Editorial: India to Provide 'Military Training' to Arunachal Pradesh Residents

Map of India - Arunachal Pradesh in Red
(Image: Wiki Commons)

By Ankit Panda

The Indian government plans to convert the residents of northern Arunachal Pradesh into an ad hoc paramilitary force.

Further evidencing India’s new center-right government’s focus on actively developing India’s claim to Arunachal Pradesh, an Indian state claimed almost in its entirety by China, India’s central government plans to provide “military training” to ” people living in areas close to the China-Indian border,” according to The Times of India. According to a report in the Times of India based off “sources within the home ministry,” the Indian government plans to actively encourage Indians living in these areas to be prepared to take up arms “at the level of a paramilitary force … so that in times of emergency they can be utilized.” India already maintains a forward military position in these areas, having relatively recently moved two mountain divisions into the harsh terrain of northern Arunachal Pradesh.

“[A] border population makes the eyes and ears of a government on the border. They are the biggest bulwark against any aggression by the enemy as they live there and watch every movement. [The] world over, governments encourage people to settle on the border. Only in India this is discouraged in the name of ‘sensitivity’,” said “a senior home ministry official,” cited by the Times of India. 

Read the full story at The Diplomat