PUNE, the Southern Command headquarters of the Indian Army, has emerged as another node of counter-terrorism (CT) and counter-insurgency (CI) joint exercises by Indian and foreign forces.
An India-China military exercise which concluded in Pune on Tuesday had focused on CI and CT tactics for the last 12 days at the College of Military Engineering (CME) and Aundh Military Station (MS). A senior army officer said, “These exercises have shown that Pune is capable of hosting CI and CT training. Pune has a significant military presence and has defence institutions dealing in all the aspects. Belgaum and Bhatinda have been joint training nodes until now in India. Pune has emerged as an important option.”
The officer added, “More such joint exercises can be held here in future. In Pune, we have the resources, we have technology and we have space.”
While the second edition of the exercise was held at Belgaum in 2008, it has been conducted twice in China in 2007 and 2013. This was the fourth chapter of the exercise named “Hand-in-Hand.”
Speaking to reporters, Lt General K Surendranath, chief of staff of Southern Command who reviewed the concluding parade of the exercise said, “We have learnt from them and they have learnt from us the techniques of counter-terrorism and counter-insurgency operations. This had led to an amalgamation of techniques from both sides which can be called an alternate solution, which is possibly a better solution.”
Lt Gen Surendranath added, “This was definitely a great beginning and I hope this leads us to better co-operation and regular joint exercises. This activity is now restricted to counter-terrorism and counter-insurgency tactics and can be taken to further army to army contact.”
The concluding day of the joint tactical exercise at CME saw a cordon and search exercise by troops in a dummy village where “terrorists were hiding.” Lt General Ashok Singh, Commander, Southern Command of the Indian Army and Lt General Zhou Xiaozhou, Chief of Staff, Chengdu Military Command, People’s Liberation Army of China inspected the exercise along with other senior officers.
