Although the Indian Minister of Defence has denied it, the local officials in Ladakh, in the state of Jammu and Kashmir (J&K), have arrived at the conclusion that during the last 20 to 25 years the country has lost a “big chunk” of land to the Chinese along the Line of Actual Control (LAC), the line that separates India with the illegally occupied Indian territory by the Chinese. It was a finding of the Ladakh district administration, in association with the Army and the Indo-Tibetan Border Police, the organisations which man the LAC. They concluded “We are withdrawing from the LAC and our area has shrunk over a period of time”. Stating that the “The Chinese are pushing us back from our own territory” the note suggested that the boundary question “should be settled once for all”.
Obviously, the survey was carried out as a sequel to several instances of Chinese aggressive posturing on the LAC last year. Two Chinese choppers violated the Indian airspace and buzzed the village of Demchok in Ladakh. The Chinese even objected to construction of a road up to the village which is well within the LAC. The J&K Government, apparently, feeling a little unsure of the entailing consequences, promptly stopped the work.
Then again, Chinese troops breached the unmanned border and intruded 1.5 kilometres deep into Indian territory in the Chumar sector east of Leh, and painted “China” on stray rocks and boulders. The Indian border patrol discovered the signs of Chinese intrusions last July. Sniffing a story to catch the Government on the wrong foot, the media went on an overdrive, with the electronic media telecasting pictures of the boulders with “China” writ large on them in Cantonese. Keen to bring down the temperature, the India’s defence establishment played down the reports of incursions.
Similar reports had earlier emanated from the eastern sector of the India-China border. However, in October 2009 it was a different ball game on display. Indian Prime minister, Dr. Manmohan Singh happened to visit Arunachal Pradesh, a state that borders Tibet the status of which the latter holds in dispute. His visit, essentially for canvassing for elections to the state legislative assembly, brought forth a virtual torrent of undiplomatic verbiage. Expressing its “strong dissatisfaction” over Dr. Singh’s visit to the state, China demanded India to address its “serious concerns and not trigger disturbances in the disputed region so as to facilitate the healthy development of China-India relations”. The whole thing was quite inexplicable as Dr. Singh was not the first Prime Minister of India to have visited the state.
This was not all. Even the visit of Dalai Lama to Tawang in Arunachal Pradesh early in November 2009 came in for adverse notice of the Chinese. Their Foreign Ministry issued a strong statement expressing dissatisfaction over the permission given by the Indian Government to the Tibetan leader to visit Tawang and its spokesperson branded Dalai Lama as “anti China” merely because he visited the monastery located therein. The more than three centuries old monastery is one of the biggest outside Lhasa. Dr. Singh clarified that the Tibetan spiritual leader was an honoured guest in India and was free to travel anywhere within the country. Latter’s visit to Tawang, however, sent the mercury soaring in China.
Mild-mannered as he is, Dr. Manmohan Singh, made a mention of the recent Chinese belligerence during his state visit to Washington in November 2009 with his characteristic mildness. While addressing a US think tank, he pointed out that India had taken note of a “certain amount of assertiveness” on the part of China lately. He went on to say that he did not “fully understand” the reasons for the recent Chinese actions.
Some Indian China-watchers say that the Chinese cussedness in so far as India is concerned is Dalai Lama-centric, that is, they are annoyed with India for having given asylum to the Tibetan spiritual leader. It seems, during his Delhi visit in 1956 Zhou Enlai, the then premier of the People’s Republic of China, gave a very broad hint to his Indian counterpart, Jawaharlal Nehru, that any Indian assistance to the Tibetan leader would be treated as an unfriendly act. The continued rebellion in Tibet in the early 1950s perhaps gave the Chinese a hunch that Dalai Lama would eventually seek assistance from India. And, when India played host to Dalai Lama in 1959, Mao is reported to have ticked off India as an enemy. That, perhaps, explains the Chinese policy of keeping the Indo-Chinese border on the boil even after China resolved its land border disputes with 12 of its neighbours, including Russia, North Korea and Vietnam despite brief skirmishes with each.
That apart, one has to reckon with the Chinese irredentism. According to Michael Richardson, a former editor of International Herald Tribune, China is the leading proponent of irredentism and it lays claims on vast territories – both land and maritime – on grounds of vague ethnicity. Claims against India, substantial as they seem to be, are perhaps receiving special treatment.
Bill Powell, writing in Time magazine (August 10, 2009) said that with its growing economic importance China has increasingly “started throwing its weight around”... and “push other governments to see things China’s way”. From India’s viewpoint, that, perhaps, is a more accurate assessment of China. While it has been objecting to developmental activities within the LAC in Ladakh calling it disputed, China has merrily been carrying out infrastructural development on its side of the LAC as if that is not disputed. Worse, having gobbled up Aksai Chin in 1950s, China has occupied large swathes of land in Ladakh. One doesn’t know whether it is Chinese irredentism or Chinese expansionism?
Even if he does not understand the new Chinese “assertiveness”, Dr. Singh has to appreciate the fact that he is up against a bully. Playing down the Chinese aggressive posturing only betrays the softness of the Indian State. Dr. Singh, therefore, would do well to prepare the country to meet any eventuality vis-a-vis China. Its military unpreparedness, as was splashed all over recently, to meet the threats from its northern and western neighbours had alarmed the nation. The country needs to shore up its defences. True, it may not be possible to match the military might that the Chinese have built up over the last couple of decades but India can surely manage to develop enough deterrent capability to dissuade anyone from treating it as a push-over. There are enough resources available within the country. Dr. Singh only has to evolve a political consensus to clamp down on large-scale waste and rampant corruption, both at the Centre and in the states. The attitude towards corruption, particularly in the high places, has to change. Besides, decisive steps, as promised, to recover the billions of dollars illegally stashed away in tax havens abroad are urgently needed.
If the country is economically and militarily strong none would ever think of messing with it.
(Published by Indian News & Features Alliance, New Delhi, on 22nd January 2010 under the title "Halt Chinese push-over"
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