New Delhi: Indian Army personnel will learn Chinese at Assam’s Tezpur University where an MoU was signed on Wednesday, news agency IANS quoted defense sources as saying. “A Chinese language course in-house will improve Mandarin expertise and empower Army personnel to engage with their Chinese counterparts,” news agency IANS quoted Lt Col Mahendra Rawat as saying. He said that with better Chinese language skills, army personnel would be able to communicate more effectively.
“It was aimed at better exchange of views on the activities of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) and their cooperation during various interactions including commander-level talks, flag meetings, joint exercises and border personnel meetings,” IANS quoted IANS as saying. It will also help in understanding the activities. Rawat said.
A Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was signed between the Indian Army and Assam’s Tezpur University on 19 April to train Indian Army personnel in Chinese language.
The course will be of 16 weeks duration and will be conducted at Tezpur University. The MoU was… pic.twitter.com/Pk86zWmQVt– ANI (@ANI) April 19, 2023
Rawat said that a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was signed between the Indian Army and Tezpur University on Wednesday for imparting training to Indian Army personnel in Chinese language. This course will be of 16 weeks duration.
Tezpur University was established in 1994 by an Act of Parliament as a Central University. It is a leader in the North East region in teaching foreign languages including Chinese.
India-China Tawang clash
On December 9, 2023, a skirmish broke out between the Indian and Chinese armies along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in the Tawang sector of Arunachal Pradesh.
The army did not specify the number of soldiers involved in the face-off and the number of soldiers injured in the incident. However, several media reports claimed that more than 200 Chinese soldiers were involved and that they were carrying spiked clubs and sticks, and that injuries on the Chinese side could be higher.
In a statement in Parliament, Defense Minister Rajnath Singh said the Indian Army bravely prevented Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) troops from encroaching on Indian territory and forced them to return to their posts.
The Tawang scuffle was the first since deadly clashes in June 2020 when Indian and Chinese troops were involved in a face-off in Ladakh’s Galwan Valley, abutting the Chinese-occupied Tibetan Plateau.
Relations between India and China have taken a nosedive after the fierce Galwan Valley clash in June 2020, which marked the most serious military conflict between the two countries in decades.