The inhospitable Siachen glacier stands at a height of 5,400 m and is regarded as the world’s highest battlefield.
It’s now 35 years since India took control over the territory, but the extreme weather and terrain has subjected the troops to sever hardship.
What is Siachen’s story?
Boundary - After the war of 1947-48, the UN-brokered peace and a Ceasefire Line (CFL) was demarcated as per the Karachi Agreement of 1949.
The easternmost point of the CFL was “NJ9842”, and the territory beyond that was high-peaks and inhospitable – which wasn’t demarcated.
The agreement simply said that the CFL would run north of the three glaciers in the region - Siachen glacier (western most), the Rimo and the Baltoro.
Notably, CFL itself was to be just a temporary arrangement and was supposed to become irrelevant after the proposed plebiscite in Kashmir in 1950.
But the plebiscite never took place and CFL was eventually revalidated as the Line of Control (LoC) in the Simla Agreement of 1972.
While the wars of 1947, 1965 and 1971 saw both militaries crossing across the CFL on multiple occasions, the region north of NJ9842 was never touched.
This was because the rigour of the terrain and weather made it impossible for both the militaries to intrude into the sector.
Intrusion – In the 1960’s, Pakistan had begun making certain cartographic changes to the CFL beyond the NJ9842, to symbolise its claim.
The line was visibly being pushed eastward (almost reaching Karakoram Pass), in contrary to the intention of 1949 agreement on the region beyond NJ9842.
Global mountaineering maps soon started portraying this as the authentic and internationally accepted CFL-LoC, backed by mountaineering legends.
Pakistan used this change in perception to start permitting foreign expeditions in the area of the Siachen glacier to reinforce its claim on the area.
By 1978, alerted by these expeditions, Indian Army too began undertaking mountaineering expeditions as a counter measure.
Escalation - Treks were getting increasingly frequent on both sides, but Pakistan had the world’s perception on its side.
Heated diplomatic exchanges of territorial violation were sounded by both sides with regard to the Siachen sector and tensions mounted.
Increased Pakistani presence led some in Indian Army to demand a permanent summer post at Siachen, but the idea was dropped due to the harsh weather.
Instead, it was decided that besides mountaineering expeditions, Siachen glacier would be patrolled by the Army during the summer months.
As tensions over the patrolling arrangement escalated in 1983, intelligence reports suggested that Pakistan was planning to physically occupy Siachen.
Occupation - To avert a possible Pakistani takeover of the strategic Siachen heights, Indian army decided to take the summit pre-emptively.
On Baisakhi Day (a major religious festival) in 1983, when the enemy would’ve least expected the commencement of a major operation, India made its move.
The mission was to occupy Saltoro Ridge, and the operation was codenamed “Meghdoot”, and the platoon advanced to braze the harsh weather.
The siachen was soon secured and the two passes from the Pakistani side were sealed off in a comprehensively well executed operation.
The glacier continues to be occupied by the Indian forced till date, but the financial and human cost of the occupation is indeed massive.
How does the future look?
The 110 Km stretch north of NJ9842 is presently under Indian patrol and about 5000 soldiers are employed for the duty.
In the past 35 years, the army has had 900 casualties in the sector due to the hostile weather and avalanches (without even a single bullet being fired).
Also, the costs of maintaining the operations at such a height costs about 6 crores per day, which is a major pinch on the defence budget.
The ecological impact of the occupation is also immense and many organisations that have called for scaling down military operations at Siachen.
Hence, it would be prudent to work out a negotiated agreement with Pakistan to keep these pristine non-habitable zones free of conflict.
Such a move might help in demilitarising the zone and also reduce the burden on our armed forces.
