Was China captured Indian land? What is the India China Border issue? How is India China Relations? All India is talking about the border tensions brewing between India and China. It is a critical issue which has not been discussed upon much in our TV news channels because it probably raises uncomfortable questions.
Have the Chinese invaded the Indian Territory?
If yes, then to what extent and how many intruders are there? How much area has
been occupied by them and what is the reason behind this? The Indian government
has not yet provided answers to these questions. No clear cut answers to these
questions have been given by the Indian government But there are some reports
and some sources of retired army officers on the basis of which I'd like to talk
about the issue in this article today and we will try and find the possible
answers to these questions.
LAC & LOC
I will present the argument of both the sides
here So that you can evaluate both the sides and try to find out the truth
Come, let us see Let's start with the basics first- You might know that the
border between Pakistan occupied Kashmir and India is called LOC- Line of
Control But the border between Chinese occupied Ladakh and India is called LAC-
Line of Actual Control You can take a look at the map- LAC is the line between
Aksai Chin and India And LOC is the line between PoK and India Now, there are
some critical differences between LOC and LAC. LOC is very clearly defined Both
Pakistan and India are aware of where the boundary line actually is But the LAC
line is not clearly defined In English, there is a word for it- Demarcated So
LOC is demarcated while LAC is not That is, it's not clearly defined Both China
and India claim that the LAC is in different places Both the countries have
different perceptions about where the LAC actually lies And due to the
different claims by both the countries, there is an overlapping territory
between them as you can see in this diagram.
These are the lines that China and India
claim to be their borders. The area that lies in between becomes the Grey Area.
Grey Area is referred to as Area of Differing Perception- ADPA In reality, this
grey area isn't a large area Talking about the Pangong lake in Ladakh, then the
Grey area there covers only about 10 kilometres in length and no one resides
there Before the development of this situation, there weren't any posts of the
Indian army or the Chinese army Both the Indian and the Chinese army merely
patrolled that area And this iswhy there were clashes and conflicts between
both the armies when they came patrolling which you might have even heard
about- these clashes would recur between the two armies every 2-3 years and
they happened because of these grey areas One army came patrolling whilst the
other was already patrolling Then one army would write on banners to tell the
other that they were trespassing upon their territory and would request them to
go back Ever since the Indian army has upgraded its equipment and improved its
infrastructure over the past years, the Indian Army increased the frequency of
its patrols. This is the reason why the conflicts and confrontations with the
Chinese army have also increased Whenever this happens, the media on both sides
report of an Intrusion of the Indian/Chinese army on their soil Things like
these keep on recurring.
Pangong Lake
India In northern part of the Country Pangong
Lake in Union territory of Ladakh Pangong Lake, Which is in news these days But
this time not because of its beauty but coz of rising tensions in pangong lake,
between India and China one of the biggest reason for these standoff ever
increasing Chinese incursions in this area Today we will explain about the area
of conflict in pangong and reasons often leading to these confrontations stay
tuned for details behind the conflict
Pangong is long and deep lake at an altitude of 14000 ft above sea
level in Himalayas spreading across
ladakh and Tibbet its 135 kms long and total area is around 600 sq kms its in
shape of a boomrang with maximum width of 6 kms large part of pangong lies in
China and this line here is border between india and china in 1962 sino indian
war china occupied further more area of pangong lake the marked areas on map in
circle is the area they occupied in 1962 the line u see here is line of actual
control also known as LAC but on ground LAC is not clearly marked and India and
China both have different claims and perceptions about LAC this leads to
continous faceoff and confrontations now what these different claims and
perceptions? Chinese were intercepted and after that chinese intruded to 2nd
part and tried to stop Indian patrols to move further and this led to eyeball
to eyeball confrontation which further fueled the conflict most of the
intrusion in this area occurs though water Chinese often intrudes on indian
side with boats Indian patrol keeps eye on every chinese moment so
interceptions and confrontations are a continous phenomena in this area But
this time these confrontations has escalated and reason simply ever increasing
number of chinese soldiers and intrusions on indian side motive is to stop
India from developing any kind of road or infrastructure in these areas India
developed roads and Infra in this area at fast pace which china considers as
threat to its claims watever claims china make in reality whole area is part of
Ladakh out of which some occupied by china and eyes on occupying more areas
china, its expansion vision to implement it, messing with its neighbors on
borders creating disputes At present China's biggest asset is its economy and
we are one of the biggest contributor in that and if we want to stand against
China hit them where it hurts most bycott chinese products as gradually other
countyries also taking same steps this way we may hurt china in modern warfare.
Galwan Ghati
They are going to reap a huge benefit on the
military front in Galwan By coming into the Galwan valley and stationing
themselves on the Galwan heights, the 255km road that has been laid until
Daulat Beg Oldi from Shyok and Darbuk which travels northward towards Daulat
Beg Oldi The Chinese soldiers that have moved into the Galwan Valley are in a
strategically beneficial position as they can overlook that road They can use
artillery and cannons to fire on it And if they want to stop India from making
use of this road, then they can easily do so Because the intrusion in Galwan is
the most dangerous H S Panag ji has also pointed out in his article that the
area of the Galwan river valley has been breached into by China and they have
occupied around 2-3 kilometres of area at a height Around two Chinese
battalions are present at a height, which is a huge disadvantage for India It
becomes easier to attack lower terrain if one is situated at a height Another
interesting thing pointed out by him is that the differing perceptions of the
claims by India and China and the grey area in between, In the area of the
Galwan river valley, no such grey area is present India and China do not have
different perceptions in this area. There exists one single line So according
to him, Chinese intrusion in this area is them actually encroaching upon Indian
territory -And the differing perceptions regarding the claims of India and
China is clear in the case of Pangong Lake Does something like that exist in
the case of Galwan as well? -No. You've made a very important point here Galwan
was an area where both the Indian and the Chinese soldiers did not get into
conflicts The claim lines of both of them was approximately the same Chinese
claim line in Ladakh was separate from Galwan So by coming in here, the Chinese
soldiers have violated their own claim line -And (what about) the third region-
the Hot springs region? -As per our sources in the Indian Army, China is only
pressing for the third region in order to divert the focus of the Indian
soldiers and to disturb them But they will get no strategic benefit by
encroaching here Neither have they captured much land, nor is there a military
benefit as in the case of Galwan.
Army Officer Views
I'd like to tell you the viewpoints of some
more retired army officers Lt. General Rameshwar Roy has said that we should
not compare this situation with the earlier situations The situation today is
far more grim Col Malkiat has said that this situation is basically like
"Chinese Kargil" This situation is that critical KJS Arora said that
this is a loss of national pride and it is extremely shameful how some
politicians are trying to douse the situation by giving us the excuse of
different perceptions and are not admitting that India has actually lost
territory to the hands of China Our government has made no clear cut
communication with its citizenry during this entire situation In an interview,
Rajnath Singh ji said that Chinese have come into Indian territory in sizeable
numbers When the video went viral, some people began to shared it as an
admission by the Defense Minister So then PIB brought out a "fact
check" and the government denied it, saying that Rajnath Singh meant
something else and that he is being misinterpreted He merely meant that the
Chinese troops have reached the LAC -So the BJP leadership of India is not able
to take some stern steps but it does not want to show the public that it is
adopting some other ways in front of China and this is why, they have
maintained right from the start that China has done nothing at all They say
that China merely occupied a small portion of the disputed are for a while,
after which they left The tune that Pakistan adopted during the surgical
strikes and during the time of Balakot, that India said nothing. They're merely
lying that they came Similarly, the BJP leadership is adopting the same
approach against China right now That they never came China has trespassed into
the Indian soil as of now -So India is doing the same thing with China, which
Pakistan did with India back then -India is doing the same thing with China.
This leadership, in a way, is forfeiting its own territory Some experts believe
that not telling everything to the citizens is a good strategy by the
government Otherwise, it would lead to a lot of pressure being mounted on the
government from the opposition and the people to take action in one direction
If the government does not divulge a lot of information to the people, then it
would have more available options of how to address the situation.
Maybe they would want to let go off an area
But if they let the public know, there is so much nationalist sentiment within
the people today that they would they take the government to task It would then
mount pressure upon the government to retaliate to China in the same manner
that it adopts for example, the surgical strike in Pakistan that we talk about
but on the other hand some experts like Lt. Gen. H S Panag maintain that if the
government is denying this information to the public, then it is basically
playing into the hands of China What do you think here? Is the government's
decision to give out no clear cut information to the public a correct one?
Write down your opinions in the comments below.
Why is China making such intrusions in India?
There are many different theories for this by
different experts Some say that China is inculcating nationalist sentiments
within its own country in order to divert the attention of the people from the
state of the economy which has crashed due to COVID 19 Others deny this and say
that the reason is that China is threatened by the the road India is
constructing and China wants the construction of the road to stop and India is
denied the strategic advantage that it would otherwise get -What do you think
are the reasons for the Chinese to behave like this? One reason is stated to be
the DSDBO road China is doing this to stop the construction of this road
-Impeding the road construction is an instrument,an advantage, a military tool
that they have got But why they want to stop the construction of the road is
extremely important In my opinion and according to many experts, when India
changed the status of Kashmir on 5th Aug last year and changed the status of
Ladakh as well When it was made into a union territory by India from being a
portion of the state of Jammu and Kashmir and when it was said that Aksai Chin-
which has been occupied by China is also a part of it, This made China feel
that India is unilaterally changing the status of this entire area And this was
not at all liked by them And now they want to show that if you can change the
status unilaterally, so can we -But will not doing this affect them
geo-politically? As it is, a lot of countries in the world are against China at
the moment regarding the Corona virus situation and due to other reasons as
well. UK is also against it due to what's happening in Hong Kong So will it not
backfire on China to be at loggerheads with all the countries? -China is
basically trying to show that it is a global power And that they will resort to
arbitrariness if they so wish to and they can do so on many fronts Gone are the
days of fighting only on one front, of it not being able to fight with India if
a fight with Vietnam is on Right now, China believes that it is the kind of
super power that it can pursue Chinese interests on multiple fronts
simultaneously So China is in a very arrogant mind-frame right now And India,
which is a quite powerful and stable country, China is also trying to display
that India cannot meddle with it and that they can take steps against India if
they so wish to -So a final question- What do you think will be the solution of
the talks that have been held? Or what solution has been chalked out, as per
your sources? My sources say that China is still behaving boisterously and that
it is not ready to take even a single step backwards They maintain that the
land that they have occupied is Chinese territory And that it has always been
Chinese territory and it will always remain so I'd like to give you a small
update that came in yesterday, while I was making this article Some of our
media channels posted that the Chinese troops have retreated 2.5 kms from the
Galwan Valley and that they have disengaged themselves ANI posted this and said
that the source of this information came from "top government
sources" So I asked Ajay Shukla ji on the phone about what his opinion
regarding this was And he said that this claim was not correct according to him
and if it does anything, it only proves that there was a Chinese intrusion -So,
do you think there will be more talks in the coming future? and this situation
is still stuck in the same place that it was before, you've raised a very
interesting point.
The talks that are ongoing are happening on
many levels Our ambassador is in talks with the Chinese foreign Ministry in our
embassy in Beijing A border mechanism has been prepared by both the sides to
resolve any border disputed that arise Talks are also happening on the border
mechanism front And finally, there is a military to military talk as well The
government is attempting to keep the spotlight on the military to military
talks so that they can foist the blame on the military later But there are
talks ongoing on all three levels- diplomatic, military and political It is yet
to be seen what progress will be made and on what level Chants of "boycott China/Chinese products/Chinese
apps" have sparked up again during these tensions. How can this be
implemented and how successful can boycotting China from India be We will talk
about this in a future article.
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