Nobody in India seems to be aware of when the Chinese Claim line of 1960 was redrawn to include Depsong Plains as part of China. Also, there is no publicly available information on whether any note was sent to China protesting such unilateral changes to the 1960 Claim line
The India-China border has drawn much attention, especially in India, in recent times because of the spate of Chinese incursions into Indian territory. However, as a recent reply in the Rajya Sabha, in response to a question on transgression into Indian territory by China, made it clear “There is no commonly delineated line of Actual Control (lAC) between India and China. There are areas along the border where India and China have differing perception of lAC. Transgressions occur on account of both sides undertaking patrolling up to their perception of the lAC.” However this does not mean that all alleged incursions occur because of differing perceptions of the lAC.
Before analysing further the nature of these incursions, one needs to be clear about the undefined boundary lines between India and Chinas. First there are the boundary lines claimed by both as their international border with the other. Boundary disputes arise when there is a difference between these two lines and each claims the land as part of its territory. Hostilities have broken out between the two countries resulting in ceasefire violations. Then there is another pair/set of boundary lines, the so-called lines of Actual Control (lAC) between the two countries. These are the boundary lines up to which each side claims control through military patrol and other such exercises. When these two artificial lines are the same, these are referred to as lOC (line of Control) as the one between India and Pakistan in the disputed territory of Kashmir. When these artificial lines differ i.e. there is no agreed lAC and there is still overlap between the territories claimed as being under control, it aggravates dispute which may or may not result in military confrontation or war as the two sides will agree to disagree allowing for further negotiations on an agreed lAC and differ to resolve peacefully any alleged incursion that may take place in each other’s territory.
This is the environment under which India and China manage their conflicting territorial claims. However, there is an important distinction in the India-China case. Neither side has revealed to the other side what it claims as its lAC! In 1996, the two countries signed an agreement on “Confidence Building Measures in the Military Field along the line of Actual Control in the India-China Border Areas.” Although Article 10 of this Agreement stated that “The two sides agree to speed up the process of clarification and confirmation of the line of Actual Control”, even the initial step of this process — clarifying the alignment of the line of Actual Control in those segments where they have different perceptions — is yet to begin. This is primarily because of the reluctance and intransigence of China, which has so far refused to indicate what it considers its lAC to be. Consequently, India being unable to locate China’s lAC has to go by its own lAC, which results in the two sides confronting each other on some occasions during their patrol activities.
In that formal sense the Indian Government’s reply to the Upper House of Parliament was correct. However, the situation changes dramatically when the forces of one side intrude into the territory of the other, as defined by its own definition of its international boundary with the other.
Here one encounters certain problems with Chinese behaviour. The Chinese have been quite free with their interpretation of their perception of the international boundary between India and China. Then Chinese Premier Mr Chou En-lai gave an “official map” to Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru in 1959. However, when encounters began to take place in the late 50s, the Chinese claimed that these maps were interim maps, as their regime had not consolidated itself in China.
In order to lay to rest any future disputes, at their meeting in April 1960 Premiers Nehru and Chu En-lai agreed that “Officials of the two Governments should meet and examine, check and study all historical documents, records, accounts, maps and other material relevant to the boundary question, on which each side relied in support of its stand, and draw up a report for submission to the two Governments. This report would list the points on which there was agreement and the points on which there was disagreement or which should be examined more fully and clarified. This report should prove helpful towards further consideration of these problems by the two Governments.”
The officials nominated by the two Governments held 47 meetings over a period of six months from June 15, 1960 to December 12, 1960 in three capitals — Delhi, Beijing and Rangoon. During these meetings both sides asked for and received clarifications on the coordinates of the boundary claimed by the other. The Government of India published the “Report of the Officials of the Governments of India and the Peoples’ Republic of China on the Boundary Question” in 1961. This gives the most detailed and authentic claim of the Chinese on what they perceived to be the historical boundary between India and China. This came to be known as the Chinese Claim line of 1960. This Claim line included far more territory that India had claimed as its own than the “official map” that Premier Chou En-lai had given to Prime Minister Nehru in 1959! The Indian “claim line”, so to speak, has remained unaltered all through this period. Since neither India nor China is reported to have further advanced its territorial claims, it is reasonable to presume that the China’s Claim line of 1960 should be still valid today.
This is where difficulties begin to manifest themselves. Although there does not seem to have been any further exchanges of official maps between the two sides, as confirmed by Indian officials, the current Chinese claim line as shown in recent official Chinese maps extends further into Indian territory beyond the 1960 Claim line. This is true in all sectors — western, central and eastern — delineating India-China border.
As far as known to this writer, nobody in India seems to be aware of either when the Chinese Claim line of 1960 was redrawn to include Depsong plains as part of China or when they became aware of such a change. There is no publicly available information on whether any note was sent to China protesting such unilateral changes to the 1960 Claim line. What is clear, however, is that the April 2013 Chinese incursion into Depsong plains was a clear intrusion into the Indian territory even by Chinese admission as per the exchanged Claim line in 1960.
This physical aggression was only a manifestation of the cartographic aggression that had been carried out by China for years. It is not surprising, therefore, to find that Chinese are reluctant to share either their final official Claim line of their perception of lAC, as this gives them the freedom to engage in further cartographic aggression leading to physical confrontation.
(The writer is Consulting Fellow, IDSA, New Delhi)