A democratically elected government needs to take its citizens into confidence about moves that have deep consequences
Two weeks after the surprise announcement of an India-China détente, and a summit on the sidelines of the 16th BRICS Summit at Kazan on October 23, 2024 between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping sealed the deal, the exchange of sweets between soldiers of the Indian Army and the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) at the Line of Actual Control (LAC) indicated that the two sides are willing to put the bitterness of the past four years behind them. If indeed that is possible, then the two have much to discuss in terms of restoring peace at the border, reversing economic restrictions on each other, allowing investment, visas and direct flights, and boosting trade and other interactions between each other.
No template or clarity
Work to disengage the two armies at Depsang and Demchok has been declared completed, while troop de-escalation and de-induction along the LAC still need to be agreed upon and will require verification on the ground and using satellite images. There is, however, no template of the agreement. Nor has the government given details of the new “patrolling arrangements” it has agreed to. Reports that the PLA has been granted access at Yangtse, the area on the Arunachal Pradesh boundary where it had attempted to transgress in 2022, have also not been explained by the government. Unfortunately, this lack of clarity is now part of a pattern.
From the start, when this daily had reported violent clashes at Pangong Tso on May 5-6, 2020, the government had erroneously maintained that there was no change in earlier troop levels. After the Galwan clashes, again of 2020, that left 20 Indian soldiers dead following brutal hand to hand combat using sticks and cudgels, Mr. Modi’s comment on June 19, 2020, that “no one has transgressed India’s borders, nor had any Indian border post been taken”, raised more questions than answers. The statement, that has never been updated, was followed only by an interview Mr. Modi gave in May 2024 in which he said that the situation was a concern and that he hoped they could resolve the LAC standoff at the earliest. Nevertheless the impression has persisted that Chinese troops have pushed Indian troops further back into Indian territory, denying patrolling rights to soldiers and grazing rights to civilians, and had entrenched themselves in the disputed area with bunkers, helicopter landing pads and tents or settlements. With the buffer zones now created in different areas of disengagement, a full return to status quo ante 2020 is virtually impossible unless the zones are dismantled.
Going forward, it is necessary to answer three basic questions. Are the patrolling arrangements agreed to, new? In which case, will India and China now update past protocols as well as the Border Defence Cooperation Agreement of 2013 to reflect the reality of a new status quo? How does India avoid its fate after the Doklam agreement of 2017, where after disengagement, Chinese troops doubled down on infrastructure on the Doklam plateau upto the tri-junction area, making a return to their forward positions much easier at a later date? The most perplexing question that is still unanswered and which must be studied further is: why did Chinese troops amass and transgress along the LAC in 2020 at all?
Theories on Chinese actions
While the government has been consistent in stating that it does not know the answer to that question, scholars have propounded at least four theories in the past few years. The first, that this is part of a larger Chinese policy, announced by Mr. Xi in 2014, to control “every inch of territory” belonging to China. This has led to aggressive moves by the Chinese military in several theatres: with Taiwan, with maritime shoals in the South China Sea; Doklam with Bhutan, and on the Tibet-India LAC in Ladakh, Sikkim, Doklam and Arunachal Pradesh. The second, that is a reminder from Beijing that as close as the partnership between India and the United States gets in the maritime sphere, India’s continental realities including a 3,500 kilometre boundary with China will always be a primary concern. The third relates to a Chinese pushback against the increased infrastructure construction by India, beginning with the operationalisation of the air strip at Daulat Beg Oldie (DBO) in 2008, to roads, bridges and border villages. China’s specific security vulnerabilities over Xinjiang as well as plans to connect Tibet-Xinjiang by a railway line and the G695 highway through Aksai Chin, and the start of a Karakoram-2 Highway to Pakistan-occupied Kashmir are further reasons for this theory. It is another matter that if this was a Chinese goal, it backfired as India has sped up its construction of highways, tunnels and border villages on its side of the LAC more than ever before in the past five years.
While all three theories could, individually or together, account for China’s actions, it is the fourth theory that possibly accounts for the timing of the PLA’s deliberate moves across four points of the LAC in April-May 2020 — that is, as a reaction to India’s moves to reorganise Jammu and Kashmir in August 2019. These were followed by Union Home Minister Amit Shah’s assertion in Parliament that India would take back Aksai Chin from Chinese occupation. It should be remembered that in the aftermath of the moves of August 5, 2019, China was the only country to issue two separate statements of protest — one dealing with the change of status quo and United Nations resolutions in Jammu-Kashmir, and the second, in more stern language, dealing with the changes in Ladakh that Beijing called “Chinese territory” and warning India against “any move that may further complicate the boundary question”. Within a week, India’s External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar hot footed to Beijing to explain the inherently “internal” nature of the changes which did not change India’s external boundaries or negotiations. He also invited Mr. Xi for the retreat in Mamallapuram, Tamil Nadu, a month later, among the last of 18 formal Modi-Xi meetings in five years, until their meeting this year in Kazan. The third Chinese response, in November 2019, was to the publication of new Indian maps delineating the boundaries, which may well have been the lynchpin for the timing of China’s subsequent actions — amassing along the LAC and transgressing into Indian territory as soon as the snows melted along the LAC.
It is therefore significant that the agreement with China last month came after three other détentes. The first was the holding of elections in Jammu and Kashmir, which is expected to be followed by the roll-back to Statehood status, as well as possibly a reversal in terms of more powers transferred to the State. The next was the détente with Ladakhi protesters led by climate activist Sonam Wangchuk, who ended their mass hunger fast on an assurance by the Home Ministry that a high-powered committee would discuss their demands for Statehood, tribal status, employment guarantees for locals, and Parliament seats for Leh and Ladakh, with a meeting set for December. Finally, there was the opening with Pakistan, through Mr. Jaishankar’s visit to Islamabad to attend the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) conference in October. While no substantive agreements were made, Mr. Jaishankar’s presence in person by itself was the message, given that the Modi government has handled other such SCO Ministerial meetings virtually. It remains to be seen whether the next few months will see other openings, including a rollback by Pakistan of trade, rail and road link bans that it implemented in 2019.
Need for government transparency
If there is a larger purpose to restoring sustainable peace and tranquillity at the India-China border, then New Delhi must begin by restoring some transparency to its plans for the future of the ultra-sensitive sub-region at its northern peripheries. A thorough enquiry of events at the LAC, and the lessons learnt from China’s unexpected transgressions and India’s response, are merited. Domestically, it may be time to acknowledge that the “shock and awe” method of surprise announcements has run its course, whether it is in terms of escalation or de-escalation. While a one-party rule hegemonistic entity such as China may choose a different path, it behoves a democratically elected government to take its citizens into confidence about moves that have such deep consequences.
The LAC agreement, the détentes and the questions
A democratically elected government needs to take its citizens into confidence about moves that have deep consequences
Two weeks after the surprise announcement of an India-China détente, and a summit on the sidelines of the 16th BRICS Summit at Kazan on October 23, 2024 between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping sealed the deal, the exchange of sweets between soldiers of the Indian Army and the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) at the Line of Actual Control (LAC) indicated that the two sides are willing to put the bitterness of the past four years behind them. If indeed that is possible, then the two have much to discuss in terms of restoring peace at the border, reversing economic restrictions on each other, allowing investment, visas and direct flights, and boosting trade and other interactions between each other.
No template or clarity
Work to disengage the two armies at Depsang and Demchok has been declared completed, while troop de-escalation and de-induction along the LAC still need to be agreed upon and will require verification on the ground and using satellite images. There is, however, no template of the agreement. Nor has the government given details of the new “patrolling arrangements” it has agreed to. Reports that the PLA has been granted access at Yangtse, the area on the Arunachal Pradesh boundary where it had attempted to transgress in 2022, have also not been explained by the government. Unfortunately, this lack of clarity is now part of a pattern.
From the start, when this daily had reported violent clashes at Pangong Tso on May 5-6, 2020, the government had erroneously maintained that there was no change in earlier troop levels. After the Galwan clashes, again of 2020, that left 20 Indian soldiers dead following brutal hand to hand combat using sticks and cudgels, Mr. Modi’s comment on June 19, 2020, that “no one has transgressed India’s borders, nor had any Indian border post been taken”, raised more questions than answers. The statement, that has never been updated, was followed only by an interview Mr. Modi gave in May 2024 in which he said that the situation was a concern and that he hoped they could resolve the LAC standoff at the earliest. Nevertheless the impression has persisted that Chinese troops have pushed Indian troops further back into Indian territory, denying patrolling rights to soldiers and grazing rights to civilians, and had entrenched themselves in the disputed area with bunkers, helicopter landing pads and tents or settlements. With the buffer zones now created in different areas of disengagement, a full return to status quo ante 2020 is virtually impossible unless the zones are dismantled.
Going forward, it is necessary to answer three basic questions. Are the patrolling arrangements agreed to, new? In which case, will India and China now update past protocols as well as the Border Defence Cooperation Agreement of 2013 to reflect the reality of a new status quo? How does India avoid its fate after the Doklam agreement of 2017, where after disengagement, Chinese troops doubled down on infrastructure on the Doklam plateau upto the tri-junction area, making a return to their forward positions much easier at a later date? The most perplexing question that is still unanswered and which must be studied further is: why did Chinese troops amass and transgress along the LAC in 2020 at all?
Theories on Chinese actions
While the government has been consistent in stating that it does not know the answer to that question, scholars have propounded at least four theories in the past few years. The first, that this is part of a larger Chinese policy, announced by Mr. Xi in 2014, to control “every inch of territory” belonging to China. This has led to aggressive moves by the Chinese military in several theatres: with Taiwan, with maritime shoals in the South China Sea; Doklam with Bhutan, and on the Tibet-India LAC in Ladakh, Sikkim, Doklam and Arunachal Pradesh. The second, that is a reminder from Beijing that as close as the partnership between India and the United States gets in the maritime sphere, India’s continental realities including a 3,500 kilometre boundary with China will always be a primary concern. The third relates to a Chinese pushback against the increased infrastructure construction by India, beginning with the operationalisation of the air strip at Daulat Beg Oldie (DBO) in 2008, to roads, bridges and border villages. China’s specific security vulnerabilities over Xinjiang as well as plans to connect Tibet-Xinjiang by a railway line and the G695 highway through Aksai Chin, and the start of a Karakoram-2 Highway to Pakistan-occupied Kashmir are further reasons for this theory. It is another matter that if this was a Chinese goal, it backfired as India has sped up its construction of highways, tunnels and border villages on its side of the LAC more than ever before in the past five years.
While all three theories could, individually or together, account for China’s actions, it is the fourth theory that possibly accounts for the timing of the PLA’s deliberate moves across four points of the LAC in April-May 2020 — that is, as a reaction to India’s moves to reorganise Jammu and Kashmir in August 2019. These were followed by Union Home Minister Amit Shah’s assertion in Parliament that India would take back Aksai Chin from Chinese occupation. It should be remembered that in the aftermath of the moves of August 5, 2019, China was the only country to issue two separate statements of protest — one dealing with the change of status quo and United Nations resolutions in Jammu-Kashmir, and the second, in more stern language, dealing with the changes in Ladakh that Beijing called “Chinese territory” and warning India against “any move that may further complicate the boundary question”. Within a week, India’s External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar hot footed to Beijing to explain the inherently “internal” nature of the changes which did not change India’s external boundaries or negotiations. He also invited Mr. Xi for the retreat in Mamallapuram, Tamil Nadu, a month later, among the last of 18 formal Modi-Xi meetings in five years, until their meeting this year in Kazan. The third Chinese response, in November 2019, was to the publication of new Indian maps delineating the boundaries, which may well have been the lynchpin for the timing of China’s subsequent actions — amassing along the LAC and transgressing into Indian territory as soon as the snows melted along the LAC.
It is therefore significant that the agreement with China last month came after three other détentes. The first was the holding of elections in Jammu and Kashmir, which is expected to be followed by the roll-back to Statehood status, as well as possibly a reversal in terms of more powers transferred to the State. The next was the détente with Ladakhi protesters led by climate activist Sonam Wangchuk, who ended their mass hunger fast on an assurance by the Home Ministry that a high-powered committee would discuss their demands for Statehood, tribal status, employment guarantees for locals, and Parliament seats for Leh and Ladakh, with a meeting set for December. Finally, there was the opening with Pakistan, through Mr. Jaishankar’s visit to Islamabad to attend the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) conference in October. While no substantive agreements were made, Mr. Jaishankar’s presence in person by itself was the message, given that the Modi government has handled other such SCO Ministerial meetings virtually. It remains to be seen whether the next few months will see other openings, including a rollback by Pakistan of trade, rail and road link bans that it implemented in 2019.
Need for government transparency
If there is a larger purpose to restoring sustainable peace and tranquillity at the India-China border, then New Delhi must begin by restoring some transparency to its plans for the future of the ultra-sensitive sub-region at its northern peripheries. A thorough enquiry of events at the LAC, and the lessons learnt from China’s unexpected transgressions and India’s response, are merited. Domestically, it may be time to acknowledge that the “shock and awe” method of surprise announcements has run its course, whether it is in terms of escalation or de-escalation. While a one-party rule hegemonistic entity such as China may choose a different path, it behoves a democratically elected government to take its citizens into confidence about moves that have such deep consequences.
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