Policy

The Republic of India has not acceded to the Mine Ban Treaty.

At the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) First Committee in November 2022, India reiterated that it “supports the vision of a world free of antipersonnel landmines and is committed to their eventual elimination.” India further stated that “the availability of militarily effective technologies that can perform cost effectively the legitimate defensive role of antipersonnel landmines will considerably facilitate the goal of the elimination of antipersonnel landmines.”[1]

India has given slight variations of the same statement since 2007, which shows how little its position on the Mine Ban Treaty has advanced.

India has ratified the Convention on Conventional Weapons (CCW) and its Amended Protocol II, which permits certain antipersonnel landmines and, in India’s view, “enshrines the approach of taking into account legitimate defence requirements of states especially those with long borders.”

India participated as an observer at several meetings during the Ottawa Process that created the Mine Ban Treaty, including the Oslo negotiations in September 1997. However, India did not adopt the treaty or attend its signing conference in December 1997.

India has attended several meetings of the Mine Ban Treaty as an observer, most recently the Twentieth Meeting of States Parties held in Geneva in November 2022. India gave a statement that covered the same points made in previous years at meetings of the Mine Ban Treaty and the UNGA First Committee.[2]

India abstained from voting on UNGA Resolution 77/63 on 7 December 2022, which called for universalization and full implementation of the Mine Ban Treaty. India has abstained from voting on the annual UNGA resolution promoting the treaty since it was first introduced in 1997.

The International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL) has previously urged India to undertake a comprehensive review of its policy on antipersonnel mines.[3]

India is party to CCW Protocol V on explosive remnants of war (ERW). India is not party to the Convention on Cluster Munitions.

Production and transfer

India is one of the few remaining countries to still produce antipersonnel landmines, exclusively through the state-owned and controlled Indian Ordnance Factories.[4]

In August 2020, India announced plans to increase domestic production of antipersonnel mines and end their importation.[5] The Indian Armed Forces reportedly received the first of 700,000 domestically-produced “Nipun” antipersonnel blast mines at the end of 2021, which were designed to replace the M-14 antipersonnel mine.[6]

At least two other mines are reportedly under development, including “Ulka,” a bounding antipersonnel fragmentation mine and “Parth,” a directional antipersonnel landmine.[7]

Indian Ordnance Factories has produced the M-14 and M-16 antipersonnel mines, which are copies of earlier United States (US) designs.[8] Tender records retrieved from a publicly accessible online government procurement database from 2016–2022 show that Indian Ordnance Factories has listed tenders for components of M-14, M-16, and APER-1B antipersonnel landmines.[9] Components produced under these contracts have been supplied to Ammunition Factory Khadki and Ordnance Factory Chandrapur in Maharashtra state, and to Ordnance Factory Dum Dum in West Bengal state.[10]

In November 2022, India said that a moratorium on the export and transfer of antipersonnel mines has been in place since May 1996.[11] India has previously stated that it favors an outright ban on the transfer of antipersonnel landmines, even to States Parties of CCW Amended Protocol II.[12] Five States Parties to the Mine Ban Treaty have reported Indian-made landmines in their stockpiles: Bangladesh, Bhutan, Mauritius, Sudan, and Tanzania.

In June 2018, a private Indian arms manufacturer advertised a “bounding mine with fuze” in its sales catalogue at the Eurosatory military trade event in Paris. On the second day of the event, Eurosatory organizers ordered the display booth of the Indian company to close, and removed their entry at the event from the online catalogue.[13] Previously, in February 2017, the same Indian arms manufacturer had components for bounding fragmentation antipersonnel landmines listed within its sales catalogue on display at the International Defence Exhibition (IDEX) military trade event in Abu Dhabi.[14]

Stockpiling

In 1999, the Monitor estimated that India stockpiled between four and five million antipersonnel mines, making it one of the world’s largest stockpilers.[15] India has neither confirmed nor denied this estimate.

Use

Government use

India’s last significant use of antipersonnel mines was between December 2001 and July 2002, when the Indian Army laid an estimated two million landmines along its northern and western borders with Pakistan, in Operation Parakram.[16]

In 2010, India stated that the army had not laid any mines during 2008 or 2009.[17] Indian officials have often stated that “There is no minefield or mined area in any part of India’s interiors,” but have acknowledged that “minefields are laid, if required, along the border areas as part of military operations.”[18]

The Monitor has previously reported mine use during counter-insurgency operations in Kashmir.[19] Civilians continued to be killed and injured by landmines in Kashmir in 2022 and 2023.[20] In August 2020, conflict between India and China over disputed territory in Kashmir resulted in at least one death and one injury due to mines laid in the past on the Line of Actual Control (LAC).[21]

Use by non-state armed groups

New use of improvised antipersonnel landmines, attributed to non-state armed groups (NSAGs) affiliated with the Maoist insurgency in India, has been reported sporadically since 2017.

There were several reports and allegations in 2022 and 2023 that the Communist Party of India-Maoist (CPI-M) and its People’s Liberation Guerrilla Army (PLGA) continued to use pressure plate antipersonnel mines. In May 2023, a man was killed by a mine attributed to Maoist rebels while foraging in Luiya forest in Chaibasa district, Jharkhand state. Several other villagers in Chaibasa district had been reported killed by landmines in similar incidents in the first months of 2023.[22] In January 2023, the Maoist insurgents had sent leaflets to villages in Kolhan division, Jharkhand state, warning that they had laid explosives in the area.[23]

Previously, in December 2022, a man collecting wood in Goilkera forest in West Singhbhum district, Jharkhand state, died after stepping on a landmine.[24] In September and November 2022, mines attributed to Maoist rebels were removed by the Indian military after livestock injuries in Kathagudem, Telagana state.[25]

There have been no reports or allegations of landmine use by insurgents in India’s northeastern states, or in Jammu and Kashmir, in recent years. Previously, some NSAGs operating in India committed to ban antipersonnel mine use, but none have done so in the past decade.[26]