By Raju Vernekar
Mumbai, Dec 16:
The 6th Edition of Indo – Kazakhstan joint training exercise-”Kazind-22″, with Kazakhstan Army, has begun at Umroi Military station in Ri-Bhoi district, 25 km from Shillong in Meghalaya and it will conclude on December 28.
Joint annual training exercise with the Kazakhstan Army was instituted in 2016 as Exercise “Prabal Dostyk”, which was later upgraded to a company level exercise and renamed as “Ex Kazind” in 2018.
Kazakhstan Army soldiers from the South-based Regional Command and Indian Army soldiers from the “11 Gorkha Rifles” are participating in the exercise. Aim of the exercise is to build positive military relations, imbibe each other’s best practices and promote the ability to operate together while undertaking counter terrorist operations in semi urban/jungle scenario, under a UN peace enforcement mandate, an official statement read.
This joint exercise will enable the two armies to train, plan and execute a series of combined tactical drills for neutralising of likely threats that may be encountered in UN peace keeping operations.
As both armies will be participating in various combat games besides joint tactical planning and drills, it is expected that the exercise will improve military relations, imbibe each other’s best practices and promote the ability to operate together while undertaking counter-terrorist operations in semi-urban or jungle scenarios under a UN peace enforcement mandate.
The scope of this exercise involves a Command Post Exercise (CPX) at the Battalion level and Company level Field Training Exercise (FTX) on sub-conventional operations. During the exercise, participants will engage in variety of missions ranging from joint planning, joint tactical drills, basics of special arms skills, HADR and raiding a hostile target.
According to the Ministry of Defence, “Exercise KAZIND” will enhance the level of defence cooperation between Indian Army and Kazakhstan Army which will further foster the bilateral relations between the two nations.