India not lowering guard on border with China: Sitharaman

Nearly a month after talks with her Chinese counterpart Wei Fenghe, Sitharaman said both sides recognised that the broad decisions arrived at the informal summit between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping in Wuhan should govern management of the border.

"Absolutely", she told PTI when asked whether India is still on guard and not lowering it despite the Wuhan sprit.

At the Wuhan summit in April, Modi and Xi resolved to open a new chapter in ties, and directed their militaries to boost coordination along the nearly 3,500 km Sino-India border, months after the most serious military faceoff in decades between the two nuclear-armed neighbours in Doklam triggered fears of an war.

Asked whether the decision of Modi and Xi at the summit to issue strategic guidelines to their militaries to maintain peace along the border is working, she said, "I want to believe it is working."

At the same time, she added that as defence minister of the country she was conscious of the fact that the she will have to keep the border guards alert.

"Then I would also be, as Raksha Mantri, I would also be conscious that I have to keep (them) alert...Wuhan spirit, yes," she told PTI during an interaction.

When asked if Army Chief Gen. Bipin Rawat's comments earlier in the year that the time has come for India to shift focus to its northern border from the western frontier, she said, "I cannot afford to say, at the cost of one border, I will be more alert, more ready in another. A border is a border. I have to be conscious of both my borders."

"I will also have be conscious of my sea. It is less talked about," she said.

Last month Sitharaman and Wei held extensive talks here during which they decided to work towards firming up a new bilateral pact on defence cooperation and agreed to increase interactions between their militaries at various levels to avoid Doklam-like standoffs.

"It is this (Wuhan) spirit, which both the Chinese and we recognise, will have to govern our borders. The Chinese minister referred to the Wuhan spirit more than twice and said we expect the sprit to be governing everything which happens to the last company which comes to the border," Sitharaman said.

The defence minister also referred to Modi's speech at Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore in June, saying his views about the region was even welcomed by China.

In his address at the premier defence and strategic affairs conference, Modi said Asia and the world will have a better future when India and China work together with trust and confidence while being sensitive to each other's interests.

Talking about the Line of Actual Control (LAC), Sitharaman said as it is not completely demarcated, there are differing perceptions about it by both sides.

"There are several areas where the border is not completely defined and demarcated. As a result, the perception of where the border is one thing for us and completely differnt for them. So they come to a point where we think they should not be coming and we go to a point where they think we should not be going. So periodically this becomes cause for the flare up," she said.