With China attempting to ‘change status quo’ on its border, expect more Doklam-like stand-offs: Army Chief

China is attempting to “change the status quo” on its border with India and incidents like the ongoing stand-off in the Doklam area are likely to “increase” in future, Army Chief General Bipin Rawat said today.

“The recent stand-off in the Doklam plateau by the Chinese side attempting to change the status quo are issues which we need to be wary about, and I think such kind of incidents are likely to increase in the future,” Rawat said.

He was delivering the General B C Joshi Memorial Lecture on ‘India’s Challenges in the Current Geo-Strategic Construct’ organised by the Department of Defence and Strategic Studies of Savitribai Phule Pune University here this evening.

“Pockets of dispute and contested claims to the territory continue to exist. These are due to differing perceptions on the alignments of the Line of Actual Control (LAC).

“Transgressions across Line of Actual Control do happen and sometimes they do lead to some kind of misunderstanding between the forward troops…However, we do have joint mechanisms in place to address such situations,” said Rawat.

He said that during the flag meetings with Chinese counterparts, the Indian Army keeps insisting that both sides should return to the pre-June 16 positions (before the stand- off …read more