The officials said the weather was hot and humid when the training activity was taking place

Photo for representation only. Source: iStock.

New Delhi, August 21

One Army jawan died, and a few others were injured during a supervised training activity at Mamun military station near Pathankot in Punjab on Saturday as the weather conditions were “severe”, said senior officials.

The senior Army officials said that the affected jawans have been admitted at the military hospital in Pathankot and are being provided with required medical care.

The officials said the weather was hot and humid when the training activity was taking place.

The training activity was organised, supervised and monitored in the area under the 9 Corps of the Indian Army, they said.

They said due to “severe” weather conditions, there has been one fatal casualty and a few jawans have been admitted to the hospital. — PTI

The report says the Pakistani government is concerned that a civil war in Afghanistan would have destabilising effects on Pakistan, including an influx of refugees and providing a potential safe haven for anti-Pakistan militants

An Afghan woman clad in a burqa walks in the fence, as she along with others enter Pakistan via Friendship Gate crossing point at the Pakistan-Afghanistan border town of Chaman, Pakistan. Reuters

Washington, August 21

Pakistan’s strategic security objectives in Afghanistan almost certainly continue to be countering Indian influence and mitigating spillover of the Afghan civil war into Pakistani territory, a US government report has said, citing inputs from the Defence Intelligence Agency.

“Pakistan continues to support peace talks, while maintaining ties with the Afghan Taliban,” US Department of State Office of the Inspector General noted in its latest quarterly report on Afghanistan.

“According to the DIA, Pakistan’s strategic security objectives in Afghanistan almost certainly continue to be countering Indian influence and mitigating spillover into the Pakistani territory,” the report said.

The report for the quarter April 1 to June 30 said the Pakistani government is concerned that a civil war in Afghanistan would have destabilising effects on Pakistan, including an influx of refugees and providing a potential safe haven for anti-Pakistan militants.

During the quarter, financial contributions to the Afghan Taliban increased in the Pakistan border regions, according to media reports, citing eyewitness sources. Solicitation efforts traditionally targeted mosques, but Afghan Taliban militants now openly visit the bazaar areas in nearby Pakistani towns, it said.

“The militants typically solicit contributions of USD 50 or more from shopkeepers. Local residents told reporters that solicitation efforts were now commonplace in the towns and cities of Quetta, Kuchlak Bypass, Pashtun Abad, Ishaq Abad and Farooqia,” it said.

According to the report, the DIA, citing media reports, said that Iran welcomes the withdrawal of US and coalition forces from Afghanistan but “almost certainly” remains concerned about the resulting instability in Afghanistan.

According to the DIA, Iran will continue to pursue influence in any future Afghan government through relations with the Afghan government, the Taliban, and power brokers, but Iran opposes the re-establishment of the Taliban’s Islamic Emirate, it said.

As a resurgent Taliban continues to occupy new territory and an overtaxed Afghan National Defence Security Force is increasingly unable to provide security in certain areas, Afghan power brokers have increasingly begun raising private militias, it said, citing media reports.

“During the quarter, leaders related to the Northern Alliance spoke openly of a ‘second resistance’ to the Taliban, and some of the leaders began to mobilise anti-Taliban forces under their respective commands,” the report said.

The Northern Alliance comprised militias of primarily Tajik, Uzbek and Hazara ethnicity, while the Taliban was largely of Pashtun ethnicity. The period of direct conflict between Northern Alliance and the Taliban included significant violence, often targeting civilians because of their ethnicity.

According to the Afghanistan Analysts Network, a resumption of conflict between the Taliban and the elements, which formerly made up the Northern Alliance risks a recurrence of such violence.

In April, Ahmed Massoud – a militia commander and son of the Northern Alliance’s most prominent leader Ahmed Shah Massoud killed by al-Qaeda shortly before the attacks of September 11, 2001 – said in a media interview that his followers were prepared for the “failure of peace”.

In May, Massoud told reporters that over 100,000 militia leaders, fighters and other stakeholders in northern Afghanistan have pledged support to his anti-Taliban movement.

He said public concerns about the stagnant peace process, US withdrawal of troops and apparent Taliban gains against the Afghan National Defence and Security Forces (ANDSF) have led to an increasing number of Afghans to take up arms and organise independently, the report noted. PTI

India has already evacuated 200 people, including the Indian envoy and other staffers of its embassy in Kabul

Evacuee children wait for the next flight after being manifested at Hamid Karzai International Airport, in Kabul, Afghanistan. AP/PTI

New Delhi, August 21

Around 80 Indian nationals were evacuated on Saturday from Kabul by a transport military aircraft of the Indian Air Force amid a deteriorating security scenario in the Afghan capital, people familiar with the development said.

The aircraft landed at Dushanbe in Tajikistan after evacuating the Indians, they said, adding the flight is expected to arrive at the Hindon airbase near Delhi in the evening.

India has already evacuated 200 people, including the Indian envoy and other staffers of its embassy in Kabul, in two C-17 heavy-lift transport aircraft of the IAF after the Taliban seized control of Kabul on Sunday.

The first evacuation flight brought back over 40 Indians on Monday.

The second C-17 aircraft evacuated around 150 people including Indian diplomats, officials, security personnel and some stranded Indians on Tuesday.

The Taliban swept across Afghanistan this month, seizing control of almost all key towns and cities, including Kabul, in the backdrop of the withdrawal of the US forces.

The mission to evacuate close to 200 Indians was accomplished with support from the US.

Following the evacuation, the MEA said the focus now would be to ensure the safe return of all Indian nationals from the Afghan capital.

The MEA said the immediate priority for the government is to obtain accurate information about all Indian nationals currently staying in Afghanistan.

It also requested the Indians as well as their employers to urgently share the relevant details with the special Afghanistan cell.

As per a rough estimate, the number of Indians stranded in Afghanistan could be around 400 and India has been looking at ways to evacuate them, including by coordinating with the US and other friendly countries. PTI

There were Indians, Europeans and Africans besides people from Afghanistan in the plane who were leaving the strife-torn picturesque country

Taliban fighters patrol in Kabul, Afghanistan. — PTI

Kolkata, August 21

When the New Delhi-bound Kam Airlines flight finally took off from Kabul airport hours before the Taliban entered the city on August 15, Subrata, an Indian working in a senior position of an International NGO (INGO) posted in Afghanistan, sent up a silent prayer of thanks.

Subrata had been able to board the flight after travelling two hours in his car to travel the 12 km distance between his lodging and the Hamid Karzai International Airport, as the road was clogged with vehicles even early in the morning.

To top it all, his flight was stopped from taking off for over an hour almost at the edge of the runway, as US Air Force planes were landing to evacuate nationals of that country, sparking fears of imminent Taliban entry into the city.

Hours earlier, Subrata, who prefers to go by his first name, spent a tense and sleepless night planning his disguise to make it to the airport without any trouble.

“I contemplated travelling to the airport dressed as an Afghan sporting the customary long beard and turban, or a deaf and mute person. I was afraid that I might be held by the Taliban in the check posts they might have put up on the road,” he told PTI over the phone from Delhi.

Subrata even tried out his disguises before discarding each of them and deciding to travel in his normal clothes.

There were Indians, Europeans and Africans besides people from Afghanistan in the plane who were leaving the strife-torn picturesque country.

Afghan stewards of the plane, however, were sceptical about their return.

“I heard a steward whispering in Pashto: God knows how and when we will return to Kabul’,” said Subrata.

On the night before he took the flight, Subrata realised that guns alone cannot ensure security and information is the strongest defence.

“I had no information that night whether the Taliban had already entered the city. Nobody goes out in the night for fear of being attacked and killed. And there were looters.

“I left my lodging at dawn to travel the 12 km distance to the airport and reached it at around 6.15 am. The flight was scheduled to depart at 10.45 am,” Subrata, who had been posted in Afghanistan since 2015, said.

He had advanced his flight ticket to Delhi, where his family stays, after the security officer of his organisation told him that the Taliban were expected to enter Kabul soon and he should “just leave”.

Subrata had been hesitating as he, like many of his counterparts in other INGOs, was sure that Kabul will not fall before Muharram on August 20.

It turned out later that his was the second last commercial flight to leave Afghanistan for India.

“The situation in Kabul had become tense since August 13 as the Taliban had captured Herat, Kandahar, Kunduz and other provinces one by one by then. I think even the Taliban themselves did not expect that these provinces would fall so fast,” said Subrata, who has been posted in that country since 2015.

With the memory of Taliban torture during its rule two decades ago still fresh in their mind, the people of Afghanistan had been living in fear since the US peace deal with the group in Doha in February 2020.

The pact had drawn up plans for withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan in exchange for security guarantees from the terrorist outfit.

Subrata said that many Afghan people – both men and women – had requested him to help them find refuge in Delhi.

“I did not want to return home before August 18 as I had reached Kabul only a week back and had a lot of work left. But the scenario was changing fast. I was told that banks had downed shutters saying they had no money left,” he said.

Rumours that fresh passports were not being issued anymore fanned the fear among the people manifold.

Subrata could not contact the Indian embassy and to add to his fears, he was told that there were blasts at Pul-e-charkhi jail in Kabul, which is the largest prison in Afghanistan, allegedly to liberate jailed members of the Taliban.

“I saw the narrow streets of Kabul chock-a-block with cars of internally displaced people who had come with their families to the city from neighbouring areas thinking it would not fall. The parks were occupied by these hapless people who had nowhere else to go,” he said.

They had been coming for the past one month but the situation had turned chaotic on August 14 as the roads were completely blocked, he said.

Subrata also recounted his conversation with a kiosk owner at the airport from whom he used to buy biscuits and cakes during his frequent travels.

“The man looked very sad. He told me: ‘Please remember that Afghanistan is a beautiful country but has no luck as far as lasting peace is concerned’,” Subrata said.

There was an air of desperation, a feeling of helplessness, arising out of the fear of an uncertain future.

“People are tired of the constant insecurity and want to leave the country. Their agony is increased manifold by the frequent attacks of armed looters who find them easy prey and do not hesitate to kill if faced with resistance,” he said.

The losses due to the unprecedented drought and the havoc wreaked by COVID-19 appear to have taken a back seat in the mind of the people of Afghanistan, Subrata said.

Most of them wish to relocate to either the US or India as they perceive these countries as peaceful and stable, he said.

Asked whether he would like to return to Afghanistan, Subrata said he would, as there is a lot of work left to be done.

“The INGOs are into the development work in the country in a big way. They are building roads, bridges, hospitals which the government cannot,” he said. — PTI 

Those felicitated include Rupinder Pal Singh, Gurjant Singh, Monika Malik, Sharmila Devi, Reena Khokhar, Shivendra Singh and Gurminder Singh; two hockey coaches given a cash award of Rs 2.5 lakh each

Haryana Governor Bandaru Dattatreya and Punjab sports minister Rana Gurmit Singh Sodhi present during the felicitation ceremony of hockey players in Chandigarh on Saturday. Tribune photo: Nitin Mittal

Chandigarh, August 21

Hockey Chandigarh and Tynor on Saturday felicitated the hockey players who participated in the recent Tokyo Olympics at a function here by giving five players a cash award of Rs 5 lakh each.

Haryana Governor Bandaru Dattatreya was the chief guest and Punjab Sports Minister Rana Gurmit Singh Sodhi was the guest of honour.

Those felicitated were Rupinder Pal Singh, Gurjant Singh, Monika Malik, Sharmila Devi, Reena Khokhar, Shivendra Singh and Gurminder Singh. Two hockey coaches were given a cash award of Rs 2.5 lakh each.

The Haryana Governor congratulated the hockey stars who after 41 years won a bronze medal and brought international acclaim to Indian hockey. He said he was happy to see that the hockey team had a lot of players from Haryana and Punjab.

Dattatreya said under the state sports policy, the Haryana government had awarded Rs 6 crore to Olympians for winning gold, Rs 4 crore for winning silver, and Rs 2.5 crore for bronze medal winners. The Haryana government had given Rs 23.25 crore as reward to outstanding players, adding that all states should prepare a sports policy to encourage players so that they can perform even better.

The Punjab Sports Minister said it was praiseworthy on the part of Hockey Chandigarh to felicitate the hockey stars. Lauding their performance at the Tokyo Olympics, he said it was indeed a proud moment for the state that the players had given an excellent performance.

Giving details about sprucing up facilities in Punjab, he said new facilities would be created in the state and the existing ones would be upgraded.

Karan Gilhotra, president, Hockey Chandigarh, said, “It was always the endeavour of Hockey Chandigarh to encourage the players and will continue to promote the sport in a big way. It was indeed a moment of pride for the country to see our players excelling at the Olympics.”

He heads the Karan Gilhotra Foundation which is actively engaged in the service of the sports community.

P.J. Singh, Senior Vice-President, Hockey Chandigarh and Chief Managing Director, Tynor, assured support to the hockey players. IANS

On June 30, 2020, he led an Army team that neautralised 2 ultras

Major Ankesh Jarial with President Ram Nath Kovind after receiving the Sena Medal at the Rashtrapati Bhawan.

Our Correspondent

Una, August 21

Major Ankesh Jarial, a resident of Amb in Una district, was awarded the Sena Medal for Gallantry at a function organised at Rashtrapati Bhawan in New Delhi on the occasion of Independence Day. Major Ankesh is at present serving in Rashtriya Rifles and posted in South Kashmir.

According to his citation, on the night of June 30, 2020, on the basis of inputs from local sources regarding the presence of militants at a location in Anantnag district, Major Ankesh led a team of soldiers and cordoned off the terrorists, who were planning an attack.

The terrorists began firing indiscriminately. The Army team retaliated and neutralised the two terrorists.

Major Ankesh’s mother Kiran Lata said that she was proud that her son had led his team and fought the terrorists bravely for the nation. She added that during a telephonic conversation Major Ankesh told her that he had dedicated the medal to his late father BN Jarial.

The group was detained by Taliban; Indians were taken for verification; Afghan Sikh, Hindus turned back

Photo for representation only. AP/PTI file

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, August 21

The Government is likely to send an aircraft to evacuate Indians from Kabul after they were released from Taliban custody and have been asked to wait near the airport.   

Earlier in the morning, the Taliban released over 200 people, many of them Indian nationals and some of them Afghan Sikhs and Hindus, it had taken into custody as they were approaching the Kabul airport for flights out of Afghanistan.

While the Indian nationals were taken to the local police station for verification of their documents, the Afghan Hindus and Sikhs were turned back. Some of the Afghan Hindus and Sikhs are locals while those from outside are huddled at Gurdwara Karta-e-Parwan.

The story was broken by Al-Itteha that said Taliban affiliates, most likely fighters of the Haqqani network, had taken more than 150 people, most of them Indian nationals, from near Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul.

These people included a number of Afghan citizens and Afghan Sikhs, but most of them were ordinary Indian citizens.

Quoting a person who was travelling with his wife, the group had left for the airport in eight buses at 1 am but could not enter the airport. As they were waiting outside, several unarmed Taliban members came to their side and, after beating several of them, took them all to Tarkhil, Kabul.

The person and his wife threw themselves out of the vehicle and went back to the city.

Taliban spokesman Ahmadullah Waseq denied the allegations of abduction in an interview with the daily Al-Information. He said members of the group were present around Hamid Karzai International Airport and would not allow people to enter the airport.

In a rare rebuke to Pakistan, China has asked it to take adequate measures to upgrade security mechanisms and protect nationals following a suicide blast targeting a convoy of Chinese engineers working on the Gwadar port project in the troubled Baluchistan province late on Friday night. – File photo

New Delhi, August 21

In a rare rebuke to Pakistan, China has asked it to take adequate measures to upgrade security mechanisms and protect nationals following a suicide blast targeting a convoy of Chinese engineers working on the Gwadar port project in the troubled Baluchistan province late on Friday night.

China urged Pakistan’s “relevant departments at all levels” to investigate the matter and severely punish the perpetrator. The Chinese Embassy statement also asked Pakistan officials to take practical and effective measures “to accelerate, to implement, (and) strengthen whole-process security measures and upgrade security cooperation mechanisms to ensure that similar incidents do not happen”.

Chinese and Pakistani media outlets have reported the death of two children and injuries to one Chinese worker. The Pakistan Interior Ministry said the suicide bomber targeted a convoy of three vehicles carrying Chinese nationals and a police contingent. The investigating team is also due to identify the nature of the blast.

This was a much stronger reaction than the previous one by Beijing to an attack on a bus last month in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province that killed nine Chinese engineers working on a dam project which, like Gwadar, is part of the $60 billion China-Pakistan Economic Corridor. — TNS

New Delhi: The Army, Navy and Air Force chiefs will be visiting the National Defence Academy (NDA) this week to review the training and administrative arrangements for the intake of women cadets, work on which was already initiated early this year.

Sources in the defence and security establishment said that the visit by Army chief General M.M. Naravane, Navy chief Admiral Karambir Singh and Air Force chief R.K.S Bhadauria on 20 August had already been scheduled at the beginning of the month, before the Supreme Court passed an interim order allowing women to sit for the academy’s entrance exam.

They added that the visit of the three chiefs has no relation to the court’s order that was passed Wednesday.

“The visit was scheduled earlier this month to review the training and administrative arrangements for women cadets. Additional infrastructure to provide for women cadets has been approved earlier and should come up in a time-bound manner. Gender equality has been an issue, which has been actively debated and found positive response in the Services,” a source told ThePrint.

The discussion on the induction of women into the armed services through the NDA had been ongoing and was finding support amongst the leadership, the source added.

ThePrint reported in June that the NDA is being expanded and its annual intake of military cadets will be progressively increased by around 400 to cater to the shortfall of officers in the armed forces.

The increase in seats is also to cater to the bigger demand for training of foreign cadets and ground duty cadets of the Indian Air Force (IAF).

A project for enhancement of NDA infrastructure was also rolled out this year keeping in mind a possible intake of women cadets in the institution.

Also read: Sainik schools will admit girls too, must ensure equal representation for women: Modi on I-Day

Women have long been part of armed forces

The induction of women into the armed services via the NDA will not be the first such instance.

Sources said the Armed Forces had inducted women as officers in the medical services a very long time ago

The Armed Forces Medical College in Pune has been training men and women medical officers for years. Military Nursing Officers have been in service since well before Independence and continue to serve the Defence Services, the source quoted above said.

Women were also inducted in the lower ranks in the Corps of Military Police recently.

“Permanent Commission to Short Service Commission women officers had been considered earlier in JAG and Education Branches and recently they have been given similar benefits in some other branches. Women officers have also been inducted for training into Army Aviation recently”, the source said.

As of February this year, there were 9,118 women officers serving in the three Services.

Women officers have been inducted into the Army since 1993. In the beginning, they were brought in for five years of service under the ‘Special Entry Scheme’. This was later converted into the Short Service Commission (SSC).

In 2008, a permanent commission was extended to women in streams of Judge Advocate General (JAG) and Army Education Corps.

In 2019, the Narendra Modi government granted permanent commission to women in all ten branches that allowed women officers through the Short Service Commission.

These were Signals, Engineers, Army Aviation, Army Air Defence, Electronics and Mechanical Engineers, Army Service Corps, Army Ordnance Corps and Intelligence.

However, the rule was applicable for the current serving SSC officers and future ones and was not retrospective.

Following an order of the Supreme Court, a total of 147 additional women SSC officers of the Army were granted permanent commission. But combat roles for women in the Army are yet to be opened up due to a wide range of reasons.

(Edited by Manasa Mohan)

Tweaking of system needed to facilitate co-ed training

Photo for representational purpose only. File photo

IN a heartening reaffirmation of the hard-fought gender equality that is being increasingly felt in the defence forces, the portals of the academies for pre-commissioned training are set to open for women. It is another matter though that, as in every other small or big step taken towards parity and overcoming the misogynistic mindset despite proving themselves as worthy defence and combat officers in the past nearly three decades, this battle too has been won through the court. Defending yet again women’s equal right to recruitment in the army, the Supreme Court, in its interim order on Wednesday, cleared one of the last hurdles that still smacks of discrimination. It allowed women candidates to take the NDA and Naval Academy exams scheduled for September 5 this year, subject to the final decision.

Excluding women from taking the test is a grave violation of the broad intent of last year’s orders of the SC that allowed permanent commission to women officers. To prevent the irreparable damage that this miss would have caused to women’s rights, the SC direction to the UPSC to issue a corrigendum is timely. The new rule must be widely publicised so that all eligible and aspiring women candidates could compete for recruitment as cadet officers.

The SC directive should goad the policymakers to take heed and shed their resistance to gender equality. As the SC noted, it is indeed regretful that the Army has been more reluctant than the Air Force and the Navy to fully accommodate women officers in its ranks. It is prone to dithering till ordered to act by the courts. The forces would do well to accept that women officers are very much here to stay and soar to heights and that gender neutrality is non-negotiable. It is time for the forces to adapt themselves towards a compatible co-educational ethos and infrastructure for women in all their institutes of training, and tweak the system, keeping in mind the technical intricacies peculiar to their work culture.