Year on, India upgrades infra in ‘vibrant’ villages along LAC

Ajay Banerjee

New Delhi, April 10

It was a year ago that India launched the ‘Vibrant Villages Programme’ along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) to create additional infrastructure matching China’s aggressive approach of creating new villages called ‘Xiaokang’ on its side.

The Tribune had exclusively reported in its edition on April 6 that China is adding 175 more such villages to the 628 it has raised since 2019.

Eyes and ears of Army

• The ‘Vibrant Villages Programme’ was launched on April 13, 2023, from Kibithoo in far-east Arunachal Pradesh with the aim to counter Chinese influence in the disputed Himalayan region
• Kibithoo, now, among other bordering villages, is showing early signs of reverse migration. In the 1962 Sino-India war, Kibithoo was attacked by China
• Bordering villages are also playing the role of eyes and ears of the Indian Army

Several villages in Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, eastern Ladakh, Arunachal Pradesh and Sikkim have been upgraded or are in the process under the mega Rs 4,800 crore project that for the first three years will cover 662 villages. In all, the government has identified 2,963 villages to be upgraded over 10 years.

Seventy-five villages in Himachal Pradesh and 51 in Uttarakhand are to be developed in the first phase. Thirty-five villages of Ladakh, 46 of Sikkim and 455 of Arunachal will also be developed. All of them are within 10 kilometres of the LAC — the un-demarcated boundary with China.

Select villages in blocks abutting northern border in Kinnaur and Lahaul and Spiti districts of Himachal Pradesh, and Chamoli, Uttarkashi and Rudraprayag districts of Uttarakhand have been covered under the project.

The programme is focused on generating livelihood, ensuring better road connectivity, developing housing and infrastructure, creating solar and wind energy, providing high speed telecom connectivity, promoting tourism, cultivation of medicinal plants, and developing co-operative societies for managing agriculture and horticulture.

The livelihood enhancing programmes includes beekeeping, improvement of agricultural yields and encouragement of handicrafts and local products.

The ‘Vibrant Villages Programme’ was launched on April 13, 2023, from Kibithoo in far-east Arunachal Pradesh with the aim to counter Chinese influence in the disputed Himalayan region.

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, who was in Arunachal on Tuesday, had said, “Not only are these villages strategically important, but the people living in them are our strategic assets.”