New Delhi, April 1 : After the recent airborne exercise in the Eastern Front, Indian Army on Friday conducted another such exercise at Pokhran, Rajasthan along the Western Front bordering Pakistan. The aim of the airborne exercise is to validate the rapid response capabilities of the Indian Army’s Airborne Rapid Response teams, sources said. The Airborne Exercise included Combat Free Fall jumps with Guided Precision Aerial Delivery System and battle drills in a simulated hostile Mechanised environment. Indian Army has, in the recent past, conducted a series of airborne exercises to check and rehearse its Rapid Response capabilities. It conducted another airborne exercise involving 600 paratroopers of the elite Airborne Rapid Response teams in the sensitive Siliguri Corridor on March 24 and 25. The teams carried out large scale drops near the Corridor. The Exercise was carried out after being airlifted from various airbases. It involved advanced free-fall techniques; insertion, surveillance and targeting practice and seizing of key objectives by going behind enemy lines. The Siliguri Corridor, also known as Chicken’s Neck, is a strategically important narrow stretch of land bordering Nepal, Bhutan and Bangladesh. The Indian Army had also conducted a similar exercise at on March 4 wherein the airborne forces rehearsed their aerial insertion capability and rapid response at the Siliguri Corridor. In that exercise, the combat freefallers of the Special Forces inserted from an altitude of 20,000 feet, alongwith logistic supply loads on precision guided platforms. The freefallers, after landing at a location in the Siliguri Corridor, established surveillance positions to guide accurate fire onto select enemy targets. Indian Army, post the 2017 Doklam standoff, resorted to step up the security and defence of the geostrategically important Corridor. ASU SHK1940