India-China ties a lot better, both showing flexibility: Army chief

General Upendra Dwivedi says ground-level engagement has risen and friction points have reduced, though major decisions remain at higher levels

Indian and Chinese troops are engaging better with the improvement in bilateral ties, Indian Army Chief General Upendra Dwivedi said here on Monday.

 

He said the Chinese side informs the Indian side about their construction activities these days, and that the scope of friction has reduced and tempers have cooled along the Line of Actual Control (LAC), the de facto border between the two countries.

 

Construction on the Indian side in response to construction on the Chinese side had reportedly triggered the violent hand-to-hand combat in the Galwan River valley in June 2020, when at least 24 Indian and Chinese soldiers were killed. That led to a freeze in diplomatic relations and the gathering of thousands of troops along the LAC. 

“There’s been a lot of change over the past one year — a lot of improvement in relations,” Dwivedi said during a broadcasted chat with an Indian TV presenter at the Manekshaw Centre.

 

It was a curtain-raiser event for this year’s Chanakya Defence Dialogue, which will be held in the city jointly by the Indian Army and the Centre for Land Warfare Studies, a think tank, over November 27-28.

 

The cooperation is good at this time, Dwivedi said referring to Chinese troops, and added that 1,100 ground-level interactions have taken place over the past one year, which translates to three interactions each day. “But major decisions are still taken at high levels,” he said, adding: “We look for solutions on the ground. Both sides are showing flexibility.” 

 

Since Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping met on the sidelines of the Brics summit in October 2024, in Kazan, Russia, India and China have held multiple rounds of talks, resulting in a general thaw in relations, and the resumption of direct flights (although not between New Delhi and Beijing yet).

 

Modi visited China for the first time in seven years at the end of August to attend the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit. Defence Minister Rajnath Singh met his Chinese counterpart Admiral Dong Jun during the SCO defence ministers’ meeting in June, and in November in Malaysia for an Asean defence ministers’ meeting.

 

Disengagement has been achieved to an extent along the LAC. But “de-escalation” remains unclear — if heavy defence equipment have been removed and how far troops have moved back.

 

“After that when we talk about boundary delimitation and other things, this environment will be helpful,” Dwivedi said, adding that the Working Mechanism for Consultation and Coordination (WMCC) on India-China border affairs “will let us know how we should proceed ahead”.

 

The WMCC is an institutional mechanism that was set up in 2012.

 

Dwivedi struck a different tone on Pakistan at the same event. He described Operation Sindoor, India’s military reprisal against Pakistan in May, after 26 people were killed in a targeted terrorist attack in Jammu and Kashmir in April, as a movie “trailer”, saying that India could teach Pakistan a lesson on neighbourly behaviour if the situation again arose. “Blood and water cannot flow together,” he stressed.

 

The Army chief also said India has the deterrence, and should be prepared for future wars — whether they last four months or even four years.

 

Dwivedi did not make any direct comment on the car blast that killed at least 15 people in Delhi on November 10.

 

Unlike the April attack, which the government quickly linked to Pakistan-based groups, the Delhi blast has been called a terrorist incident (an investigation is ongoing).