India deploys US-made surveillance drones along LoC

Aerial surveillance drones manufactured in the United States are being deployed by India for surveillance along the Line of Control in Poonch and Rajouri districts, media reports said on Wednesday.

"The data centre of these drones has been established in Srinagar for monitoring, processing and disseminating data to deployed troops," The Express Tribune while quoting a source familiar with the development reported. "The US is refusing to supply the same drone to Pakistan for deployment along LoC."

India's drone inventory currently comprises mostly surveillance-only models made by Israel but with the acquisition of armed drones India "could be more likely to strike in Pakistan to retaliate after any terrorist attack which leaders in New Delhi immediately blame on Islamabad", it added.

In July 2016, the Pakistan Army claimed to have shot down an Indian 'spy drone' in Pakistan administered Kashmir (PaK), in a sign of the decades-old tension between the nuclear-armed neighbours. "The spy drone was being used for aerial photography," military's media wing, ISPR, said.

The United States has dislodged Russia as the top arms supplier to India. New Delhi is also on the cusp of sealing a US nuclear reactor deal worth billions of dollars.

In return, Washington has given New Delhi access to high-end military technology, such as a new system to launch planes off aircraft carriers, and leaned on other countries to give India membership in the Missile Technology Control Regime, which cleared the way for the sale of the unarmed Predator.

Pakistan is upset over the development due to the fact that the United States has refused to supply similar drones to Islamabad despite repeated requests.

"It is a matter of grave concern," said former ambassador Ali Sarwar Naqvi. He said Washington and New Delhi had signed a strategic partnership pact during President Barack Obama's term and India has possibly acquired the US drones under that agreement.

He suggested that the Pakistan government raise the issue with the US but at the same time take appropriate measures to pre-empt any negative fallout of the deployment of drones along the LoC.

For Lt Gen (retd) Talat Masood, who once headed the Pakistan Ordnance Factories that supply arms and ammunition to the military, deployment of drones would significantly increase the risk of war between Pakistan and India.

"The drones, which can reach anywhere in Pakistan, obviously can heighten tensions and increase the risk of a conflagration," he told The Express Tribune.

The development came at a time when tension between Pakistan and India is running at an all-time high. The two states were close to a limited war when India claimed that its special forces had conducted

'surgical strikes' in Azad Kashmir in the wake of a deadly attack on its military base in Uri in September last year.

Pakistan dismissed the claim as baseless and said India just staged a farcical drama to divert global attention from a popular uprising in Occupied Kashmir.