to 6 pm

Closed on Mondays/gazetted holidays

Entry ticket costs: Rs 50

& Immersive experience ticket Rs 295

Children below 18 years are exempt from entry ticket

Get it via ‘Chandigarh Tourism’ app or at IAF Heritage Centre, Sec 18

14,000 tickets sold on Day 1

On Day 1, 14K tickets sold till evening; sale started at 12 noon

On the 1971 War, Rajnath stated the jointmanship, integration and commitment showcased by the three services was unprecedented and extraordinary.

He said the war was not fought for any land or power, but for humanity and democracy. “It was proof India believes in ‘Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere’ and it is our duty to stand against any kind of injustice. Winning the war on the strength of our strategies and not imposing any kind of political control there symbolised India’s strengths as well as its values and cultural generosity,” he said.

The minister said the centre would serve as a source of inspiration for the future generations. “The IAF has a rich heritage and it is our responsibility to preserve and showcase it.

This centre will become an important means of preserving the history of the IAF and motivating the youth to imbibe the values of the armed forces,” he said.

Governor of Punjab and UT Administrator Banwarilal Purohit, Chief of the Air Staff Air Chief Marshal VR Chaudhari, local Member of Parliament Kirron Kher and senior officers of the Air Force and UT Administration were also present.

The centre is an embodiment of IAF’s rich history and legacy, and houses a collection of artefacts, murals and 3D dioramas, showcasing the evolution of the force since its inception, various operations undertaken through the years and achievements of its personnel.

Among key attractions are flight simulators, MiG-21, MiG-23, Gnat and HPT-32 aircraft and Pechora surface-to-air missiles. Scale models of aircraft, missiles and bombs, IAF accoutrements and murals are other highlights of the centre.

Centre testament to airmen’s courage

Heritage centre is a testament to courage of all those who served in the IAF, a tribute to their sacrifice and a reminder of their invaluable contribution in protecting the nation. — Rajnath Singh, Minister of Defence

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and Punjab Governor Banwarilal Purohit at the function. Tribune photo: Pradeep Tewari
PTI

Chandigarh, May 8

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh inaugurated the first-of-its-kind Indian Air Force (IAF) Heritage Centre here on Monday, officials said.

The Centre has been set up under a memorandum of understanding between the Union Territory of Chandigarh and the IAF which was signed last year.

Punjab Governor and Chandigarh Administrator Banwarilal Purohit, Air Chief Marshal VR Chaudhari and Chandigarh MP Kirron Kher were also present on the occasion.

The IAF chief had visited the Indian Air Force Heritage Centre last month to review its progress.

Spread over 17,000 square feet, this is the first heritage centre of the IAF and depicts its role in various wars, including in 1965, 1971 and the Kargil war, and the Balakot air strike through murals and memorabilia.

Its exhibits will be a source of inspiration for future generations and will showcase the indomitable spirit of the Indian Air Force, officials said. 

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, May 8

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh laid the foundation stone for the Centre for Cyber Operations and Security (CenCOPS) here today.

The centre will be a state-of-the-art facility, first of its kind in India, which will enable police forces of the UT and the neighbouring states to solving complex cases of cybercrime and strengthening the cyber security.

It will have facilities for data analytics and predictive policing, evidence collection and advanced forensics, cyber security and cybercrime investigation, social media analytics and citizen outreach.

The project has been awarded to the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) on a nomination basis at an estimated cost of Rs 88 crore under the Cybercrime Prevention against Women and Children (CCPWC) scheme. It will be completed within six months.

If the goal of the Indian Army is to deter Pakistan from attacking our forces in J&K, surely it would warrant retaliation every time a major attack takes place. If Pakistan gets the impression that retaliation is not automatic, its calculation will be simple — go ahead and take a chance. Unfortunately, the pattern in the past decade reveals India’s confused signalling on the subject.

Manoj Joshi

Distinguished Fellow, Observer Research Foundation, New Delhi

On May 5, five soldiers were killed and an officer injured in Rajouri’s Kandi forest region while conducting a search operation. Almost certainly, the attacks were executed by jihadis who have come across the nearby Line of Control (LoC) from Pakistan.

Two weeks earlier, on April 20, five Indian soldiers belonging to the Rashtriya Rifles had been killed in an ambush on a road from Bhimber Gali to Surankote in a nearby area.

The only official reaction we have had so far are the External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar’s fulminations at the SCO summit in Goa and a visit by Defence Minister Rajnath Singh to condole with the forces who suffered the casualties. Even though it is election season, there has largely been silence from the Prime Minister and the Union Home Minister.

Recall that four years earlier, on February 2019, in retaliation for a bomb blast that killed 40 jawans in Pulwama, India had launched a retaliatory air attack on Balakot in Pakistan. An event that triggered a sharp India-Pakistan aerial battle that led to the shooting down of a Pakistani F-16 and an Indian MiG-21.

Likewise, in 2016, a Pakistani attack on an Indian brigade headquarters near the LoC in Uri that killed 19 Indian soldiers led to simultaneous cross-border raids 11 days later. But these were passed off as pre-emptive ‘surgical’ strikes, rather than retaliatory action by the Indian Army.

So, can we expect an Indian retaliatory strike in the coming days? Despite the fact that this is election time, the incidents don’t seem to figure in the Karnataka campaign rhetoric, unlike the Uri and Pulwama terror attacks that played a significant role in campaigning for the 2017 UP Assembly and then the 2019 General Election.

What is the government’s calculation in choosing to retaliate or not to do so? Is there a threshold? As for the numbers, the death toll of 10 in the past two weeks or so looks no less substantial than that of 19 in Uri and 40 in Pulwama, and all the attacks are attributed to Pakistani jihadis. Or, is the process entirely subjective, driven by political compulsions of the day?

If the goal of the Indian Army is to deter Pakistan from attacking our forces in J&K, surely it would warrant retaliation every time a major attack takes place. If Pakistan gets the impression that retaliation is not automatic, its calculation will be simple — go ahead and take a chance.

Unfortunately, the pattern in the past decade reveals India’s confused signalling on the subject. The Indian reaction to similar incidents has ranged from indifference and passivity to aggression, with no clear redlines visible.

Two months after the so-called surgical strikes, in November 2016, the Jaish-e-Mohammed launched a strike at Nagrota, the headquarters of the Indian Army’s 16 Corps, near Jammu, killing 10 soldiers. There was no reaction by India.

In 2017, there were several cross-LoC Border Action Team (BAT) attacks by Pakistan, resulting in the killings of Indian soldiers, but again there was little response. In early 2018, there was an attack on the Sunjuwan camp near Jammu, housing soldiers and their families. As many as 11 soldiers and a civilian were killed, but still there was no reaction.

Trying to connect this to the government’s Pakistan policy is a bit of a challenge. Let us begin with the Prime Minister’s outreach at the time of his installation in 2014, when he invited Nawaz Sharif to attend. This was followed the next year by his surprise visit to greet Sharif on his birthday on December 25. Then, following the January 2016 Pathankot attack, came the big shift.

In Kashmir, the Army initiated Operation All Out to crush the insurgency, and the 2003 ceasefire along the Line of Control began to break down with numerous instances of violations. In 2018, the ceasefire had broken down and had to be renewed by the Directors General of Military Operation of the two sides. In February 2021, this ceasefire was yet again renewed and has been largely holding since.

Relations have been in deep freeze. The heads of government have not met since 2015. No official-level talks have taken place for nearly a decade. Terrorism has become a major item of India’s global toolkit. It figures in almost every bilateral or multilateral summit, even though terrorism is no longer a significant threat in India, but cross-border attacks are.

There have been recent reports that speak of efforts made by Modi to develop a backchannel in 2017 which clearly didn’t work. Later, NSA Ajit Doval and former Pakistan Army chief General Qamar Bajwa went along a backchannel that led to the LoC ceasefire of 2021. But these efforts have foundered and their thrust seems to have been more at conflict management than conflict resolution.

True, the challenge of deterring Pakistan is a complex one. It ranges from dealing with nuclear weapons, large-scale conventional threat and groups of proxy warriors who carry out small-scale cross-border attacks. While on the nuclear and conventional front there is a measure of stability, we have not been able to devise a formula for getting Pakistan to cease and desist from conducting the last named type of attacks. The botched Balakot strike, where we lost a fighter jet and a helicopter to ‘friendly fire’, has not helped.

The options before us are two. First, to undertake a policy of relentless retaliation against cross-border attacks and be prepared for any escalation that could come with it. Or, second, to work through a mix of diplomatic and kinetic means to reduce violence on the borders and hope it can be completely eliminated over time. What we cannot afford to do is to muddle along and simply hope for the best. 

THE death of three civilians in a MiG-21 crash during a routine training sortie in Hanumangarh district of Rajasthan begs the question: how many more lives will be lost before this fighter aircraft of the Indian Air Force (IAF) is grounded for good? The pilot was lucky to escape with minor injuries, unlike the two pilots who were killed when a trainer version of a MiG-21 Bison had crashed in Rajasthan’s Barmer district in July last year. The ageing MiG-21 fleet is scheduled to be phased out by 2025, but it is too much to expect that the intervening period will be incident-free for pilots as well as civilians — unless accountability is fixed and exemplary action taken whenever such a crash happens.

The MiG-21, which India first procured from the Soviet Union a year after the 1962 China debacle, has seen several variants over the past six decades; these have been manufactured by Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL), India’s premier aerospace and defence company in the public sector. The sporadic crashes are mainly attributed to technical defects or in-flight human errors. For every technical fault that causes losses in both human and monetary terms, a thorough inquiry is a must to ascertain how and why HAL failed to ensure the MiG-21’s airworthiness.

A major reason why MiG-21 is being used way beyond its shelf life is the tardy progress of the Light Combat Aircraft (LCA) programme, which was launched back in 1983. Earlier this year, the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Defence, in its report tabled in the Lok Sabha, had red-flagged ‘considerable delay’ in the supply of 40 Tejas Light Combat Aircraft by HAL. Lack of adherence to the timelines has widened the demand-supply gap, leading to deficiencies in the IAF’s fighter aircraft inventory. HAL and other stakeholders owe an explanation for the laxity plaguing this high-stakes project. The excruciatingly slow pace at which MiG squadrons are being retired from service does not bode well for the combat readiness of the IAF, which is grappling with a shortage of fighter squadrons. It is vital to expedite the production of the Tejas aircraft so that the MiG phaseout happens sooner rather than later.

Kyiv, May 9

Russia unleashed a barrage of cruise missiles on Ukraine overnight into Tuesday, hours before the start of Moscow’s annual commemorations celebrating the defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II, which this year is taking place amid tight security measures.

The Kremlin’s forces launched 25 missiles overnight in a wave of attacks across Ukraine, the Ukrainian air force said, adding that air defence had successfully destroyed 23 of them.

In a Telegram post, the air force said eight Kalibr cruise missiles were launched from carriers in the Black Sea toward the east and 17 from strategic aircraft.

The barrage comes as Moscow and other Russian cities are preparing to host military parades and other festivities marking Victory Day, Russia’s biggest secular holiday that this year has been significantly overshadowed by the war in Ukraine.

At least 21 Russian cities cancelled May 9 military parades — the staple of celebrations across Russia — for the first time in years. The Immortal Regiment processions, in which crowds take to the streets holding portraits of relatives who died or served in World War II — another pillar of the holiday — have also been cancelled in multiple cities.

Regional officials blamed unspecified “security concerns.” Some speculated, however, that the reason behind cancelling Immortal Regiment marches was the fact that Russians might bring portraits of relatives who died in Ukraine to those processions, illustrating the scale of Russia’s losses in the drawn-out conflict.

Moscow is expected to project a show of force during its flagship parade on Red Square, with top-notch military equipment rumbling through it and leaders of ex-Soviet nations standing beside President Vladimir Putin.

Initially, only one of them — Kyrgyz President Sadyr Zhaparov — was expected to attend, but at the last minute on Monday officials confirmed that leaders of Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan were heading to Moscow as well.

The pared-down celebrations come after ambiguous official reports last week that two Ukrainian drones flew into the heart of Moscow under the cover of darkness and reached the Kremlin before being shot down. The Kremlin billed it as an attempt at Putin’s life; Ukraine denied involvement.