Border Road takes expertise to new altitudes

The Border Roads Organisation has been tasked with building 64 strategic roads, stretching across 3500 km with 100 bridges, tunnels and highways. Shahkar Abidi reports on the challenges involved.

- Shahkar Abidi

Sonam Nawang, a tourist taxi driver from Ladakh during one of his travelling assignments in 1997 chanced upon some Chinese settlements across mountainous terrains, presumably on the Indian side of the Indo-China border. Time lapsed since then even as the settlements increased with each passing year.

The situation changed dramatically around two decades later, in 2017 when India's tiny neighbour Bhutan alerted India to the arrival of a huge convoy of construction equipment including excavators, bulldozers, tillers amongst others being brought in allegedly by the Chinese for building high-altitude roads along the countries’ contested borders. Although India sprang into action by sending troops to evict the Chinese, the development consequently resulted in escalation of the tensions between the two Asian tigers. The stand-off continues even today with little progress towards a resolution of the issue.