Army Plans Civilian Trekking Expedition to Siachen despite Pak Protest

Despite loud protests from Pakistan, India will conduct a civilian mountaineering and trekking expedition to the forbidding Siachen Glacier for the fourth consecutive year this year in October-November, said media reports.

“The Siachen trekking expedition this year is in its planning stage and is likely to take place some time in October-November,” an Army officer involved in the planning of the trek was quoted as saying.

The expedition is meant to demonstrate to the international community that Indian troops hold the Siachen glacial heights, regarded as the world’s highest battlefield, with Pakistan being nowhere near the Glacier, reports said.

At an altitude of 18,875 feet, the 78-km-long Glacier boomed with guns till November 25, 2004, when a formal ceasefire agreement between India and Pakistan came into effect along the 740-km Line of Control (LOC) and 110-km Actual Ground Position Line (AGPL).

Army plans to take along as many as 35 civilians during this year’s expedition, said reports.

The civilians will include including women, journalists, scientists from the DRDO and other glacial studies institutes, and mountaineers from among civilian enthusiasts as well as military training establishments, reports said.

An official said that the participants would be trained in mountaineering, skating and other such skills required to go through the arduous month-long trek to the Glacier, said reports.

Beside, they would also be visiting some of the Indian Army positions on their way up the glacier and back, reports said.

The civilian Siachen expedition was dragged into controversy in 2007 when Pakistan lodged a strong protest, calling it ‘incongruous’ to ongoing peace efforts between the two countries.

Though the Army halted the trip immediately after the protest that year, it went ahead with the trekking expedition after a go-ahead was given by the UPA government later.

Every year since then, India continued with its Siachen expedition of civilians and mountaineering enthusiasts, even as Pakistan had voiced its concern.

(Based on internet reports)